I was just moving around some live rock around the zoos, after taking my hand out of the tank, I had this tingling in my fingers, which progressed to a burning about a half hour later. All is well now, but still pretty scarry. Just a word of advice, wear gloves whenever you put your hands in the tank. I won't make that mistake again.
Doesn't sound like the zoanthids were the actual culprits in your case (even a slight dose of palytoxin would be MUCH more severe), more likely you brushed up against a common bristleworm or some other "stinging" animal -- but for some people those can be just as dangerous if they have an allergic reaction.
I know a guy who will sometimes require an epinephrine injection to keep breathing if he touches a bubble-tip anemone due to a severe allergic reaction (sucks for him because he runs an LFS ... and it's happened to him more than once). I doubt many of the stinging/poisonous critters in our tanks, or their respective chemical compounds, are accounted for in a typical allergy scratch at your local clinic so allergies are something everyone should watch out for.
Allergies aside, wearing gloves is still a good piece of advice to follow, especially when working with potentially toxic species such as zoanthids or palythoa polyps. Palytoxin isn't something you ever want in your body -- read the Wikipedia article for a brief but scary description of what awaits the careless aquarist who sticks his fingers in his mouth while fragging his zoanthid colony!
in order to be affected by it, do we need to like lick our hands orlike if we have and open wound? or just coming in contact with any skin? and is we get poisoned..can we still live or is there no chance of survival?
Lucas, thanks for the information, and Mark, I really have no idea how it works, maybe someone on here can give you the answer, and then we would both know.
These toxins are very real... and some I'm sure have severe reactions to it especially after repeated exposure. BUT... on several occasions I have gotten the juice on my lips and have not felt a thing. Juice from palythoa and zoanthids.
The stupidist thing I've ever down was to start a daily siphon on a QT tank (while I had a shattered tooth) to clean the tank of a fish ended up having myco..... I'm lucky.
I bet you wont do that again Renee. I guess there are alot of things in our tanks that can be harmful if we take them for granted, but if we can learn from each others mistakes, and knowlege, we will all become better at our hobby
I don't think the palytoxin is normally found in the seawater the polyp uses to inflate itself, it's actually found in the mucus layer that the polyp produces and coats itself with.
Many cnidarians produce a slimy mucus coating for various reasons (collecting/clumping surface detritus, warding off competitors, killing algae from growing on the surface, etc...) but you really notice it during fragging when the specimen is out of the water.
Even if you're not working with zoanthids, the layer of slime on any coral is usually a microbial soup that can harbor dangerous bacteria as well as other toxins depending on the species of the coral -- Vibrio and Mycobacterium infections seem to be the most common ones reported by reef aquarists. Thus: always wash your hands and make use of activated carbon or polyfilters on your prop tanks to keep the level of harmful dissolved organic compounds to a minimum.
Yes your right... it's the "snot" that very well may contain the toxin... but when ya rip a polyp up with your nails I'm pretty sure that would be the time the chemicals will be released.
i have a friend that use to rip the polyps with her finger nails... she was all broke out from it. i suggest using gloves if you are going to be handling your corals for any reason.
__________________ Sheli Jo Reefkeeping is an Addiction, not a Hobby!
In a fragging technique article last year on ZoaID.com the author recommended wearing not only gloves but also a face shield or visor so you don't get squirted in the face by a polyp you accidentally squeezed too hard or bent the wrong way during the fragging procedure.
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