Fishes of the Western North Atlantic 487 



Not Anodon Agassi?,, Nom. Zool. Index, 1846: 24; emended spelling for I'Aodon massasa, Lacepcde 1798 

 (Hist. Nat. Poiss., 4° ed., in Buffon, Hist. Nat., l, 1798: 298); equals Squalus massasa Forskal 1775; 

 see above.'* 



Generic Characters. Mobulidae with mouth on lower surface and with teeth in both 

 jaws. Front of head wedge-shaped dorsoventrally, the anterior edge sharp. Cephalic fins 

 thin, leaf-like, directed obliquely forward and downward, very flexible; curved from 

 below outward in a subcylindrical roll when swimming, but unrolled and capable of 

 curvature inward when capturing planktonic prey (see p. 493). Dorsal fin at base of 

 tail opposite bases of pelvics. Pelvic fins extending but little beyond posterior corners 

 of pectorals. Mouth only a little posterior to front of head; articulation of jaw cartilages 

 so loose and skin so distensible that lower jaw, when opened, drops equally low across 

 width of mouth from corner to corner; gape subrectangular, about 1/4 to ^3 ^s deep 

 vertically as wide transversely and facing directly forward. Skin more or less roughened 

 with small spines. Lateral pinnations of free distal margins of adjacent branchial plates 

 separate, not fused as in Manta (pp. 482, 501). Characters otherwise those of the family. 



Size. One species, Mobula mohular of the eastern Atlantic, rivals and possibly 

 equals the breadth of the Giant Devil Ray {Manta).'''' At the other extreme, Mobula 

 diabola in Australian waters "grows to only a couple of feet wide."'^ Mobula hypostoma 

 of the western Atlantic matures at a width of about 3 1/4 feet, and we found no definite 

 record of a measured specimen wider than four feet (p. 493, footnote 99). 



Diet. The stomach contents of Devil Rays of this genus examined thus far have 

 consisted of small fishes or of either euphausiid- or mysid-like crustaceans, of which 

 large ones may contain several quarts." 



Range. Both sides of the Atlantic; Island of St. Helena 8" northward to the Mediter- 

 ranean, Portugal, and accidentally to southern Ireland in the east;*' Brazil to Cape 

 Lookout, North Carolina, and as a stray to the vicinity of New York in the west; Lower 

 California (perhaps Gulf of California and Costa Rica) and northern Chile*'' on the west 

 coast of America; Hawaiian Islands; western Pacific from Japan to southern Queens- 

 land; East Indian-Philippine-Malayan region in general; coasts of the Indian Ocean 

 from Bay of Bengal and Gulf of Oman to Madagascar, Natal, and the southeast coast of 

 Africa ;*3 also the Red Sea. 



Species. The members of the genus fall in two divisions : (a) with a tail spine (or 



76. The generic name Anodon had already been used by Oken (Lehrb. Naturg., j, Zool., i, 1815: 236) for moUusks; 

 by Smith (Zool. J., 4, 1829: 443) for reptiles; and by Wagler (Syst. Amphib., 1830: 34; not seen) for cetacea. 



77. See p. 496 for records of large specimens of M. mobular. 78. Whitley, Fish. Aust., i, 1940: 226. 



79. Bertolini, Boll. Soc. Biol, sper., 9, 1934: 1270; McGinitie, Copeia, 1947: 277. 



80. The Devil Ray from St. Helena, pictured in ventral view by Russell (Fish. Coromandel, I, 1803: pi. 9 bis), was 

 either a Mobula or a Ceratobatis, as shown by the position of its mouth. 



81. The capture of a Mobula off the south coast of Ireland about 1830 was reported nearly simultaneously by Thompson 

 (Proc. zool. Soc. Lond., 1835: 78) by Yarrell (Brit. Fish., 2, 1836: 446), and later by M'Coy (Ann. Mag. nat. Hist., 

 jp, 1847: 176, pi. 11). 



82. The Devil Ray reported from Chile as Cephaloptera ? tarucapana by Philippi (An. Mus. nac. Chile, Sec. i, Zool. 3, 

 1892: 8, pi. 3, fig. 2) appears to have been a Mobula, since the drawing shows its mouth on the lower surface. 



83. Mobula diabola has been reported recently from Port Alfred, S. Africa (Smith, Trans, roy. Soc. S. Afr., 30, 1943: 

 75; Sea Fish. S. Afr., 1949: 72). 



