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This morning Tony had students at Long Beach and I tagged along. We swam out for depth, and in about 7.5 metres of water – brittlestar country – we found this absolute beauty resting on the sand. Can you see what it is?
Giant short tailed sting ray
Tony and Kate have seen two rays so far this week – one in the wreckage on the Clan Stuart, and another near the yellow buoy at Long Beach. This one was further north, in fairly deep water. It let me film it for a while, and then got annoyed at my heavy (somewhat excited) breathing and left.
Too big to get all in one picture!
We generally see the rays starting in late October to early November – basking in the sand at Long Beach, and even hanging about in the shallow water near the slipway at Miller’s Point. It’s a fantastic experience to spot one.
According to Georgina’s book, these rays give birth to live young, about 40 centimetres across, and grow to about 2 metres across. The specimen we saw was at least 1.5 metres across. The young are born folded up like crepes, and unfold their wings as they enter the water. Short tail sting rays are thought to feed on sand-dwelling invertebrates, grinding up shells to get at the creatures inside. It must take a LOT of eating to keep a body that size going!
Raymond the ray
When our ray left, he stirred up a huge cloud of sand and then swam so low over Kate’s head that she had to lift her hand up to fend him off. I guess we can add rays to the list of creatures who don’t give way to divers!
The Two Oceans Aquarium housed a gorgeous giant short tailed sting ray called Olive, who passed away recently. She was magnificent, and loved to swim up the glass in the I&J Predator Exhibit where she was housed.
15 Comments
Sea life:Â Molluscs « Learn to Dive Today
15 Nov 2010 07:11 am
[...] creatures as not being that interesting – after all, we dive in order to see BIG things, like rays, sharks, fancy fish, and octopus. Kelp limpet at Fisherman's [...]
Touch or don’t touch? « Learn to Dive Today
22 Nov 2010 08:11 am
[...] I’ve been nibbled more than once by fish in the aquariums in Durban and Cape Town. I’ve watched a ray swim so close over fellow divers’ heads that they had to lift up their hands to fend it [...]
Zero to… HERO! « Learn to Dive Today
10 Dec 2010 08:12 am
[...] the ocean she encountered seals (she’s not a fan), giant short-tailed sting rays, hundreds of octopus, sevengill cowsharks, and her favourite friends – barehead [...]
Magazine: Submerge « Learn to Dive Today
11 Feb 2011 10:02 am
[...] crown of thorns starfish. Species Focus is on batoids (skates and rays). Unfortunately our own giant short-tailed stingray was [...]
Newsletter: 50 metres and Gordon’s Bay « Learn to Dive Today
09 Mar 2011 01:03 pm
[...] had three good days of diving last week and saw a huge ray, several cuttlefish, puffer fish, and of course the regular octopus. There have also been huge [...]
Eye to eye « Learn to Dive Today
17 Mar 2011 07:03 am
[...] to have their chin scratched or to sit in one’s hand. This photo is from one of my most memorable dives ever – it was an ordinary day at Long Beach with some of Tony’s students, but while they [...]
Bookshelf: The Art of Diving « Learn to Dive Today
26 Mar 2011 08:03 am
[...] on different sea creatures that have been demonised in literature and film – sharks, rays, octopus, moray eels – and shows how these perceptions are wrong. Michael Rutzen, South [...]
Newsletter: Seasons of the sea « Learn to Dive Today
13 Apr 2011 10:04 am
[...] fortunate enough to see tiny octopus, warty pleurobranchs spawning egg ribbons, klipfish mating, huge rays feeding and shysharks having a feeding frenzy. We visited the cowsharks, watched sadly as injured [...]
FAQ: Diving in Cape Town « Learn to Dive Today
25 May 2011 07:05 am
[...] cold waters of the Atlantic and the warmer waters of False Bay are host to countless fish species, giant sting rays, beautiful sea plants, and extremely diverse invertebrate life such as nudibranchs (colourful sea [...]
Diving in the I&J Predator Exhibit at the Two Oceans Aquarium « Learn to Dive Today
29 May 2011 07:05 am
[...] giant short tailed sting ray, Olive, was fascinating to watch (a video of her can be found here) but she sadly passed away late [...]
Newsletter: The rays are back « Learn to Dive Today
13 Oct 2011 10:10 pm
[...] Beach was 5-6 metres and the water 16 degrees. The ocean treated us to a display of the smallest short tailed stingray I have ever seen. Linda and James meeting some [...]
Magazine: Wired on ancient sharks « Learn to Dive Today
17 Oct 2011 07:10 am
[...] Ptychodus mortoni, which was up to 11 metres long and had flattened teeth, much like those of sting rays, suitable for crushing hard-shelled creatures. Its size makes it comparable to modern basking [...]
Newsletter: Spring diving « Learn to Dive Today
20 Oct 2011 08:10 pm
[...] as Long Beach has, with wonderful and weird creatures. I have seen devil rays, sharks, a John Dory, giant short tail stingrays, a snakelet, pipefish, cuttlefish, bobtail squid, toadfish, horsefish, seals, whales and dolphins [...]
Newsletter: Rays and rest | Learn to Dive Today
12 Jan 2012 07:01 pm
[...] weeks (as much as 23 degrees on the surface) and we’ve been thrilled to catch sight of the giant short-tailed sting rays that visit close inshore during the summer months. We saw our first ray of the season in mid [...]
Sea life: More giant short-tailed sting rays | Learn to Dive Today
22 Feb 2012 07:02 am
[...] means giant short tailed sting rays close to shore, at our most frequented dive sites in Cape Town. During winter these creatures [...]
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