Rajidae

Biscoito, Manuel, Ribeiro, Cláudia & Freitas, Mafalda, 2018, Annotated checklist of the fishes of the archipelago of Madeira (NE Atlantic): I-Chondrichthyes, Zootaxa 4429 (3), pp. 459-494 : 486

Family Rajidae

Dipturus batis (Linnaeus, 1758) —No common name in Madeira; Blue skate

Nobre 1935: 475 | Albuquerque 1954 –56: 168 (as Raia batis )

Fowler 1936: 111 | Noronha & Sarmento 1948: 121 | Maul 1948: 140 | Nunes 1953: 198 (as Raja macrorynchus )

Stehmann 1973: 62 | Stehmann & Bürkel 1984a: 175 | Sanches 1986: 106 (as Raja (Dipturus) batis

Lloris et al 1991: 236 (as Raja batis )

Ebert & Stehmann 2013: 317–321 (as Dipturus sp. cf. flossada)

Carneiro et al. 2014: 15.

Distribution in Macaronesia. possibly Madeira archipelago, Azores ( Porteiro et al. 2010) and Canary Islands ( Brito et al. 2002; Brito Hernández & Sancho Rafel 2003).

Remarks. Iglésias et al. (2010) have demonstrated that Dipturus batis (Linnaeus, 1758) is a composite species and provisionally split it into Dipturus sp. cf. flossada and Dipturus sp. cf. intermedia . Last et al. (2016b) retained D. batis and considered Dipturus sp. cf. flossada (Risso, 1826) as a junior synonym. Older records from Madeira refer this species as Raja macrorynchus Rafinesque, 1810 ( Fowler 1936; Noronha & Sarmento 1948; Maul, 1948; Nunes 1953). This species is here considered as a junior synonym of D. batis (see remarks on next section).

Ebert & Stehmann (2013) and Last et al. (2016b) note that both species ( D. batis and D. intermedius ) appear to live sympatrically in most of their distribution area, although not occurring with the same abundance, therefore we have opted to place D. batis as a doubtful record, until specimens from Madeira come to hand.

Raja miraletus Linnaeus, 1758 —No common name in Madeira; Brown ray

Garman 1913: 323 | Fowler 1936: 116 | Maul 1948: 140 (as Raia quadrimaculata )

Albuquerque 1954 –56: 153 | Stehmann 1973: 58 | Stehmann & Bürkel 1984a: 187 | Sanches 1986: 98 | Lloris et al 1991: 236 | Wirtz et al. 2008: 4 | Ebert & Stehmann 2013: 370 | Carneiro et al. 2014: 15

Distribution in Macaronesia. possibly Madeira archipelago, Canary Islands ( Brito et al. 2002 as dubious record) and Cape Verde ( Reiner 1996, 2005).

Remarks. Garman (1913) refers the presence in Madeira of R. quadrimaculata Risso, 1827 , now considered a junior synonym of R. miraletus ( Eschmeyer et al. 2017) , based on Günther’s (1870: 462) Raja circularis , who in turn gives Madeira based on a specimen (BMNH 1860.8.30.3) sent by R. T. Lowe. As pointed out above, Lowe’s specimen was observed by one of us (MB) who concluded that in fact it belongs to Leucoraja circularis . Since no specimens or other material could be found in natural history museum collections, the presence of this species in Madeira is considered as in need of confirmation.