Hobbies And Interests
Smooth Stingray
The world's largest stingray is the smooth stingray (or short-tail stingray). It is indigenous to South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Mozambique. It weighs more that 770 lbs., with a diameter of more than 6 feet and a length including its tail, of up to about 15 feet. The smooth stingray has a blue-gray or gray-brown coloring, with a small, front-positioned stinger and a larger, toxic stinger at the rear.
Southern Stingray
This especially flat, diamond-shaped ray, is a muddy-brown color. Its tail is barbed and venomous. It is indigenous to tropical and subtropical waters of the southern Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean. The southern stingray's disk is approximately 1.2 times broader than it is long.
Blue Stingray
This stingray has an unusually broad, curved front edge to its disk and a small, pointy snout. Its tail is relatively long at around double the length of its body. Running along the center of the body from snout to tail, are a row of small, prickly spines. This stingray is gray or brown in color, with a hint of violet. It is found in the warm waters of the Eastern Atlantic and in the Mediterranean. The blue stingray has a disk diameter of just under 3 feet.
Blue Spotted Ray
This stingray is very colorful. It has bright, blue spots on its greenish body. Its body is an oval, elongated disk shape, with blue side-stripes along the edges. At a maximum length of about 40 inches, this stingray is found in the Indo-West Pacific region, the Red Sea, East Africa, Japan, Solomon Islands and Australia.
Common Stingray
The common stingray has angles to its disk shape, giving it two, straight front edges, coming to a point at the snout. The width of its disk is only a little more than the length of its body. It has a pointy snout and a relatively long tail with a large spine one-third of the way along it. This stingray is a gray color, with hints of brown-red and olive green.
Little Stingray
Found in the north-western Atlantic, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico, the little stingray has a rounded outline to its pectoral fins. Its tail is unusually slender at the tip and has a prominent ridge fold along it. The little stingray's snout is triangular and pointy in shape and it has a spine that is very long and thin. Its coloring is yellow-brown and the disk measures about 20 inches in diameter.