NanoCube-boy
New member
Corbinwaltz, Did you where gloves?
Zoanthids are they toxic?
- Thread starter kevin_kramer
- Start date
Icefire
Seasoned reefer
Here's a response from Yuzuru Shimizu who made 2 study about Palytoxin:
I asked about toxicity and the relation between Paly and dinoflagelate Ostereopsis that produce palytoxin.
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Stephane:
Don't worry. You won't be hurt with the zoanthus in aquarium. Even if
it is toxic, enough toxin will not come into your body. The toxicity
of Palythoa varies. I collected a large amount in Puerto Rico with no
ill effect. However, it is always a good practice to wear rubber
gloves, because many marine organisms are cause of allergic reactions.
As to Ostereopsis, it produces a small amount of palytoxin analogues,
but it is not known if they are the source of palytoxin in Palythoa.
Again, you have to grow thousands of liters to get visible amounts of
them. We grew one time thousand of liters, but found very little
toxins.
Yuzuru Shimizu, Ph.D., D. Pharm. Sci. (Hon.)
Omar-Youngken Distinguished Chair Emeritus of Natural Product Chemistry
Professor Emeritus of Biomedical & Pharmaceutical Sciences,
College of Pharmacy, University of Rhode Island
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I asked about toxicity and the relation between Paly and dinoflagelate Ostereopsis that produce palytoxin.
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Stephane:
Don't worry. You won't be hurt with the zoanthus in aquarium. Even if
it is toxic, enough toxin will not come into your body. The toxicity
of Palythoa varies. I collected a large amount in Puerto Rico with no
ill effect. However, it is always a good practice to wear rubber
gloves, because many marine organisms are cause of allergic reactions.
As to Ostereopsis, it produces a small amount of palytoxin analogues,
but it is not known if they are the source of palytoxin in Palythoa.
Again, you have to grow thousands of liters to get visible amounts of
them. We grew one time thousand of liters, but found very little
toxins.
Yuzuru Shimizu, Ph.D., D. Pharm. Sci. (Hon.)
Omar-Youngken Distinguished Chair Emeritus of Natural Product Chemistry
Professor Emeritus of Biomedical & Pharmaceutical Sciences,
College of Pharmacy, University of Rhode Island
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
tkeracer619
New member
Why do you keep posting that? Thousands of liters and Puerto Rico. Thats just a small part of the whole cookie. They found very little...... to me that means they found some even in a few thousand liters of water. How can one be so certain off this study that you wont get hurt. I think you should really look at who you take your advice from. Any scientist who speeks of something and says words that signal 100% (all, won't ...) from a small study then says they found minimal amounts in the same study, to me, falsifies any and all of his statements.
The second link in this thread. I suggest you read it.
http://www.cbwinfo.com/Biological/Toxins/Palytoxin.html
Last edited:
Icefire
Seasoned reefer
theracer619 I posted that link. If you read it:
Source
Palytoxin was first isolated from the soft coral Palythoa toxica. Several species of Palythoa are used in aquariums, but do not produce the toxin. Originally, it was only found in a single tidal pool on the island of Maui in Hawaii and native Hawaiians used to coat spear points with a red seaweed from the pool. Toxin-containing corals appear to be randomly and sparingly distributed throughout the South Pacific and there is now a school of thought that suggests that the coral is simply concentrating the toxin made by a dinoflagellate (a small single-celled organism) called Ostreopis siamensis
Source
Palytoxin was first isolated from the soft coral Palythoa toxica. Several species of Palythoa are used in aquariums, but do not produce the toxin. Originally, it was only found in a single tidal pool on the island of Maui in Hawaii and native Hawaiians used to coat spear points with a red seaweed from the pool. Toxin-containing corals appear to be randomly and sparingly distributed throughout the South Pacific and there is now a school of thought that suggests that the coral is simply concentrating the toxin made by a dinoflagellate (a small single-celled organism) called Ostreopis siamensis
cmb88
New member
firstly i have been following this thread since day one. I am so sorry fot yuor loss...I just wanted to put my thoughts down. I am a vet tech who has been in the field 8 yrs of animal emergencies. I have seen almost every intoxication in dogs that you can imagine...
IMO small dogs in particular are more suseptible to toxicity in what they eat. they are like little vacumes turn your back for a min and pow!! what did they eat?
I am also a molecular cellular biologist and i promise i will do more research and bring my zoos to the lab etc..I will let you know what i find..a lot of my peers travel around the world researching these types of corals etc..(lucky bastards lol)
I am not debating that there is a toxin, or that animals and some people (especially those with sensitive skin etc) can be harmed...but....
here we go...
When an owner comes into my hospital complaining of one syptom or what they think happened..99% of the time they either got into something else as well and or there are 4-5 other problems with their animal they were not aware of. This is why detailed histories are important.
My point is for all we know the dog was in the back yard ate rat bait 3 days before or did drink the water and got sick, or ate human food got salminela sp?, or went to the river three weeks ago ate a raw salmon and got toxicity (takes 2-3 weeks for symptoms)..or was older had renal failure to begin with, etc..was the dog vomiting? did he appear drunk? Walking around eyes blinking etc? What was the body temp?
I think we all need to be careful duhh wash your hands dont let kids or animals drink your tank water etc..but we do not need to become scared..I have a tank with all zoo's all kinds..I am a dirty girl who works in animal feces all day soo my cleanliness level is slightly altered lol, but i can tell you i have smoked after not washing my hands, sipped some water accidently siphoning, etc..If you get a rash etc..pull them out try again..
I am glad for all these threads etc..education is a good thing..lets just try to be level headed..
