{"id":9001,"date":"2016-07-22T02:22:34","date_gmt":"2016-07-22T06:22:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=9001"},"modified":"2016-07-22T02:26:29","modified_gmt":"2016-07-22T06:26:29","slug":"watch-cownose-rays-sighted-at-brick-beach-heres-what-theyre-all-about","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2016\/07\/watch-cownose-rays-sighted-at-brick-beach-heres-what-theyre-all-about\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch: Cownose Rays Sighted at Brick Beach; Here&#8217;s What They&#8217;re all About"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Cownose Rays at the Jersey Shore\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/175795820?dnt=1&app_id=122963\" width=\"1000\" height=\"563\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen; picture-in-picture; clipboard-write\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>On several occasions this week, beachgoers in local towns thought they might have come too close for comfort with a scene out of \u201cJaws.\u201d In reality, while sharks most certainly patrol the waters off the Jersey Shore, this week\u2019s sightings were of a less gargantuan predator.<\/p>\n<p>Schools of cownose rays have been swimming up and down the coast of Ocean County all week. The sighting, at one point, prompted lifeguards in Brick to usher swimmers out of the water. Experts tell us, however, that rays are generally docile and aren\u2019t looking to attack human beings.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGenerally, there\u2019s not a lot to be worried about,\u201d Dr. Paul Bologna,\u00a0Director of the Marine Biology and Coastal Sciences Program at Montclair State University told Shorebeat. \u201cThey are extremely common. Every year they\u2019re here.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The rays sometimes move closer to shore in search of food \u2013\u00a0generally, shellfish \u2013 and can be mistaken for a shark.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey can get extremely large,\u201d Bologna said. \u201cWhen they\u2019re swimming in the water, it\u2019ll look a little bit like a shark fin is coming up because they have a wingtip that comes up out of the water.\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_9003\" style=\"width: 628px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/4146102920_5af68fc9f0_b.jpg\" data-rel=\"lightbox-image-0\" data-rl_title=\"\" data-rl_caption=\"\" title=\"\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-9003\" class=\"size-large wp-image-9003\" src=\"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/4146102920_5af68fc9f0_b-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"Cownose ray. (Credit: Calvert Marine Museum)\" width=\"618\" height=\"412\" srcset=\"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/4146102920_5af68fc9f0_b.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/4146102920_5af68fc9f0_b-400x267.jpg 400w, https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/4146102920_5af68fc9f0_b-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 618px) 100vw, 618px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-9003\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cownose ray. (Credit: Calvert Marine Museum)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>A beachgoer from\u00a0Lavallette sent a video to Shorebeat which chronicled his short encounter with the species this week.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re pretty quick, and\u00a0they move fairly fast,\u201d Bologona said. \u201cTheir encounters with people aren\u2019t that lengthy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>If you spot a cownose ray in the water, don\u2019t panic, Bologna advised.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you\u2019re running and making a lot of movements, that would spook any animal. Be calm, but swim away from them,\u201d he said. \u201cAvoiding them is probably the best action. If they\u2019re swimming along, they\u2019re usually either chasing prey or migrating, searching for shellfish beds.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>A species of eagle ray, the cownose ray has a spine coated with a weak venom that causes symptoms similar to that of a bee sting, according to an NOAA Fisheries report. This differs from the southern stingray, which can whip its tail around when disturbed. The cownose ray generally swims in the water column, Bologna said, so it\u2019s unlikely that a swimmer\u00a0would step on one.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re a little bit more of a warm water species, in general, which is why we get them during the summer,\u201d Bologna said.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fcbkbttn_buttons_block\" id=\"fcbkbttn_left\"><div class=\"fb-share-button fcbkbttn_large_button \" data-href=\"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2016\/07\/watch-cownose-rays-sighted-at-brick-beach-heres-what-theyre-all-about\/\" data-type=\"button_count\" data-size=\"large\"><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On several occasions this week, beachgoers in local towns thought they might have come too close for comfort with a scene out of &#8220;Jaws.&#8221; In reality, while sharks most certainly patrol the waters off the Jersey Shore, this week&#8217;s sightings were of a less gargantuan predator&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[20],"tags":[1767,24,2321,182,942],"class_list":["post-9001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-shore-environment","tag-beaches","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-cownose-ray","tag-jersey-shore","tag-new-jersey"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/Screen-Shot-2016-07-22-at-1.51.27-AM.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-2lb","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}