Is 80-year-old mistake leading to first species to be fished to extinction?
A species of common skate is to become the first marine fish species to be driven to extinction by commercial fishing, due to an error of species classification 80 years ago, reveals research published today in the journal Aquatic Conservation. The European common skate, Dipturus batis, has been on the World Conservation Union’s Red List of Threatened Species since 2006, with France currently being responsible for 60.2% of reported landings. These catches are predominantly registered under the name ‘D.batis,’ however researchers, led by Dr Samuel Iglésias, show that ‘D. batis’ is in fact two clearly distinct species which have been incorrectly categorised as one since the 1920s. From the mid-19th century the common skate was described as two distinct species, the flapper skate, D. intermedia, and the blue skate, D. flossada. However, in an influential work in 1926 R.S Clark recognised only ‘D. batis’ as a valid species and this classification has largely gone unchallenged since. This c
