Baby manta ray snowboard12/17/2023 The juvenile manta ray habitat is located in the Gulf of Mexico off Texas at NOAA’s Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary. ’18, and colleagues from NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries confirmed the world’s first known manta ray nursery. However, a graduate student at Scripps Institution of Oceanography recently made a discovery that could help unravel the mystery of juvenile mantas. Yet despite being so conspicuous, these gentle giants are notoriously hard to access and study, so major knowledge gaps remain in their basic biology, ecology and life history.Įven less is known about baby mantas, which are virtually absent from nearly all known manta populations around the world. These plankton-eating marvels can reach up to 23 feet in wingspan as adults. Gliding through the water with the slow hypnotic beat of their fins, the otherworldly manta rays are a perfect combination of size and grace. Schmahl/FGBNMS Sweet Baby Rays Alumnus uncovers first-known manta ray nursery Her fetal folds (birth wrinkles) were still visible, but they were a bit more stretched and had flattened out.Manta ray with diver at Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary. But we were even more thrilled to welcome her back at the viewing site in April 2022. Read more here about how manta rays get their official names! Five months later…Īfter a few sporadic sightings in November and December of 2021, Kamala Ray didn’t show herself in the first three months of 2022. Really, we had no choice but to call this baby manta ray “Kamala Ray”. (In 2017, we named a manta “Obama Ray”, and that is a fun story you don’t want to miss!) I admire Kamala Harris for her incredible leadership and breaking of the glass ceiling, and had been wanting to name a manta ray “Kamala” for a while so this was my chance! I was thrilled that the pup is a female, and really, had no choice but to call her “Kamala Ray”. Since the first couple of sightings took place in November and December of 2021, shortly after the US Presidential Election of 2020, when Kamala Harris became the first woman, the first Black American, and the first South Asian American to be elected vice president of the United States. We have enjoyed naming many manta rays over the years. Read more here about how to see the difference between a male and female manta! The Naming of the Baby Manta Ray This allowed us to identify the little manta as female. In order to do that, we looked for claspers (male parts) by the pelvic fins but couldn’t find any. Once we got over the surprise of meeting this tiny new manta ray, we wanted to check the sex and see if it’s a male or female manta. Picture of Kamala Ray (and her wrinkles) taken on November 23rd, 2021. She came so close, that we were able to take pictures of her fetal folds. We were overjoyed that the pup came incredibly close to us humans she was obviously new to the situation of feeding around the big lights at the manta ray viewing site. These crease marks were still showing on this “tiny” pup, and this was something that (to my knowledge) had never been reported on before about a live manta ray. Read all about the birth of manta ray babies (with pics and videos) on this page! The baby manta gets expelled from the mother with its pectoral fins folded behind its back (imagine: rolled up like a burrito), and so it makes sense that when the pup unfolds its wings to start swimming, there would be crease marks (aka fetal folds or birth wrinkles). This baby manta was about 2.5 feet.Īlthough manta rays are fish, their pups are born alive they only give birth to one pup at a time. Two days before Thanksgiving 2021, we were taking a group on a moonlight swim with manta rays when we saw a tiny manta.Īs far as manta rays can be tiny, of course: newborn reef mantas are usually around two to three feet (around 60-90 centimeters) from one fin tip to the other. In 2021, we had the privilege of meeting the smallest manta ray we’d ever seen – she must have been a newborn. But by observing manta ray mating rituals, the birth of a manta ray pup, and the pregnancy of individual manta rays (like the video footage we turned into Big Bertha’s pregnancy diary here), we’re learning more and more each year. It’s still unclear to us how baby manta rays develop, as it is hard to study ocean creatures this mysterious and elusive.
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