Barndoor skate

Description

The barndoor skate is a flat-bodied fish with a large,disk-like body with sharply angled corners and a pointed snout.Its pectoral fins have evolved into broad,flat,wing-like appendages used to propel the fish through the water.These fins have a concave front edge with rounded posterior corners.Like sharks,it has a boneless skeleton made of cartilage,a tough,elastic substance composed of collagenous and/or elastic fibers,cells,and a firm,gel-like substance called the matrix.It has slot-like body openings called gill slits on the underside of the body beneath the pectoral fins that lead from the gills.The dorsal fins are close together and far removed from the tail.[3] It has two eyes on its dorsal surface,located approximately 5.5 centimeters (2.2 in) apart.