Manta rays are large, intelligent elasmobranches increasingly affected by tourism pressure at cleaning stations, bycatch in fisheries, and targeted hunting for gill plates. Evidence-based guidelines protect both ray welfare and the quality of tourism interactions.
Repeated harassment at cleaning stations causes manta rays to abandon vital parasite removal behaviour, accumulating ectoparasite loads that impair health. Tour operators who allow or encourage touching cause welfare harm that compounds across the thousands of diver interactions these site-faithful animals experience annually. Best-practice tourism guidelines — maintain one metre distance, no touching, no flash photography, limit group size to six divers per ray — reduce disturbance while maintaining sustainable viewing. Targeted hunting for gill plates threatens population viability, eliminating long-lived individuals with decades of reproductive potential.