• Like their relatives the sharks, sting rays have special organs called ampullae of Lorenzini that help them sense electrical fields. This ability helps them locate prey that is buried beneath the sand.
• A stingray’s gills are on the underside of its body near its mouth. Holes near the eyes, called spiracles, draw water in, which is then expelled through the gills. A stingray can bury itself to hide in the sand, leaving only its spiracles and eyes poking out.  
• Stingrays are named for the venomous barbs on their tails, used for defense.
• Male stingrays are easy to differentiate from females as they have a clasper on either side of the tail base, used when mating.

The zoo currently has two southern stingrays on display, one male and one female. More may be added in the future. Look closely at their tails and you can tell the male from the female—he has a clasper on either side of his tail.

The rays are offered food on the same days as the sharks in the exhibit. Shark and ray feeding is viewable to the public on Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday at 11:30 AM. The rays can eat any food that may hit the bottom of the tank any time the fish are fed, but generally they rise to the surface near the shark feeding platform to take food offered by the aquarists on a feeding stick. As the rays rise from the bottom of the viewing window you can see the color of their undersides and the location of their mouths. If they are resting on the substrate, you may occasionally see them flap their fins to cover themselves with sand. In the wild they use behavior this to find buried food like clams and mussels.

Range:  
Southern stingrays inhabit the Atlantic coast of the United States from New Jersey down to the Gulf of Mexico and the coast of Brazil. They inhabit warm water estuaries, lagoons and sea grass beds, particularly those with sandy bottoms. This allows them to conceal themselves from predators, buried partially beneath the sand with little more than their eyes exposed.

Description:
Ranging in color from gray to dark shades of green and brown with a pale underside, southern stingrays are well concealed on the seafloor. Males are smaller than females, often less than half as big. Stingray bodies are flattened with their pectoral fins acting like wings. Southern stingrays have a diamond shape to their discs and have a long slender tail that may be as long as their body. A serrated venomous stinger is positioned near the tip of the tail.

Diet:
Mature individuals are sometimes eaten by large fish or sharks. The hammerhead shark in particular has a tendency to dine on southern stingrays. Small fish, crustaceans and mollusks are the stingray’s preferred diet. The stingray will shoot jets of water or use its fins to stir up sediment and reveal a hidden meal. A stingray’s mouth is on the underside of its body. Southern stingrays feed most often at night.

Reproduction:
Southern stingrays are sexually mature by the time they reach 29-31 inches in disc width. There are a few instances of southern stingray mating observed in the wild, but much of what we know of their reproduction comes from stingrays kept in aquariums. The female has a gestation period ranging from 135-226 days. The pups look like miniature adults. As many as 10 pups are born at a time, and a female may have up to two litters a year. Pups can measure 8-13.5 inches in disc width—a size that appears dependent on their mother’s size.