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Rays, mantas, guitarfishes and torpedoes of Peru

Thirty-two rays from four different orders are recorded in the sea of Peru, from mantas several metres across to round rays barely twenty centimetres wide.

Published 8 November 2026

What rays are and which ones live in Peru

Rays are cartilaginous fishes with a flattened body and the gill slits on the underside of the head.¹ The updated checklist of chondrichthyans of the Peruvian sea gathers 115 species, 43 of them batoids.² Its authors caution that misidentifications at ports are common and that species-richness comparisons between countries need to be validated with voucher specimens.²

Mantas and devil rays, eagle rays and whiptail stingrays belong to the order Myliobatiformes.³⁴ Guitarfishes and sawfishes are grouped in Rhinopristiformes, electric rays in Torpediniformes and the bottom-living skates that lay egg capsules in Rajiformes.⁵⁶⁷⁸ Sawfishes look like sharks, but they are rays.⁹

Among the rays of Peru there are tropical species that arrive from the north and temperate ones that arrive from the south: the giant electric ray (Narcine entemedor) ranges from the Gulf of California to northern Peru,¹⁰ while the Chilean eagle ray (Myliobatis chilensis) lives in the temperate waters of the Humboldt Current, between Chile and Peru.¹¹ The electric ray Discopyge tschudii is found, on the Pacific side, from Peru to southern Chile.¹²

Mantas and devil rays (Mobulidae)

Five rays of the family Mobulidae are recorded in Peru: Mobula birostris, Mobula mobular, Mobula munkiana, Mobula tarapacana and Mobula thurstoni.¹³ The giant manta, Mobula birostris, is the largest: according to the data compiled in a 2019 paper, its disc reaches at least 670 cm across.¹⁴ The group living off Ecuador and northern Peru is probably the largest known population in the world.¹⁵

Of the five satellite tags fitted off Tumbes in 2018, three sent data: two mantas stayed on or near the continental shelf, moving between the coast of Tumbes and that of Ecuador, and the third headed into the open ocean and reached the Galápagos, some 1300 km away.¹⁶ A female with a 621 cm disc tangled in a net near Acapulco, Tumbes, in September 2017 carried a 137 cm female fetus, and the authors suggest that the north coast of Peru could be a breeding area.¹⁴

Devil rays of the genus Mobula have the mouth on the underside of the head, unlike the mantas, whose mouth is subterminal.¹⁷ Mobula thurstoni reaches about 220 cm across and, in the Gulf of California, eats almost nothing but one small crustacean, the euphausiid Nyctiphanes simplex.¹⁸¹⁷ Mobula tarapacana is an oceanic animal: individuals fitted with satellite transmitters in the central North Atlantic dived to almost 2000 m.¹⁹ Between 2013 and 2023, Mobula mobular dominated Peruvian landings of mobulid rays, with 3152 tons, 71.79 % of the total.¹³

Mobula munkiana is the smallest of the genus: a disc width of up to 112 cm has been given.²⁰²¹ Its range runs from the Baja California peninsula to Peru, the Galápagos included, and it forms aggregations of thousands of individuals.²¹²⁰ In Costa Rica, groups of 2 to 10 juveniles feed in the surf zone, at less than 50 cm depth.²¹

Eagle rays, cownose rays and whiptail stingrays

The white-spotted eagle ray, Aetobatus laticeps, is called «raya bruja» in Peru.²² Its back is bluish black covered in white spots and its belly is almost entirely white.²³ For a long time these rays of the American Pacific were included in Aetobatus narinari, a species considered to be found worldwide.²⁴ Later work restricted Aetobatus narinari to the continental western Atlantic,²⁵ and a 2026 analysis concluded that the spotted eagle rays of the continental coast of the eastern tropical Pacific are a single species, Aetobatus laticeps.²⁶

The Chilean eagle ray, Myliobatis chilensis, is pelagic but drops to the seabed to feed.¹¹ In the landings at Salaverry, La Libertad, the largest female measured about 222 cm in disc width and, from 155 cm upward, only females appeared.¹¹ At Chancay, one crustacean, Pleuroncodes monodon, made up 89 % of prey weight in 24 stomachs.²⁷ The Pacific cownose ray, Rhinoptera steindachneri, reaches a maximum of 104 cm across and has a single pup per cycle.²⁸²⁹

