488 Memoir Sears Foundation for Marine Research 



spines) and (b) without. In the Atlantic each of these groups is represented by a single 

 well defined species, namely M. mobular (Bonnaterre) 1788** with tail spine and M. 

 hypostoma (Bancroft) 1831 without. A Mobula, whose specific identity cannot be deter- 

 mined because information is lacking as to the presence or absence of a tail spine, has 

 been pictured from the Island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic. ^^ The half dozen 

 species that have been named from the western Pacific-Indian Ocean region and from 

 the Hawaiian Islands appear similarly to be reducible to two: M.japanica (Miiller and 

 Henle) 1841 with tail spine and M. diahola (Shaw) 1804^8 without. 



One representative of the genus, Mobula lucasana Beebe and Tee-Van 1938," 

 which lacks a tail spine, has been described from the eastern side of the Pacific (Lower 

 California, probably the Gulf of California and Costa Rica as well). A spineless Mobula, 

 M. tarapacana Philippi 1892, has been reported also from Chile, but its relationship to 

 M. lucasana is problematical, for the old drawing on which the name was based was 

 evidently faulty. 



Key to North Atlantic Species 



I a. Tail with a spine (or spines). mobular (Bonnaterre) 1788, p. 495. 



lb. Tail without a spine. hypostoma (Bancroft) i83i,p. 488. 



Mobula hypostoma (Bancroft) 1831 



Lesser Devil Ray 



Figures 1 10, 113, 114 



Study Material. Four females, 550-1,070 mm wide, from: Brazil; New Smyrna 

 Beach, East Florida; and Cape Lookout, North Carolina ;88 in Harvard Museum of 

 Comparative Zoology. 



Distinctive Characters. The presence of cephalic fins gives to these Devil Rays so 

 characteristic an appearance that they could not be mistaken for any other batoid except 

 some other member of their own family. In the present case there is little danger of 

 this, for its smaller size and the position of its mouth on the under side mark it off at 

 a glance from the Giant Devil Ray, Manta birostris; the presence of teeth in its lower 

 jaw, easily felt if not seen, separates it from Ceratobatis; and its lack of a tail spine dis- 



84. Whitley (Aust. Zool., 8 [3], 1936: 185) uses the specific name edentula (Brunnich) 1768 for this species rather than 

 mobular (Bonnaterre) 1788. However, the dried head on which edentula was based seems more likely to have been 

 a Ceratobatis than a Mobula, for it was described as lacking teeth in the lower jaw and as having the upper dental 

 plate rough like the surface of a file ("Surficies limae instar scabra", Brunnich, Ichthyol. Massil., 1768: 6). Nothing 

 is known of its geographic origin, other than that it was in the Pisa Museum. 



85. RusseU, Fish. Coromandel, j, 1803: pi. 9 bis, ventral view. 



86. See Fowler (Bull. U. S. nat. Mus., 100 [13], 1941: 480) for synonyms and references for these. Garman (Mem. 

 Harv. Mus. comp. Zool., 36, 191 3 ; 450) classed M. diabola (Shaw) 1804 as a synonym of M. mobular of the eastern 

 Atlantic and Mediterranean, but Shaw definitely based his M. diabola on the Eereegoodee Tankee of Russell 

 (Fish. Coromandel, 1803: 5, pi. 9) from India. 



87. Zoologica N. Y., 23, 1938: 299, pis. 1-3. 



88. One catalogued as from DanviUe, Virginia (a locality far inland) probably was from Cape Lookout because it was 

 from the collection of the late R. J. Coles, whose extensive observations on elasmobranchs were made in that vicinity. 



