Reef Manta
| Reef Manta | ||||||||||||
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Reef Manta ( Mobula alfredi ) |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Mobula alfredi | ||||||||||||
| ( Krefft , 1868) |
The reef manta ( Mobula alfredi , Syn .: Manta alfredi ) is a species of ray from the family of devil rays . It occurs in the Red Sea and the Indo-Pacific from South Africa to Hawaii , Japan and French Polynesia and, in contrast to the sometimes oceanic giant manta ray ( Mobula birostris ), only lives close to the coast. Reports of an occurrence in the Atlantic Ocean, in the Canary and Cape Verde Islands are based on confusion with another, possibly previously undescribed species of manta ray. In March 2013, the CITES Species Conservation Conference in Bangkok decided to regulate the trade in manta rays; the regulation came into force on September 14, 2014.
features
The reef manta, including its long, whip-like tail, grows to a maximum of five meters and thus remains smaller than the giant manta. The wingspan of the fins, which can reach a maximum of 5.5 meters, is 2.2 to 2.4 times as large as the length of the body disc. The tail, if still intact, can reach 120% of the length of the body disc. The top and bottom of the body disc are covered with small, knob-like placoid scales. Those on the ventral side are a little larger. The upper jaw is toothless, the lower jaw is covered with six to eight rows of small, triangular teeth. In a row there are 142 to 182 teeth next to each other, so that the total number of teeth is about 900 to 1500. The tail is thornless and without cartilage keels on the sides. In contrast, the top of the tail can have pits immediately behind the small, triangular dorsal fin.
Way of life
The reef manta only occurs near the coast, always only a few kilometers from the nearest land area or island. It lives near rocky and coral reefs , where plankton-rich water rises to the surface. Like all devil rays, it is ovoviviparous .
Systematics
The Reef Manta Ray was the Australian zoologist 1868 Gerard Krefft by the scientific name Deratoptera alfredi described and later the genus Manta assigned. The validity of this species, as well as all other described manta rays except for Manta birostris , was later questioned. In June 2008, the marine biologist Andrea Marshall reported for the first time at a specialist congress in Canada on new evidence for two species of manta ray. The second Manta species was assigned to Manta alfredi in the journal Zootaxa , an international journal for zoological taxonomy , and the validity of the species was thus restored. A third, Atlantic manta ray is provisionally called Manta sp. cf . called birostris . Since both the morphological and the genetic characteristics of the genus Manta lie within the range specified for the genus Mobula , the genus Manta was synonymous with Mobula in June 2017 , so the reef manta now has the scientific name Mobula alfredi .
literature
- Andrea Marshall, Leonard Compagno , Michael Bennett: Redescription of the genus Manta with resurrection of Manta alfredi (Krefft, 1868) (Chondrichthyes; Myliobatoidei; Mobulidae). Zootaxa (2009), Volume: 2301, Issue: 2301, Pages 1–28 ISSN 1175-5326 Abstract (PDF; 16 kB)
- Juliette Irmer: Manta rays, encounter of the second kind. In GEO , May 2011, Verlag Gruner and Jahr, ISSN 0342-8311
Web links
- Riffmanta on Fishbase.org (English)
- Mobula alfredi inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Threatened Species . Listed by: Marshall, A., Kashiwagi, T., Bennett, MB, Deakos, M., Stevens, G., McGregor, F., Clark, T., Ishihara, H. & Sato, K., 2011. Retrieved on September 17, 2013.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Cites resolution: Endangered shark and manta ray species should be protected Spiegel Online from March 11, 2013
- ↑ Species protection: These sharks must now be better protected by humans. The time of September 12, 2014
- ↑ William T. White, Shannon Corrigan, Lei Yang, Aaron C. Henderson, Adam L. Bazinet, David L. Swofford, Gavin JP Naylor: Phylogeny of the manta and devilrays (Chondrichthyes: mobulidae), with an updated taxonomic arrangement for the family. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2017, June, 1–26, DOI: 10.1093 / zoolinnean / zlx018