gargantuan manta beam of light are one of the world ’s most iconic and best - loved marine animals . However , due to their elusive nature , astonishingly trivial is known about what they eat .
A new study exhibit that instead of the gentle - giant , plankton - eating fish scientist had previously thought they were , elephantine manta rays are in reality abstruse - sea predators . This new information could be critical in helping sweat to protect these incredible creatures in the future tense .
The study , a collaborationism between the University of Queensland ( UQ ) , Australia , and theMarine Megafauna Foundation , began back in 2010 , and focalize on Isla de la Plata , off the Ecuador mainland , which host the world ’s largest assemblage of giant manta rays .
“ The previous noesis of giant manta ray diet was based on observations of feeding activeness on control surface piss zooplankton at well - bonk aggregation sites , ” chair researcher Katherine Burgess , a PhD bookman at UQ , say in astatement .
Normal process would be to study the subject matter of their stomachs , but such an invasive and potentially lethal procedure is dangerous to attempt with protect mintage . gargantuan manta light beam were listed as " vulnerable " on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’sRed List of Endangered Speciesback in 2011 .
rather , Burgess explained : “ We studied the giant manta beam of light ’ diet using biochemical trial , such as stable isotope analytic thinking , which function on the ‘ you are what you eat ’ paradigm . These tests can learn what animals have been eating by examining a piece of tissue from a muscle biopsy from a loose - swimming fauna . ”
The written report institute that even though rays are filter - feed brute , the bulk of their dieting actually comes from deep - sea sources rather than surface zooplankton . Their findings , publish in the journalRoyal Society Open Science , point that 73 percent of their diet was made up of fish and other animals from as deep as between 200 and 1,000 meters ( 650 and 3,280 feet ) under the surface .
The fear for conservationists now is that as fisheries exhaust the ocean open , they will expand their fishing to deeper waters , which could run to an increase in the numeral of rays either caught and killed accidentally or overfished .
" At nowadays , fisheries are progressively start for species found in deeper waters as airfoil stocks of other species deplete , ” Burgess say theBBC . “ As such , any sort of piscary pressure can have a spartan shock on populations , whether it be incidental or targeted . "
This could intend the giant manta irradiation ' protect status is in serious need of upgrading . Watch this infinite .
