A stingray named Charlotte at a North Carolina aquarium is expecting babies, and staff believe she may have been impregnated by a shark since there were no male rays in her tank. daily mail reported.
In September, the ECCO Aquarium and Shark Lab discovered Charlotte's swelling, which they initially suspected was cancer, but after ultrasounds, they discovered she was pregnant with multiple cubs.
“We've been doing ultrasounds on our stingray, Charlotte, since September when she started swelling. We documented multiple 'growths' internally and initially thought she had cancer,” said staff member Ramer.
There are two possible explanations for Charlotte's mysterious pregnancy: parthenogenesis, where the eggs develop independently without fertilization and create a clone of the mother.
“I contacted Dr. Rob Jones, the aquarium veterinarian, and he identified the growths as eggs,” Ramer said. “We don't have any male rays. He said there have been few cases of parthenogenesis in rays.”
The other reason, staff believe, may have been a male shark placed in their tank in mid-July.
“In mid-July 2023, we moved two 1-year-old male white-spotted bamboo (sharks) into that tank. We couldn't find anything definitive about their maturation rate, so we didn't think there would be a problem.” Ramer said.
“We started noticing bite marks on Charlotte, but we saw other fish nibbling on her, so we moved the fish, but the bites continued.”
Bite marks on the edges of the fins indicate the sharks mating, another employee explained, adding that Charlotte had several bite marks on the edges of her fins.
Charlotte's puppies will undergo DNA testing once they arrive in the coming days to determine if they are crossbreeds or clones of their mother.
The gestation period for a stingray is usually three to four months.
Manta rays are flattened fish, closely related to sharks, belonging to the group of elasmobranchs. They have no bones in their bodies and have a flexible cartilage skeleton.
They are ovoviviparous and hatch from eggs found inside their bodies. Many manta rays live alone and only come together to reproduce and migrate.
