Blue skate
Dipturus batis · Rays and skates
Also called common skate, skate
A protected species. If you catch one, handle it carefully and put it back alive.
A huge, critically endangered skate once called common skate, now seen mainly in the Celtic Sea and off north-west Scotland. Release it alive.[1]
How to recognise it
- Very large (up to about 2.85 m). Broad, angular snout and a diamond-shaped disc with a deeply concave front edge.[2]
- Olive-grey or brown back with light blotches and yellowish ring-like markings. The iris is yellowish and the belly greyish; the flapper skate has an olive-green iris and a longer, more pointed snout.[2]
- Adults have a row of 12 to 31 thorns along the middle of the tail.[2]
When and where
- Found over
- sand, mud[1]
Sources
These notes are a draft: we gathered them from the sources above and are still checking them. We don't work out best times for this fish yet. The size rules come from the same checked byelaws as every other fish.