Action for undulate rays
SCUBA MAGAZINE’ S MARCH 2019 ISSUE carried an article by Matt Doggett, Rays set to stun about The Undulate Ray Project. The Undulate Skate( to give it the more accurate name) remains a globally endangered species. Sealife Centres, with the support of the ICUN Conservation Planning Specialist Group cpsg. org / have taken the undulate skate under their wing, with the intention of creating a strategy to ensure the species remains viable and sustainable.
A workshop is being planned for September / October, to involve sharing current knowledge of the species and its status in British waters, identifying knowledge gaps, setting goals for managing the species and formulating plans to achieve those goals.
The outcome of the workshop will be a strategy document for the species, with clear timeframes and an agreed governance structure, to ensure this strategy leads to action where needed. Members of The Undulate Ray Project featured in the 2019
article are contributing to the framework, but if anyone else has any expertise please email billy @ undulateray. uk SHEILAH OPENSHAW
Visit the coastal cafe
Common prawn
Compass jelly
WHILE BUBBLING AWAY THE THOUGHT struck me, everything down here is feeding, except for me. I could see jellyfish, the ocean drifters with tendrils containing nematocysts, harpooning their prey as they passed. The nematocysts spring out like a rope being twisted, when you can see the fibers sticking out from the main strand. The prey is paralyzed, then passed to the main body and eaten.
On the sea floor prawns are like dustmen cleaning up debris and dead matter. Tompot blennies are hunters who select prey and dart out to feed, yet another method employed in the food chain.
Sea slugs have rhinophores on the body to track chemical trails, plus an external lung to extract oxygen from the water. Toxins derived from their diet keeps them safe from creatures which would otherwise eat them.
Bivalves such as mussels filter seawater. Taking the food from it, they also cleanse
Tompot blenny
the sea. Anemones have their food delivered to them on the current; the anemone’ s arms pick out organisms to eat. They move with all the breakneck speed of the British legal system … believe me, I’ ve watched it!
Such are the different methods of gathering and eating that we divers can see if we pause to observe them. It’ s like having your own supermarket underwater. With all this talk about food I think I’ ll go for a sandwich now. PAUL WINKLEY
Mussel bed
Plumose anemones
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