''Bathyraja panthera'', the leopard skate, is a species of cartilaginous fish in the

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

Arhynchobatidae Arhynchobatidae is a family of skates and is commonly known as the softnose skates. It belongs to the order Rajiformes in the superorder Batoidea of rays. At least 104 species have been described, in 13 genera. Softnose skates have at times been ...

. It was first described as a new species in 2011, having been discovered in the

Aleutian Islands The Aleutian Islands (; ; ale, Unangam Tanangin,”Land of the Aleuts", possibly from Chukchi language, Chukchi ''aliat'', "island"), also called the Aleut Islands or Aleutic Islands and known before 1867 as the Catherine Archipelago, are a cha ...

at depths between . It is a moderately large species with a short snout and wide mouth. The dorsal surface is pale greenish-brown, with speckling, round black spots and yellow blotches, giving it its specific name ''panthera'' from its resemblance to a leopard skin. It is an egg-bearing species, the eggs being enclosed in egg capsules with horns at the corners.

Description

This moderately large skate has a disc that is 1.3 times as broad as long. The total length (TL) of the described species is between 197 mm and 1110 mm, the disc length is between 514 mm and 586 mm, the disc width is between 640 mm and 743 mm and the tail length is between 440 mm and 541 mm. The snout is short, the mouth width is about 15.6% of the disc width, with about 34 (31-42) thorns on the mid-dorsal line from the nuchal to the tip of the tail (nuchal: 4 (2-5), mid-dorsal: 7 (6-10), scapular: 2 (1-2), tail: 22 (19-28)). The species is

oviparous Oviparous animals are animals that lay their eggs, with little or no other embryonic development within the mother. This is the reproductive method of most fish, amphibians, most reptiles, and all pterosaurs, dinosaurs (including birds), and ...

. The egg capsules are large (between 106 mm and 134 mm) with a horn at each corner. The background colour is light greenish brown, with vermiculated and round black spots and yellow blotches. This species was named after the generic name for the

leopard The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant species in the genus '' Panthera'', a member of the cat family, Felidae. It occurs in a wide range in sub-Saharan Africa, in some parts of Western and Central Asia, Southern Russia, a ...

(

Felidae Felidae () is the family of mammals in the order Carnivora colloquially referred to as cats, and constitutes a clade. A member of this family is also called a felid (). The term "cat" refers both to felids in general and specifically to the ...

), because the dorsal coloration of the species is often characterized by rosettes of black spots surrounding yellow blotches. The

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of several ...

is housed in the University of Washington, College of Ocean and Fishery Sciences, Seattle, USA (collection number UW 116980).

Distribution

This species is known from the western

(Pacific Ocean,

Bering Sea The Bering Sea (, ; rus, Бе́рингово мо́ре, r=Béringovo móre) is a marginal sea of the Northern Pacific Ocean. It forms, along with the Bering Strait, the divide between the two largest landmasses on Earth: Eurasia and The Ameri ...

) or on Petrel Bank between longitudes 170° E and 179° W. All described specimens were collected at depths ranging from 51 m to 258 m.

References

Orr, J.W., Stevenson, D.E., Hoff, G.R., Spies, I. & McEachran, J.D. (2011)
Bathyraja panthera, ''a new species of skate (Rajidae: Arhynchobatinae) from the western Aleutian Islands, and resurrection of the subgenus'' Arctoraja ''Ishiyama.''
NOAA Professional Paper NMFS, 11: 50pp

External links

Species Description of Bathyraja panthera at www.shark-references.com
Rajidae Bathyraja Taxa named by James Wilder Orr Taxa named by Duane E. Stevenson Taxa named by Gerald Raymond Hoff Taxa named by Ingrid Brigette Spies Taxa named by John D. McEachran Fish described in 2011 {{Rajiformes-stub