Undulate ray
Marble Ray (Raja undulata )
The marble ray (Raja undulata ) is a ray species of the North Atlantic and the western Mediterranean Sea, which is considered to be at risk due to the high fishing pressure.
Features
The marble rays reaches a body length of up to one meter. He has a typical skate flattened body. The muzzle is short and pointed ending, the pectoral fins are rounded and concave indented on the front while the rear edge is convex. The back side is gray to brown with dark and small white dots lined lines, the bottom is colored white.
The two almost equally long dorsal fins are located at the end of the caudal peduncle. On the top there are also bumps, which are located on the back line in a row.
Dissemination
The marble rays live on the seabed in the North Atlantic from the south coast of the British Isles to the Bay of Biscay, Algarve, Mauritania and Senegal, as well as in the Mediterranean and the Canary Islands.
Way of life
Like the majority of rays is also the marble rays, a benthic fish, which he is to be found in the shelf zone to depths of 200 meters on sand and mud bottoms. It feeds mainly on invertebrates such as crustaceans, molluscs and echinoderms.
The females lay between March and September from large, about nine inches long and two inches wide egg capsules with long horns at the corners.
Endangering
In the IUCN Red List of marble rays is due to the strong fishing pressure at which the ray is mainly bycatch as "endangered " (endangered ) classified. Here, the stocks of 1981-2003 have reduced by about 60 to 80 %.