Scientists say Tasmania’s Maugean skate could become extinct – so why are local leaders still backing the salmon industry?

The critically endangered Maugean skate is talked about more often than seen.

A quadrangular ray-like species, it has survived in brackish water on the bottom of Macquarie harbour – an immense body of water on Tasmania’s sparsely populated west coast – for tens of thousands of years. It is not found anywhere else.