Identification
Reaching a little over a metre in total length, with a rhomboid disc, fairly rounded wingtips and a short blunt snout. The back is sandy to olive-brown, scattered with many small, sharply defined dark spots. Watch where those spots stop: on this species they stay clearly inside the edge of the disc, leaving a plain unspotted border all the way round. That is the most reliable separation from the blonde ray, whose spotting runs right out to the margin. The hind part of each pectoral fin often also carries a ring of dark spots around a paler centre.
Behaviour & ecology
It favours sand and mud, typically between 20 and 120 metres, lying flat and still and often lightly dusted with sand. Crabs, shrimp and other crustaceans make up the bulk of its diet, supplemented with small bottom fish. Like its relatives it deposits its eggs in horny cases on the seabed.
In the Netherlands
Considerably less common than the thornback, and found mainly in the deeper southern North Sea. The species is not on the prohibited list, but it shares the slow life history that makes rays so sensitive to fishing pressure. VisScanner marks it for release. Support the whole disc when returning it and let it slide back flat into the water.
