Didn’t know skates grew this big!
Captain Mark Quartiano, a charter boat operator who also goes by “Mark the Shark,” is seen grinning next to his fearsome catch in an Instagram photo he posted over the weekend.
“I’ve caught one like it before, but never that size, not in the last 30 years I’ve been doing this,” Quartiano told ABC News. “It’s a very rare fish. It’s like a big gigantic whipping stingray. It’s a dinosaur.”The monster is better known as a Dactylobatus clarkii, a deep sea species also referred to as “hookskate” or “fingerskate.” It inhabits muddy sea depths of up to 1,000 feet.
This one measures in at around 14 feet, including the tail, and was caught in waters of about 500 feet deep, Quartiano said.
Cool!
However, on Monday, George H. Burgess of the Florida Museum of Natural History identified the creature as a roughtail stingray with the scientific name, Dasyatis centroura.
Via http://www.grindtv.com/outdoor/nature/post/enormous-rare-sea-creature-hauled-from-depths-by-florida-shark-fisherman/
Just thought you’d like the other opinion.
Can’t see a stinger on this one, looks awful skate-like to me. But my expertise is North Atlantic species.
Twitter explodes in anger in… 3… 2… 1…
(oops- didn’t happen)