Among the whiptail stingrays, Hypanus dipterurus is known in Peru as «batea», a commercial name in wide use.³⁰ Between 1997 and 2015 it made up 5.9 % of batoid landings.³¹ Hypanus longus, the «raya látigo», was recorded at Punta Sal, Tumbes, and by day it rests half-buried in the sand, always near rocky reefs.³² The pelagic stingray, Pteroplatytrygon violacea, is oceanic, reaches 80 cm in disc width and is the only member of its family known to use both pelagic and near-bottom habitats.³³

Round rays and butterfly rays

Six species of round rays of the genus Urotrygon have been recorded in Peru.² Urotrygon chilensis is small, up to 51.6 cm in total length in the Gulf of California, and is caught incidentally in trawls and bottom gillnets.³⁴³⁵ Urotrygon aspidura is smaller still: the largest female measured in a Colombian study had a disc width of 26.5 cm.³⁶

Two other Peruvian species are known barely beyond their original description: Hildebrand described Urotrygon caudispinosus in 1946 from two specimens, one from Independencia Bay and one from Sechura Bay.³⁷ He described Urotrygon serrula from a single male of 187 mm taken with a seine in Lobos de Tierra Bay,³⁷ collected on 17 May 1941.³⁸

The Tumbes round stingray, Urobatis tumbesensis, is listed as Vulnerable.³⁹ At Los Órganos, Piura, it was recorded between 1 and 6 m deep, in caves and crevices of mixed ground.⁴⁰ Among the butterfly rays, the Peruvian checklist includes Gymnura afuerae and Gymnura marmorata,² although for the latter there is no confirmed record in the literature consulted, only two seafood samples identified as Gymnura sp.⁴¹ Gymnura crebripunctata is given by FishBase as far as Peru, but it is not in the Peruvian checklist of chondrichthyans.⁴²²

Guitarfishes and sawfishes

In 2016 the genus Pseudobatos was created for the American guitarfishes that had until then been placed in Rhinobatos.⁴³ The Pacific guitarfish, Pseudobatos planiceps, was believed to occur from Mexico to Chile, but a 2026 review concludes that it lives only in southern Ecuador, the Galápagos, Peru and northern Chile.⁴⁴ In northern Peru there is a coastal fishery aimed at it: between December 2012 and June 2014, 796 guitarfish were recorded in 183 sets, and they appeared in 86.3 % of them.⁴⁵

Pseudobatos prahli is one of the least known guitarfishes: when it was assessed for the Red List, in 2007, only three specimens were known.⁴⁶ In Peru a 71 cm male was recorded in the year 2000.⁴⁷ Pseudobatos leucorhynchus appears in the Peruvian checklist with a record from Tumbes.² A study of fish from Nayarit, Mexico, describes Pseudobatos glaucostigma from the Gulf of California to Ecuador and mentions no Peruvian records, although the Peruvian checklist includes it.⁴⁸² The guitarfish Zapteryx xyster was seen at Los Órganos at 1 to 6 m depth, resting buried in the sand.⁴⁰

Sawfishes are among the most threatened rays: in 2014 and 2015 two large individuals of Pristis pristis, a species thought to be gone from Peru, were caught in gillnets off Tumbes: one of about 350 cm, a gravid female caught on 22 January 2014, and another of about 600 cm.⁴⁹ Fishers from Cancas said these fish had been abundant on the north coast and that overfishing, driven by the value of the teeth, had almost eliminated them.⁴⁹ The rostral teeth of Central and South American sawfishes are the preferred material for the spurs used in cockfighting in Peru, and a pair was valued at 80 to 220 US dollars.⁵⁰

The smalltooth sawfish, Pristis pectinata, is an Atlantic species: it is now considered absent from the Pacific, and its Peruvian record, at the mouth of the Tumbes River, probably belonged to another sawfish.²⁴⁹ Old records from the Pacific coast of Central America are probably misidentifications of other sawfishes.⁵¹

Electric rays and skates

The giant electric ray, Narcine entemedor, lives on shallow sandy bottoms and stays buried by day; it enters shallow bays after dark to eat mostly polychaete worms.¹⁰ In the southern Gulf of California females reached 84 cm in total length and males 58 cm.⁵² Tetronarce tremens, from Costa Rica to Chile, reaches 90 cm and its electric organs deliver a shock of about 45 volts, which it uses to stun prey and ward off attackers.⁵³ The northernmost record is a male taken in a bottom gillnet near San Agustinillo, in Oaxaca, Mexico.⁵⁴

