Sometimes referred to as “walking sharks” because of the way they use their pectoral fins to clamber over the substrate, epaulette sharks are small, nocturnal predators that inhabit shallow inshore reefs within the Coral Triangle of Indonesia, northern Australia, and Papua New Guinea (PNG). Not far from world-renowned Raja Ampat, PNG is blessed with its fair share of coral-encrusted reefs, crowded with tropical fishes and exotic invertebrate life.

Hexanchiformes is the tiny order of just one family and five species that includes sixgill and sevengill sharks with (as their name suggests) six or seven pairs of gill slits, as opposed to the five pairs that almost every other shark and ray has. Hexanchiformes also have just a single dorsal fin (most sharks and many rays have two), and the “ancient, dead-eye” look is perhaps enhanced by the lack of nictitating eye membranes.

Christmas week 2021 was a ridiculous time to fly to Costa Rica. Besides the inevitable holiday chaos, almost every flight south had been grounded by either arctic blizzards or Omicron.

Any rational photographer would have delayed the trip until travel was easier, but I am an “elasmo-holic;” if there is even a slim chance of photographing a new species of shark or ray, I will find a way to make it happen.