Yellow Stingray (Urobatis jamaicensis)

Commonly found in the warm tropical waters of the Caribbean, Western Atlantic, and the Gulf of Mexico, the yellow stingray spends most of its time in shallow inshore waters, foraging for food in flat sandy or muddy sediment near coral reefs, rocky structures or seagrass beds. The food they forage for is usually shrimp, small fish, clams and worms. Interestingly, not only do they swim along the bottom using their fins to stir up the bottom to catch any food they come across, but they also use a tactic in which they trick their prey into thinking that they are a small cave to hide beneath. They arch their bodies over the sand in a way that makes them appear like a nice hiding spot for fish, but when the fish swims beneath them they eat them right away! In addition to using the seagrass beds and sandy or muddy sediment to find food, they also use these areas as a place to hide from large predatory fish and sharks. The yellow stingray gracefully glides along the sea floor by undulating its body or flapping its sides like wings. Their markings help them to hide amongst the sediment in which they forage for food. To reproduce, the male yellow stingray will attach to the female by biting into her pectoral fin, midway down the margin, so that he can orient himself underneath her in an abdomen to abdomen position to deposit sperm and fertilize the female's eggs. The result of this reproduction is a liter size of 3-4 baby yellow stingrays. When the yellow stingray is born, it is typically 6 inches in length; once it grows into adulthood it reaches a total length of 24 inches (and a disc width of 12-14 inches), its tail making up about 12 inches of that length. Like other stingrays, the tail of the yellow stingray is highly poisonous and capable of inflicting a very painful wound - though this stingray is not aggressive and will probably only inflict a wound if it is stepped on or its tail is touched. 

 

 

Sources:

http://www.aquariumdomain.com/viewSpeciesMarine.php?id=209

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/gallery/descript/yellowstingray/yellowstingray.html