. Birds of other lands, reptiles, fishes, jointed animals and lower forms;. Zoology; Birds; Reptiles; Fishes. Photo by tf\ Sa SHOVEL-NOSED SKATE Knoivn alio as ike Halat'! Ray [AJ:IJird-i these its trivial name. All these rays, in fact, Iiave some form or other of formidable offensive and defensive appa- ratus. The Sting-ray has on its tail a fearful serrated dagger, 6 or 8 inches long in large examples; while the ToRi'ED( I- or Numb-fish has electric organs in the head, with the aid of whicli it can give a shock suffici en tl)'strong to paralyse tlie fishes on which it feeds. Two interesting
. Birds of other lands, reptiles, fishes, jointed animals and lower forms;. Zoology; Birds; Reptiles; Fishes. Photo by tf\ Sa SHOVEL-NOSED SKATE Knoivn alio as ike Halat'! Ray [AJ:IJird-i these its trivial name. All these rays, in fact, Iiave some form or other of formidable offensive and defensive appa- ratus. The Sting-ray has on its tail a fearful serrated dagger, 6 or 8 inches long in large examples; while the ToRi'ED( I- or Numb-fish has electric organs in the head, with the aid of whicli it can give a shock suffici en tl)'strong to paralyse tlie fishes on which it feeds. Two interesting peculi- arities of the ra}-s deserve notice in concluding this chapter. Tlie first is that their egg-purses, instead of attaching themselves with filaments to weeds and rocks, like those of the sharks, are provided with a sticky secretion which answers tlie same purpose of anchoring them in security from currents that would carry them out into deep, cold water. The second is the sexual difterence in the teeth, which are pointed in the male and flat in the female. Whether this difference in the teeth (which may be likened to that between the bills of the male and female fiuia-bird of New Zealand) indicates a corresponding difference in food, or, on the other hand, some co-operation between the sexes in procuring it, is an interesting question that our present slight knowledge of the habits of these fishes does not enable us to answer. y, attention must be drawn to the remarkable transformation which the breast-fins and tail have undergone. The former have developed into powerful swimming-organs, locomotion being effected by their undulator}- movements, instead of by similar move- ments of the whole bod\-, or by side-to-side motions of the tail, as in other fishes. Whilst the latter, no longer used in swimming, has either been reduced to a mere vestige, as in the HORNED Ox-RAY, or has become developed into a long and tapering "whip- lash," provided with a poison- spine.
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Photo credit: © The Book Worm / Alamy / Afripics
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecad, booksubjectfishes, booksubjectzoology
