page_title: Reticulate whipray
section_title: Distribution and habitat
hierarchical_section_title: Reticulate whipray / Distribution and habitat
caption_attribution_description: Honeycomb stingray (Himantura uarnak) in the Red Sea off Al Bahr al Ahmar, Egypt
context_page_description: The reticulate whipray or honeycomb stingray is a species of stingray in the family Dasyatidae. It inhabits coastal and brackish waters across the Indo-Pacific region from South Africa to Taiwan to Australia, favoring sandy habitats. A large species reaching 2 m in width, the reticulate whipray has a diamond-shaped pectoral fin disc and an extremely long tail without fin folds. Both its common and scientific names refer to its ornate dorsal color pattern of many small, close-set dark spots or reticulations on a lighter background. However, the reticulate whipray is only one of several large spotted stingrays in the Indo-Pacific which, coupled with the variability of its coloration with age and locality, has resulted in a great deal of taxonomic confusion.
  Often encountered resting on the bottom during daytime, the reticulate whipray is a predator of bottom-dwelling invertebrates and bony fishes. Like other stingrays, it is aplacental viviparous, with the developing embryos nourished at first by yolk and later by histotroph. Females bear litters of up to five pups in summer, following a gestation period of a year.
context_section_description: The reticulate whipray occurs widely in the Indo-Pacific, with a range extending from off eastern South Africa to the Arabian Peninsula, westward along the coast of the Indian subcontinent to Southeast Asia, and reaching as far as Taiwan and the Ryukyu Islands to the north, and New Guinea and northern Australia to the southeast. It has also colonized the eastern Mediterranean Sea through the Suez Canal, i.e. it is a Lessepsian migrant, and it is now common in the south eastern Mediterranean. This species seems to be common only in Australian waters, where it occurs from Shark Bay to Brisbane.
  Bottom-dwelling in nature, the reticulate whipray is generally encountered over sandy flats near beaches, in lagoons, and around coral reefs, from the intertidal zone to offshore waters 50 m (160 ft) deep or more. In Shark Bay, it frequents intertidal sand flats during the warm season, and shifts to slightly deeper seagrass patches in the cold season. This species is tolerant of low salinities and has been known to enter estuaries and mangrove swamps, though records from fresh water in Southeast Asia are unverified and may represent misidentifications. Its preferred water temperatures are 23–26 °C (73–79 °F).
caption: The reticulate whipray frequents areas with fine sediment.
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