Swimming With Stingrays
In the ultimate collection of bucket list ideas, one of the best adventures one can experience in life is to swim with stingrays. For stingray lovers, having an experience like this is a life goal, but for everyone else being in the ocean with these incredible creatures is something so unique and special that it stands as a once in a lifetime thing to do in the USA.
Where To Swim With Stingrays In The Virgin Islands
There is no one location to find stingrays in the Caribbean, but there are some known spots in the Virgin Islands to go by boat that make it more likely that you’ll have a chance to swim with stingrays:
Around St. John, Trunk Bay and Waterlemon Cay are the best places to snorkel and swim with stingrays as they move around within their natural habitats.
Around St. Thomas, Brewer’s Bay and Sapphire Beach offer access to clear, calm Caribbean waters, which are great places to snorkel and swim, in hopes of swimming with a stingray.
In the BVI, the waters around Jost Van Dyke and Norman Island are where divers, swimmers and snorkelers go to seek encounters with spotted eagle rays. On our “Most of Jost” Trip page, we mention how guests might “see a big stingray swim by”.
It Can Be Safe To Swim With Stingrays
While there is the risk involved in swimming with stingrays - all wild animals can be unpredictable - swimmers can take some precautions, such as not touching or provoking them in a way that causes a threat response (sting), to lower some of that risk.
Stingray stings are almost never lethal. How many people have been killed by stingrays? Less than 20. This means the number of stingray deaths per year averages almost zero if we consider that less than 20 people have been killed by stingrays worldwide since recording these stats began back in the 1940s. Five of them happened in Australia.
Steve Irwin Death
The most famous stingray death was with Steve Irwin.
How Did Steve Irwin Die? Irwin died in 2006 by a stingray barb to the heart, causing him to bleed to death. Steve Irwin’s stingray accident happened at The Great Barrier Reef in Australian waters.
This kind of occurrence is generally seen as a very rare fluke. Irwin’s daughter, Bindi, said to Larry King she doesn’t resent stingrays because it was a crazy accident. She did say that bees and wasps scare her, but that elevator doors scare her even more. This highlights how those who should be most cautious of these aren’t too worried.
There was news of Steve Irwin’s son, Robert Irwin, swimming with a stingray, but the photo is actually of him swimming with an oceanic manta ray, which does not have a stinger and are harmless.
To belabor the point that stingrays are safe to encounter, consider that 90 people are killed a year from falling out of their beds. While there is inherent risk with any wild animal encounter, it can be argued that it is relatively safe to swim with stingrays.
Can stingrays hurt you? Yes. Stingrays can sting, which is also called a bite. Stingray bites / stings usually only happen as a defensive reaction to being stepped on, and the part of their bodies that do the stinging / biting is not the mouth, teeth, or a stinger like a wasp has. A stingray’s sting happens when the venomous barb in their tail stabs into what it perceives as a threat.
What Happens If You Step On A Stingray?
Swimming or snorkeling with stingrays is much different than walking in shallow waters where stingrays are present. With every step onto the seafloor sand the odds of getting barbed by a stingray increase.
Sting Ray Barb Fast Facts
Stingray barb size can range from a couple of inches to nearly half a foot long, and can cause mechanical injury with the needle sharp tip and even more when it is removed as the backward facing projections (barbs) that run the length of the stinger can break off and cause infections.
Stingray venom can cause chemical burns to the flesh because stingray venom contains a complex mix of toxins, including thermolabile proteins like phosphodiesterases and nucleotidases, degradative enzymes such as hyaluronidases, non-protein components like serotonin, and specialized compounds like cystatins (cysteine proteinase inhibitors), galectin (affecting blood coagulation and muscles), peroxiredoxin-6 (lipid hydrolysis), orpotrin (vasoconstrictive), and porflan (inflammatory).
Randy Lewis, founder of DragonSkin®, a company specializing in stingray-resistant surf boots, shares some insights on when stingray stings occur--typically when walking across the shallow, sandy sea bottom, as opposed to when swimmers or snorkelers venture into deeper waters (which is why it is best to go swimming or snorkeling in the Virgin Islands from a charter boat):
“One thing that is consistent is that stingray injuries almost always occur when a person unwittingly steps on them. They only sting in self defense, but misunderstandings are common because the creatures are bottom feeders and hide by burying themselves in the sand. It is estimated that there are ~50k stingray stings per year in the USA alone.
It's not a good idea to pet stingrays or otherwise touch them as it can result in stings on the body.
