Flying fish can’t really fly, at best they can leap out of the water and glide. Does that mean every sea faring creature that can leap out of the water should have the word ‘Flying’ attached to its name? If you answered yes, then you are obligated to jump back and kiss yourself because indeed, many a sea beast would be magnitudes more magnificent with such an addition to their name. Close your eyes with me and whisper these names, “Flying Killer Whale, Flying Great White Shark, Flying Swordfish, Flying Devil Ray”. If you did this in public, people should be showering you with high fives for providing them with the knowledge of this airborne oceanic dream team. In fact, I didn’t even know the Devil Ray existed until recently. I stumbled across the photo above (Florian Schulz) believing the subjects to be Golden Cownose Rays until fellow Redditor para_sight corrected me. I am forever grateful as the footage I discovered of the Devil Ray migration is astonishing.

Between the months of February and April, the Devil Ray (more commonly known as the Mobula Ray) can be seen migrating en masse off the southern coast of Baja, in the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of California). Measuring 4-7 feet in disc width, these rays gather annually to feast upon their primary food source, Mysid shrimp. The numbers of shrimp present must be staggering if they are abundant enough to satiate the hundreds to thousands of Mobula Rays that arrive yearly for this event, including the tens of thousands featured in the video below.