Almost everything gathered here about Discopyge tschudii comes from studies made in Argentina: there the males are larger than the females, which is unusual among cartilaginous fishes, and it feeds mainly on polychaete worms.¹²⁵⁵ Its inclusion in the Peruvian checklist rests on an earlier taxonomic reference, not on new sampling.²

Skates lay eggs in capsules: Sympterygia brevicaudata, called «raya espinosa» in a study of specimens bought at Peruvian ports,¹ fastens its capsules to algae and other objects with long tendrils.⁵⁶ Rostroraja velezi was studied at Los Órganos: of 74 stomachs collected at the pier, 59 held food, and decapod crustaceans made up 54.1 % of the index of relative importance and bony fishes 31.5 %.⁵⁷ Rajella nigerrima is a deep-water skate, recorded between 590 and 1000 m.⁵⁸ It is worth noting that «raya bruja» designates both Aetobatus laticeps and Rostroraja velezi in the sources.²²⁵⁹

Telling them apart, and where and when they are recorded

Telling one ray from another by eye is difficult, and more so at a port: devil rays have the mouth on the underside; the giant manta carries a spine at the base of the tail, whereas Mobula thurstoni lacks one.¹⁷¹⁴ Aboard the boats of northern Peru it is hard to tell Mobula thurstoni from Mobula munkiana.⁶⁰ For years IMARPE statistics attributed the landings to Mobula thurstoni, and misidentifications still bias the catch data.¹³

Other features are finer: Hypanus longus is told from Hypanus brevis because the distance between the eyes fits about 6 times into the disc width, against about 5.2 times in the other,³² and in Oaxaca, Mexico, processing at landing makes the features that separate it from Hypanus dipterurus disappear.⁶¹ Among the butterfly rays, the length of the nasal curtain and the lack of a tail spine in Gymnura crebripunctata set it apart from Gymnura marmorata.⁶² At Salaverry, Myliobatis chilensis and Myliobatis peruvianus were told apart by the dental plate,¹¹ and in a genetic study a fillet sold as guitarfish in a supermarket in Trujillo turned out to be Myliobatis chilensis.⁴¹

Peruvian records come mostly from the far north: at Los Órganos, 20 snorkelling trips in 2016, 2017 and 2019 were made only in the mornings, because from midday strong wind lowers visibility.⁴⁰ The mantas' satellite tags were fitted off Tumbes in May and July 2018,¹⁶ and the three recent encounters with sawfishes in Peru took place between late January and early March.⁴⁹ Sechura Bay, in Piura, is a key area for the Pacific guitarfish.⁴⁵ The management plan of the Mar Tropical de Grau National Reserve cites Aetobatus laticeps in the Arrecifes de Punta Sal and Cabo Blanco – El Ñuro sectors.²² According to high-seas longline data, the presence of Pteroplatytrygon violacea in the tropical eastern Pacific was most likely between December and May.⁶³

What they eat and how they reproduce

Devil rays and mantas filter plankton, but with nuances: stable isotopes in mantas sampled in Ecuador assign on average 73 % of their diet to mesopelagic prey and only 27 % to surface zooplankton.⁶⁴ Bottom rays eat bottom prey: Pseudobatos leucorhynchus feeds mostly on shrimps, which are 52 % of the index of relative importance of its diet,⁶⁵ and Rhinoptera steindachneri specialises in one bivalve, Tellina subtrigona, which made up 99.5 % of its diet in the upper Gulf of California.⁶⁶ The smalltooth sawfish feeds mainly on fish and uses its saw to detect and immobilise them.⁹

Many have few young: the giant manta has a single pup per birth, rarely two, after a pregnancy of about a year, and its maximum population growth rate, 0.116 per year, is one of the lowest among 106 sharks and rays compared.⁶⁷ Pristis pristis has litters of 7.3 pups on average and an intrinsic rate of increase of only 0.12 per year.⁵⁰ Hypanus dipterurus has little capacity to recover: in Mexico the population studied could grow only 5 to 6 % a year without fishing, and about 1 % under low fishing mortality.⁶⁸ Others reproduce faster: Urotrygon chilensis has, in the Gulf of California, an estimated gestation of 6 months and two reproductive periods a year,³⁴ and Pteroplatytrygon violacea can have up to two litters of 4 to 13 pups a year, with a gestation of 2 to 3 months.³³

The egg-layers have their own stories: in captivity, 32 of 72 capsules of Sympterygia brevicaudata hatched after about 7 months, and the young measured 5.2 cm.⁶⁹ Pseudobatos prahli gestates for about 12 months and gives birth around March, according to landings at Santa Elena, Ecuador.⁴⁷ Narcine entemedor reproduces all year round and its embryos can pause their development.⁷⁰

