Far more manta and devil rays die in fisheries than previously understood, with annual deaths surpassing 259,000 individuals, a new study has found. It suggests that fishing pressure on these slow-growing species in the genus Mobula is much greater than shown by existing data. The research, conducted by an international team of scientists and published in the journal Biological Conservation in November, draws on data from 99 countries and multiple sources, including fisheries landing surveys, databases and published records, and expert interviews. In seeking to generate the most comprehensive estimate to date of global mobulid mortality, the team found that many fishing nations either don’t report mobulid catches or aggregate them with other species, obscuring their true scale. The new estimate is “already alarming,” Betty Laglbauer, lead author and fisheries and policy researcher at the U.K. nonprofit Manta Trust, told Mongabay by email. But it likely understates total mortality because “significant data gaps” persist in regions where high mobulid catches occur, she said, adding that “true declines may be even more pronounced than currently recognised.” A devil ray (Mobula mobular) is caught as bycatch in the net of an Iranian flagged vessel fishing for tuna in the Northern Indian Ocean. Image courtesy of © Abbie Trayler-Smith / Greenpeace. Late monitoring reveals deeper and longer-term declines Long-term data reveal severe, widespread declines in mobulid populations, with landings or catch rates falling by 51–99% across eight of the 92 countries with documented mobulid catches. In Mozambique, sightings dropped by 81–99% over 21…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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