{"id":74,"date":"2019-03-12T23:10:32","date_gmt":"2019-03-12T23:10:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/n3-bigskate\/"},"modified":"2020-12-08T20:54:08","modified_gmt":"2020-12-08T20:54:08","slug":"n3-bigskate","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/n3-bigskate\/","title":{"rendered":"Big Skate"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p align=\"right\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\"> by Katie Jacobs<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<\/font><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\" size=\"6\">SKATES<br \/>\n<\/font><\/p>\n<p class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Skates belong to a group of<br \/>\nfish called elasmobranches, which are boneless fish. The skate is a relative<br \/>\nto sharks and rays, all belong to the order Batoidei, meaning all skates<br \/>\nand rays. But not all rays are skates. Skates can be found from the Arctic<br \/>\nto the Antarctic; their living space extends from shallow coastal areas<br \/>\nto depths 9,800 feet.<\/font><\/p>\n<p class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">The common skate can weigh up<br \/>\nto 250 lb. with a length over nine feet. Some of the more common skates<br \/>\nfound in North America include: Little skate (Raja erinacea), Barndoor skate<br \/>\n(Raja laevis), Winter skate (Raja ocellata), Thorney Skate (Raja radiata),<br \/>\nand the Smooth skate (Raja senta). <\/font><\/p>\n<p class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Skates and rays can be quite<br \/>\ndifficult to tell apart. Both are flat and live close to the ocean floor,<br \/>\nand share a similar diamond shape. These are the distinguishing features<br \/>\nof a skate:<\/font><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<ul>\n<li><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Each pelvic fin is divided<br \/>\ninto two lobes <br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<\/font><\/li>\n<li><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Tail relatively stocky without<br \/>\nstinging spines<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<\/font><\/li>\n<li><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Tail usually with two small<br \/>\ndorsal fins near its tip and a tiny caudal fin<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<\/font><\/li>\n<li><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Many have enlarged, thorn-like<br \/>\nscales along the midline of back and tail; enlarged scales also occur along<br \/>\nthe side of the body in some species.<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<br class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><br \/>\n<\/font><\/li>\n<li> <font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\"> Males have rows of enlarged<br \/>\nscales near the eyes and wingtip <\/font><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">Mainly bottom-dwellers, skates<br \/>\nfed on a variety of animals including lobsters, crabs, shrimps and other<br \/>\nsmall crustaceans, as well as worms, bivalve, mollusks, polychaetes, and<br \/>\nsmall fish. Although all skates eat the same kind of food, different kinds<br \/>\nof skates, for example little skates and winter skates, can share the some<br \/>\nhabitat without any serious competition, by eating food in different proportions.<\/font><\/p>\n<p class=\"spazx3d5yf522jmva\"><font face=\"Times New Roman, Times, serif\">In commercial fishing, a skate<br \/>\nis of little value and is usually ground up into fishmeal, but for small<br \/>\nscale fishing it is meaty, sold in large slabs or chunks as this rather<br \/>\nlarge fish is too big to display on the counters at the markets. Unlike<br \/>\nmost fish, the skate has no true bones, instead its skeleton is made of<br \/>\nsoft cartilage. The skate is a rather inexpensive fish, so it is good value<br \/>\nfor money. It is also very meaty so there is barely anything to waste. The<br \/>\nflesh is smooth and tasty, wonderful grilled or baked on charcoal and served<br \/>\nwith a hot tamarind dip.<\/font><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Katie Jacobs SKATES Skates belong to a group [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9113,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"template_8.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/74"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/74\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9114,"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/74\/revisions\/9114"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.forsea.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}