One study conducted by Ben Perlman of CSULB STABB lab on Round Stingray behavior shows 85% of stings occur when the middle of the ray has been stepped on, whereas stepping on the edges of the ray usually just results in the ray swimming away. This is why most experts endorse the stingray shuffle to reduce your chances of being stung, which is when you walk by dragging your feet along the sand rather than taking distinct steps, to avoid landing on the middle of an unsuspecting stingray and pinning it down.
What happens when you get stung - it depends. The sting response runs the gamut, from minor to extreme. On average, it's not a permanent injury, but it can be extremely painful for a couple of hours. The barb is coated in a venom, which is not yet well studied. What is understood is that the venom causes extreme pain, the only known remedy for which is soaking the foot in nearly-scalding water, which carries the risk of accidently burning the foot. Some describe the pain from a stingray injury as an extreme throbbing like having your foot hit repeatedly with a hammer or sawed with a chainsaw.
Although stingray stings are incredibly painful, fatalities are very rare.
Steve Irwin's death, although well publicized, was not typical. He died when a Short-Tailed Stingray stung him in the heart. Short-Tailed Stingrays are gigantic--much larger than the typical kinds found near the Virgin Islands.”
Types Of Rays In The Virgin Islands
There are a number of different types of rays in the VI. The most common is the Southern Stingray (Hypanus americanus), pictured below:
Photo credit: Linds & Max Photography
Southern Stingrays are so common that you can almost guarantee you'll see one snorkeling. This ray is often found in shallower sandy bottom areas.
The Spotted Eagle Ray
Less common than the Southern Stingray is the Spotted Eagle Ray, pictured below. While they look like graceful eagles soaring underwater, sometimes they will jump out of the water.
Photo Credit: Linds & Max Photography
Guests who book a USVI or BVI charter boat tour with us still see them occasionally when snorkeling, but they are not as common as the Southern Stingray.
Eagle rays in general are not a specific genus / species ray, but refer to a group of cartilaginous fishes classified under the family Myliobatidae, encompassing genera such as Aetomylaeus and Myliobatis. Eagle Rays tend be seen in open Caribbean ocean waters, and are more graceful swimmers.
Manta Rays, A Rare Sighting In The VI
Less common in the warm Virgin Island waters of the Caribbean than both of the above described types of stingray is the Manta Ray (Mobula birostris), but they are not impossible to see. There have been recorded Manta Ray sightings on Island Roots Charter Boat trips, albeit very rare. In comparison to sting rays, they are much larger - in fact, the Manta Ray is the largest ray in the world. The Manta Ray’s “wing span” can be up to 29 feet across, and they can weigh up to 3000 pounds - roughly the size of a school bus.
Fun Facts About Stingrays
Stingray teeth
While stingray teeth can vary from species to species, one of the most famous pictures circulating the internet is actually of the Cownose Stingray’s (Rhinoptera bonasus) teeth, which look like steamrolled Chiclet dentures. Dr. Sarah Hamylton, who once had an office near the Cambridge Museum of Zoology, where she found a cabinet full of stingray teeth, describes them as “resembling a conveyor belt of tic tac mints neatly lined up.” But it is not the stingray teeth that do the “stinging”. Stingrays do use their teeth to bite and chew what they eat, but stingrays “bite” humans with the venomous barbs situated within their tails.
Stingray Speed
Stingrays can hit a top speed of around 30 mph, which is about the cruising speed of the song birds in your backyard. Underwater this is incredibly fast compared to humans, which can only swim around 5 mph. So if you are swimming with a stingray, they might look like a slow gliding kite going through the wind-like current, but the speeds they can move are dazzling fast. For contrast, the fastest fish in the ocean is a sailfish, which can hit nearly 70 miles per hour (Cheetahs can run 75 mph).
Stingray Pregnancy And Baby Stingrays
Stingray pregnancies are around three months, and out comes an 8 centimeter disk called a pup. It’s sting can be extremely painful, engineered to fend off underwater predators that target vulnerable baby fish.
Stingray Skeleton
Do stingrays have a skeleton? Yes, they do, but it is not made of bone, but cartilage. A picture of the skeleton looks like someone went around large sheet of paper snipping deeply and closely together with a sharp pair of scissors. For some, it may look familiar as it resembles a paper snowflake made during the holidays.
Book a Stingray Focused Tour
If you’re interested in visiting the underwater world where stingrays live, book a charter boat trip with Island Roots, and make sure to highlight how important it is for you to see one. There are never guarantees but if the captain knows that is what you want to see, then a custom trip can be built around increasing the odds of swimming with the stingrays of the Caribbean!