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WOW! Awesome!!! Looking like giant
leaves floating in the sea thousands of Golden Rays
are seen here gathering off the coast of Mexico. The
spectacular scene was captured as the magnificent creatures
made one of their biannual mass migrations to more agreeable
waters.
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Gliding silently beneath the waves
they turned vast areas of blue water to gold off the
northern tip of the Yucatan Peninsula. Sandra Critelli,
an amateur photographer, stumbled across the phenomenon
while looking for whale sharks.
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She said: 'It was an unreal image,
very difficult to describe. The surface of the water
was covered by warm and different shades of gold and
looked like a bed of autumn leaves gently moved by the
wind. 'It's hard to say exactly how many there
were but in the range of a few thousand. 'We were surrounded
by them without seeing the edge of the school and we
could see many under the water surface too.
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'I feel very fortunate I was there
in the right place at the right time to experienced
nature at his best.'Measuring up to 7ft (2.1 meters)
from wing-tip to wing-tip, Golden rays are also more
prosaically known as cow nose rays. They have
long, pointed pectoral fins that separate into two lobes
in front of their high-domed heads and give them a cow-like
appearance. Despite having poisonous stingers
they are known to be shy and non-threatening when in
large schools. The population in the Gulf of Mexico
migrates, in schools of as many as 10,000, clockwise
from western Florida to the Yucatan.
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