474 Memoir Sears Foundation for Marine Research 



that they obtain the mollusks chiefly by dislodging them from the bottom by stirring 

 motions of the pectorals, since their subrostral fins are so soft as to make it unlikely that 

 they plough up the mud or sand with these. During a period of early abundance near 

 New York it was recorded that "a shoal of Cow-noses roots up the salt water flats as 

 completely as a drove of hogs would do."^^ They progress rapidly by flapping motions 

 of the pectorals.*" When feeding on the flats they are described as swimming in compact 

 schools, whether in Florida waters" or in the northern part of their range during years 

 of abundance there (p. 474). But this particular Ray has not been reported as leaping 

 above the surface, as has its close relative Rhinoftera steindachneri in the Gulf of Cali- 

 fornia (p. 466). 



The few dated records for Cow-nosed Rays from Florida have been for winter and 

 spring, though they may be present there the year round; they have been described as 

 present throughout the year in North Carolina waters. ''^ But they reach the coast to 

 the northward as warm-season visitors only, the earliest recorded dates for them being 

 July 16 for New Jersey, June 20 for New York, and July 12 for Woods Hole, Mas- 

 sachusetts. September-October is the only period when they have been reported in 

 numbers in northern waters, and the latest dates are October 13-16 for the general 

 vicinity of Woods Hole (including Nantucket) and New Jersey. In North Carolinian 

 waters their young are produced in spring and summer, but in tropical-subtropical 

 latitudes this probably happens throughout the year. 



Numerical Abundance. Most of the published reports of the presence of Cow-nosed 

 Rays at one point or another along the United States Coast have been based on few 

 specimens. Near Cape Lookout, North Carolina, for example, where they appear to 

 occur more regularly than anywhere farther north, only 1 1 were taken during the sum- 

 mer of 1912; more than half a dozen are seldom seen in a season, and during some 

 years none at all, while only 20 were handled near Beaufort, North Carolina by a well 

 known ichthyologist during ten summers' work." For many years previous to 1934 the 

 pound nets in Sandy Hook Bay yielded less than 40 in any one season, and we have 

 heard of only one or two specimens being taken near Woods Hole, Massachusetts, 

 during the past 1 5 years. But it has long been known that they appear in far greater 

 numbers in some years and in some localities than is ordinarily the case. An incursion 

 of this sort appears to have taken place about 1 8 1 5, when they were described as visiting 

 the coast near New York "in numerous shoals,"" and similar events may have occurred 

 at intervals later in the 1 9th century for all that is known to the contrary. But it was not 

 until 1902 that another incursion was definitely reported, when 145 of them were taken 

 in a single day in the pounds at Menemsha Bight near Woods Hole, Massachusetts. 

 The third recorded instance was on September 12, 1932 when a single pound net in 



39. Mitchill, Trans. Lit. philos. Soc. N. Y., I, 1815: 479. 



40. For a vivid account of their mode of swimming as observed in the New York Aquarium, see Gregory (Bull. N. Y. 

 zool. Soc, j5, 1935: 129)- 



41. Personal communication from Stewart Springer. 42. Smith, N. C. geol. econ. Surv., 2, 1907: 47. 



43. Gudger, J. Elisha Mitchell Sci. Soc, 49, 1933: 76. 



44. Mitchill, Trans. Lit. philos. Soc. N. Y., j, 1815: 479. 



