When ichthyologist Samuel Iglésias spent 2 years scouring French fish markets and docks, he wasn’t exactly looking for a two-for-one deal on the catch of the day, but he found one. Iglésias recognized that a species of highly endangered fish was actually composed of two separate species, each in greater danger of extinction than the single species they’re lumped together as—including one that could become the first fish species driven to extinction from fishing.
Iglésias examined more than 4,000 specimens of the European common skate (Dipturus batis), a large cartilaginous flat fish that resembles rays, the flattened pectoral fins of which sometimes appear as a traditional French dish—skate wings with black butter.
D. batis populations in the Eastern Atlantic have plummeted over the last 4 decades, decreasing some 90–95% from the 1960s to today, according to Iglésias. Since 2006, the species has been listed on World Conservation Union’s (IUCN) Red ...
