Stingrays inhabit warm temperate and tropical waters, sometimes in great abundance. They are bottom dwellers and often lie partially buried in the shallows. Stingrays eat worms, mollusks, and other invertebrates, sometimes badly damaging valuable shellfish beds. They lash their tails when stepped on, and large stingrays can exert enough force to drive their tail spines into a wooden boat. The spines cause serious, extremely painful wounds that, if abdominal, may result in death.
Certain other rays may also possess tail spines. Some of the manta rays and eagle rays are so armed. The latter, forming the family Myliobatidae, comprise several genera found in warm and temperate coastal waters. They have very long, slim tails and, unlike other rays, have heads that project beyond the body disk. Notable members of this family include the spotted duckbilled ray (Aetobatus narinari), a large Atlantic and Pacific species that can cause deep wounds with its tail spines, and the bat stingray (Myliobatis californicus), a Pacific form noted for its depredations on the shellfish of San Francisco Bay.