Further information has come to hand since the posting of Update on the Egg Casings of Elephant Sharks, Sharks, Stingrays and Skates on April 3, 2026
Colleague Jenni (one of our Facebook followers) recently sent Michelle Treloar an email with some of her photos of skate egg casings.
Michelle is from both School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Deakin University and CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research.
Michelle spotted two egg casings that she identified as being for Longnose skate, Dentiraja confusa. Jenni found that they are only found from Sydney, NSW to Portland, Victoria.
“Looks like they have somehow come here,” says Jenni. She had found the skate egg casings along Middleton Beach back in March this year (2026).
Michelle Treloar pointed out that one, possibly 2, were Longnose Skates, with the rest being Thornback skate, Whitespotted skate, and one Pygmy Thornback skate.
Jenni says that she was thrilled to hear this. She had been uploading a lot of the skate egg casings to iNaturalist, but the majority were identified as Hardnose Skates, with one Thornback and one possible Pygmy Thornback.
She says that she didn’t realise that Hardnose Skates was a group name for some 150 species.
Michelle sent this photo back to Jenni, circling the Longnose skate egg casing: –
Egg casings collected by Jenni
“I have been looking at your photo of the egg cases you have collected, and the one I have circled, and possibly the one above, is from this skate Dentiraja confusa, the Longnose skate. The others I think are a mixture of D. lemprieri and D. cerva,” says Michelle.
“You do have the Pygmy thornback there, which is a very small skate, so I am guessing the small one you found could have been from this species.
“I also think you may have been misinformed about the term hardnose skates unless you are calling a species this as a common name? The hardnose skates make up about 154 species worldwide and 17 genera including Dentiraja, which includes the Thornback skate. ….”
Jenni had taken the photo at Middleton beach on March 18th this year. “Pretty exciting to find a Longnose skate in SA,” says Jenni.
Michelle also sent a copy of a 2006 Zootaxa paper on skates titled “Descriptions of rajid egg cases from southeastern Australian waters” by M.A. Treloar, L.J.B. Laurenson & J.D Stevens to Jenni.
“Descriptions of rajid egg cases from southeastern Australian waters” is ISSN 1175-5326 (print edition) and ISSN 1175-5334 (online edition).