Conservation status and threats

On the IUCN Red List, the two sawfishes and two devil rays are in the gravest category: Mobula thurstoni and Mobula tarapacana are listed as Critically Endangered,⁷¹⁷² as are Pristis pristis and Pristis pectinata.⁷³⁷⁴ Aetobatus laticeps, Hypanus dipterurus, Hypanus longus, Myliobatis chilensis, Narcine entemedor, Pseudobatos planiceps, Pseudobatos prahli, Pseudobatos leucorhynchus, Urobatis tumbesensis, Zapteryx xyster and Mobula munkiana are Vulnerable.^{7576777879808182394083} Sympterygia brevicaudata, Urotrygon chilensis, Urotrygon aspidura, Rhinoptera steindachneri, Gymnura crebripunctata and Gymnura marmorata are Near Threatened.^848586878889 Discopyge tschudii, Tetronarce tremens, Rajella nigerrima and Pteroplatytrygon violacea are of Least Concern.^90919293

Peruvian law has protected mantas since January 2016: Ministerial Resolution 441-2015-PRODUCE bans taking them with any gear, and also landing, transporting, processing and selling them.⁹⁴ In September 2024 a new resolution extended that protection to Mobula tarapacana, Mobula mobular, Mobula thurstoni and Mobula munkiana.⁹⁵ The rule was due to take effect in January 2025,¹³ but fishing communities have voiced concern about their livelihoods and enforcement is uncertain.¹³ In 2017, by contrast, sawfishes were not protected by Peruvian law, so catching and selling them was not illegal.⁴⁹ Since February 2023, the guitarfish family (Rhinobatidae) has been in CITES Appendix II.⁹⁶

Fishing is the threat the sources document most: between 2000 and 2023, 7444.9 tons of mobulid rays were reported in the small-scale fishery, and gillnets caught 87.23 % of the landings of Mobula mobular between 2013 and 2023.¹³ Of the 156 Mobula mobular specimens measured between 2017 and 2019, 92.3 % were juveniles.¹³ Landings of Hypanus dipterurus fell by an average of 11.5 % a year between 1997 and 2006, and the species has no management measures of its own in Peru.³¹ For large coastal rays, the management plan of Mar Tropical de Grau points to catches with bottom gillnets, spearguns and handlines, and incidental catches by purse seiners and trawlers operating illegally, with significantly reduced populations.²² Sawfishes are also affected by the loss of mangroves, which serve them as nurseries.⁴⁹

What is still unknown

For several species there are almost no Peruvian data: Urotrygon serrula was described from a single male and the sources consulted add nothing more, and for Urotrygon caudispinosus the original description is still the main source.³⁷ For Gymnura afuerae the literature consulted has no description of how to recognise it in the water, and a 2024 genetic study calls for a revision of the whole genus.⁹⁷ What Sympterygia brevicaudata eats at sea has not been described.⁶⁹

Peruvian research on batoids is scarce: between 1978 and 2022 only 25 studies on Peruvian rays were published.³¹ The official statistics on mobulid rays do not separate Mobula tarapacana.¹³ Every specimen of Hypanus dipterurus from northern and central Peru shared a single COI haplotype, which could point to a bottleneck.³⁰ And a 2026 paper argues that, with a much smaller range than was believed, the Pacific guitarfish may be at higher risk than its current category indicates.⁴⁴

The species in this article

• Aetobatus laticeps
• Mobula birostris
• Urobatis tumbesensis
• Mobula thurstoni
• Hypanus dipterurus
• Pseudobatos planiceps
• Pristis pectinata
• Hypanus longus
• Sympterygia brevicaudata
• Mobula mobular
• Mobula tarapacana
• Pristis pristis
• Urotrygon chilensis
• Pseudobatos prahli
• Zapteryx xyster
• Urotrygon caudispinosus
• Myliobatis chilensis
• Narcine entemedor
• Discopyge tschudii
• Mobula munkiana
• Pseudobatos leucorhynchus
• Urotrygon serrula
• Gymnura crebripunctata
• Gymnura marmorata
• Rhinoptera steindachneri
• Urotrygon aspidura
• Tetronarce tremens
• Rostroraja velezi
• Gymnura afuerae
• Pteroplatytrygon violacea
• Pseudobatos glaucostigma
• Rajella nigerrima