As a tech I wish i could pick your brain go through it all with you, and I wish the veterinarian would post some more info, but as a fellow animal lover and owner, I feel for your loss and hope you well!!
Thanks just my .02 cents!!
IMO small dogs in particular are more suseptible to toxicity in what they eat. they are like little vacumes turn your back for a min and pow!! what did they eat?
I am also a molecular cellular biologist and i promise i will do more research and bring my zoos to the lab etc..I will let you know what i find..a lot of my peers travel around the world researching these types of corals etc..(lucky bastards lol)
I am not debating that there is a toxin, or that animals and some people (especially those with sensitive skin etc) can be harmed...but....
here we go...
When an owner comes into my hospital complaining of one syptom or what they think happened..99% of the time they either got into something else as well and or there are 4-5 other problems with their animal they were not aware of. This is why detailed histories are important.
My point is for all we know the dog was in the back yard ate rat bait 3 days before or did drink the water and got sick, or ate human food got salminela sp?, or went to the river three weeks ago ate a raw salmon and got toxicity (takes 2-3 weeks for symptoms)..or was older had renal failure to begin with, etc..was the dog vomiting? did he appear drunk? Walking around eyes blinking etc? What was the body temp?
I think we all need to be careful duhh wash your hands dont let kids or animals drink your tank water etc..but we do not need to become scared..I have a tank with all zoo's all kinds..I am a dirty girl who works in animal feces all day soo my cleanliness level is slightly altered lol, but i can tell you i have smoked after not washing my hands, sipped some water accidently siphoning, etc..If you get a rash etc..pull them out try again..
I am glad for all these threads etc..education is a good thing..lets just try to be level headed..
As a tech I wish i could pick your brain go through it all with you, and I wish the veterinarian would post some more info, but as a fellow animal lover and owner, I feel for your loss and hope you well!!
Thanks just my .02 cents!!
Last edited:
Thanks for sharing this, I know it must have been hard to loose your dog.
If its any consolation, it looks as though by sharing your loss you are spurring others to prevent further loss, I know that I am going to be sure to keep my tanks and corals out of my dogs reach (Any animal that would eat a light bulb would assuredly eat a coral)
If its any consolation, it looks as though by sharing your loss you are spurring others to prevent further loss, I know that I am going to be sure to keep my tanks and corals out of my dogs reach (Any animal that would eat a light bulb would assuredly eat a coral)
Tang Salad
Algae skeptic
Interesting thread everyone. 
How many species of Palythoa are there? And aren't more than "several" kept in aquariua?
It seems that both of these citations are underestimating the large variety of zoa/paly/proto in home aquaria.
How many species of Palythoa are there? And aren't more than "several" kept in aquariua?
It seems that both of these citations are underestimating the large variety of zoa/paly/proto in home aquaria.
I hear someone in Thailand poured hot water in a very large container to kill some Aiptasia and a small colony of green palys were effected by the hot water, the steam resulted from the hot water was somehow mixed and created fumes which put this guy in bed for 2 days. Thats paly toxin for ya.
surf406386
New member
I have seen a similair story on a German family who got sick after the owner of the tank decided to remove some Zoanthids from his tank. The (german) report is floating somewhere on the internet can't recall where I saw it.
NanoCube-boy
New member
dang...
NanoCube-boy
New member
My case. There aren't gloves that will fit my hand perfectly. I have small hands of a 10 years of age, and gloves doesn't fit me well. Any tips?
Kreeger1
KING LEAR
I've heard from other local reefers regarding said dead dog. I was at the swap where he left to go see his dog. From what others have said the dog was old, way over weight and in bad health for the start. So we could have been following a myth of the dead dog for years now. Im not saying it didn't happen, just that theres a lot of other reason it could of happened.
Erik
Erik
It DOES happen. A worker at the local LFS was fragging zoas for their online store and apparently did not wash his hands before he went out back and smoked a cig. After a little bit he got really sick and they thought he had food poisoning. One way or another they narrowed it down and it was zoa poisoning.
kevin_kramer
New member
The dog was 5 years old and in perfect health. Was it poly toxin? I do not know - never will. The dog was just fine when I left to go to the swap and after an hour or so she was extremely sick and she was dead in hours.
cook
New member
I have made many zoo frags w/o any ill effects. I have been squirted in the eye. My eye turned red for a few days and became sore.
But one day I left to a friends house to do some fragging. We handled a lot of zoas that day. afterward on the way home I became very sweaty and ill. I started throwing up a lot with slight hallucinations. this lasted about 4 hours and then I was fine. I do not know if the zoas caused this but I was not in contact with anything else. Please remember that these things do what they can to keep from being eaten. Most ocean preds and cold blooded therefore toxins have to be potent to work quickly.
But one day I left to a friends house to do some fragging. We handled a lot of zoas that day. afterward on the way home I became very sweaty and ill. I started throwing up a lot with slight hallucinations. this lasted about 4 hours and then I was fine. I do not know if the zoas caused this but I was not in contact with anything else. Please remember that these things do what they can to keep from being eaten. Most ocean preds and cold blooded therefore toxins have to be potent to work quickly.
palytoxin is only found in the coral palythoa toxica, no other zoanthid carries palytoxin. people and animals may have allergic reactions to other chemicals released by zoanthids when they are stressed or cut and this could also lead to death.
The dog in this story wasn't killed by palytoxin, the dog took around about 12 hours to die. If it was playtoxin the dog would have died in 5 minutes as the article posted earlier in this thread states
The dog in this story wasn't killed by palytoxin, the dog took around about 12 hours to die. If it was playtoxin the dog would have died in 5 minutes as the article posted earlier in this thread states
