Posted on 03/31/2011 1:47:39 PM PDT by Red Badger
Biologists have just discovered two new species of freshwater stingray in the Amazon rainforest, informally christening them "pancake stingrays" for their distinct IHOPian appearance (see below). Naturally, one of their first orders of business was to x-ray one of the specimens, the unearthly result you see above.
The two new species, Heliotrygon gomesi and Heliotrygon rosai, are quite large, though other stingray species in this family (comprised of freshwater stingrays from the New World tropics) can reach an unnerving five feet in diameter. The x-rayed specimen is a preadult male in the Heliotrygon gomesi species, found in the rainforest near Iquitos, Peru.
The biologists are particularly excited; the discovery of two new species of large fish shows that the Amazon has not nearly been fully explored or documented. Who knows what else is out there? We're still in awe of the x-ray, but we've been known to obsess over the innards of just about everything (organic or not).
Isn’t that x ray obscene?
Only if you’re a freshwater stingray of the opposite sex.................
Cool...
I hear they are tough to de-bone, before you cook them.
Beautiful and amazing! I am fascinated by rays. Incredible creatures.
They are definitely from another dimension. I, for one, welcome our new stingray overlords.
The guys that speared skate simply cut off the wings and tossed the
body back into the water.
I wonder how many “scallops” you could get out of that??? :)
Don't want to pick one up when you are shrimping on a small boat, though.
Mmmm . . . stingray pancakes!
Oh Swell, now we can have a bunny with a pancake stingray on its head!
I saw a freshwater stingray in a Florida river once. It was in a national park area and I asked the ranger about it, and he claimed not to know anything about freshwater stingrays. I also looked on the internet, and the only ones I could find were from South America. I still don’t know if it is native, or an invasive species someone dumped there.
My son was diving in the Chipola River in NW Florida, about 60 miles from the Gulf and saw a “sting ray”. He supposed it had just swum up the river.....didn’t mention that it could have been a freshwater ray.
I was thinking a pancake with a pancake on its head.
Stingrays tolerate brackish water pretty well......
It could have been a salt water species, but it was in the Ocala National Forest, 40 miles from the ocean, and the river is entirely spring fed. The ray was only a couple hundred yards from the spring.
That is odd. The only purely freshwater species I can find are in SE Asia, Australia and now South America. It may be a previously unknown species or someone dumped a specimen from overseas in the river, or it may be a saltwater species that wandered upriver and became acclimated to fresh water. They are quite common here in Choctawhatchee Bay which at times is more fresh than salt after heavy rains upstream in the north....
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