Manta Madness

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Soaring on wings that cannot fly
scouring the sand for life
drifting over beds where treasures lie
living below the worldly strife
Michael R. Ault

In days gone by, mariners sailing the high seas caught sight of strange bat-like creatures flying through the water. These monsters reached up to 6m from wing-tip to wing-tip and their heads were topped with a pair of giant black or grey horns. The superstitious sailors named them ‘devil rays’ and steered well clear.

Today divers and snorkellers travel half way round the world to swim with these majestic creatures, which have now been renamed ‘manta rays’. Words cannot really describe the beauty of a manta as it twirls and dances through the shallows, they are as graceful as ballerinas but are wider than a lorry. Even the babies are large; the size of a 6 year old human!

The horns mentioned above, are twisted like rolls of blackened newspaper, sticking out from either side of a wide gaping mouth. The ray swims along and suddenly these rolls unwind to produce two flaps that look like the blades of a fan.

Imagine that you have two large shovels attached to your mouth. These shovels allow you to scoop up vast quantities of ice-cream, cake or what ever your heart desires. It may seem unlikely, but the flaps bordering the mouth of the mysterious manta ray are two such shovels. These scoops, also called cephalic lobes, channel large quantities of water laden with food, into its mouth, as the ray cruises the watery world. Tiny plankton, such as baby fish, crabs and worms make up the mainstay of the manta’s diet, maybe not as exciting as a tub of ice-cream but the ray seems to find them tasty enough! Once the manta finds a glut of food it feeds back and forth making the most of the feast. If the food is particularly concentrated it enters into a gymnastic series of barrel rolls. Like a acrobatic plane at a air show, the ray rotates over and over, each time filtering thousands of tasty morsels from the water.

Ancestors of the manta ray left the seabed and the lazy lifestyle of sting rays, which sit almost motionless on the bottom. Over time mantas have adapted to living up in the water, allowing them to ‘fly’ through the underwater world. The manta lacks the sting or barb characteristic of bottom dwelling sting rays, and although they are in same class as sharks their teeth are small like little pins and used solely in courtship.

So if you chance upon an massive underwater bat, don’t swim away, take the time to appreciate the beauty and grace of these marine dancers.

photos courtesy of Paul Markey and Luke Riley

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Comments

[pajama]

manta mantra
no dive no splash, no touch no flash, beautifully written... nice pictures too :)