What's the difference between stingrays and manta rays? A quick guide to telling them apart

The difference between the two lies in the fact that the manta ray's tail may carry a weak electric current but is not venomous, whereas the stingray's tail is highly venomous. In addition, the manta ray belongs to the class Chondrichthyes and the family Mobulidae, which contains two genera, Manta and Mobula. The stingray is simply a cartilaginous fish.

1. Stingray

The stingray, commonly known as the yellow stingray, is a cartilaginous fish. Its body is flat and its tail is slender and long, and some species of stingray have one or several venomous spines with serrated edges growing on their tails.

Its signature move is its wing-like pectoral fins rippling in waves through the sea, while the slender, whip-like cartilaginous tissue of its tail carries a venomous spine. About 480 species of stingray are known. According to the 1995 "Dangerous Marine Creatures - A Field Guide to First Aid", the stingray is the largest known venomous fish, with a tail that can reach 37 cm in length. If stung in the chest cavity, it can cause serious injury or even death; if the heart area is injured in particular, emergency surgery is required, though injuries to the heart are usually fatal.

2. Manta ray

Also known as the manta ray and the blanket ray. It belongs to the class Chondrichthyes and the family Mobulidae, which contains two genera, Manta and Mobula. Its body is diamond-shaped and over 6 m wide. Its body is olive-brown. Its mouth is large. Its eyes are positioned on the lower sides, allowing it to look sideways and downward. On the sides of its head there is a pair of cephalic fins differentiated from the pectoral fins, projecting forward. Its dorsal fin is small, and its pectoral fins are wing-shaped. Its tail is slender and whip-like, with a tail spine. It normally lives on the bottom, but sometimes rises to the surface to swim and makes long-distance migrations, moving agilely. It feeds on planktonic crustaceans and small fish. It is ovoviviparous. Its liver is rich in fat and can be rendered into fish oil. The manta ray's tail may carry a weak electric current but is not venomous.

Unlike traditional fish, manta rays do not have a spindle-shaped body; they have no dorsal fin, and their broad triangular pectoral fins and disc-like body form a giant flat sheet, like a “kite of the sea”. Their skin feels far less smooth than it looks; the dorsal side is mostly black or grayish-blue, while the ventral side is grayish-white with scattered dark spots. Their huge pectoral fins resemble birds' wings in both form and function. The distance between the two pectoral fins is called the “wingspan”, which is the body width and is greater than the body length; this is the standard for measuring the size of a manta ray and identifying its species.

The stingray and the manta ray are two rather special kinds of fish in the ocean. Those who have a chance to encounter a stingray should be careful to avoid it.