# Sticky  Coral Toxicity (beginners must read!)



## jman785

I originally had this posted over at Coral Forum from way back when, but have since posted it on a few other boards, feel free to pin the article if you want mods as I think it serves great importance for all interested in our hobby









Welcome beginner coral enthusiasts!

This thread was created when I used to moderate a saltwater forum, because I had been thinking of the safety of others for once, instead of myself









I have a couple of pointers to point out, that might save your life or keep you from becoming ill when your playing with your reef.

You might think, how is my life endangered when I play with my tank? There are a lot of ways to die or be injured from playing with tanks, electrocution, cut fingers instead of cutting corals, but being poisoned? Is this possible with the reef? If your asking that question in your head, your dang skippy. Because Zoanthids, contain one of the worlds most deadliest toxins called, Palytoxin.

1. When handling Zoanthids (Zoo's, Zoanthus, Zoanthidae, etc.), handle them as few times as you can when fragging them, as they will shed slime in defense of you handling them and cutting at them.

2. ALWAYS wear gloves, NO MATTER WHO DOESN'T WEAR THEM, you remember to ALWAYS wear them because a lot of people are injured and get sick from not wearing them. Cuts on your hand make you even more vulnerable to being exposed to the toxin.

3. Wash your hands when your finished, even if you wore gloves.

4. Keep kids and pets away while your fragging, and never let them handle corals.

5. Sometimes small Nudibranchs (sea slugs) are on Zoanthids. Do not attempt to remove them by hand, because you'll most likely end up being exposed to the toxin. From reports across the web, they are claiming that the Nudibranchs toxins are Palytoxin, that it gets from the Zoanthids...except that its MUCH more concentrated. So refrain from mushing them on the glass to kill them, and just wear gloves, and use a pair of pliers to remove them.

Children particularly would be at risk to this toxin, so please beware, its not just harming pets, its harming humans as well.

Here is a link to RC, where a person by the name of Kevin's dog was killed...

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.p...threadid=158663

This quote was taken from TRI, but was quoted from The Reef Aquarium 2.

A quote from The Reef Aquarium 2 
The Hawaiian zoanthid,Palythoa toxica contains an especially toxic chemical [most likely palytoxin] within its gastric cavity.Bowers and Walsh reported that a student collector had to be hospitalized for several days after accidentally touching a colony to an open wond on his hand. 
The early Hawaiians were aware of the toxic nature of this zoanthid as they used to dip their spear points in them to make wonds made by them fatal.

Other dangerous things

Cone Snails

http://grimwade.biochem.unimelb.edu.au/cone/index1.html
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-07/rs/index.htm
http://www.kingsnake.com/toxinology/conotoxins.html

Nudibranch

Zoanthid Eating Nudibranch
http://zomania.com/index.php?main_page=page_3

Mycobacterium Marinum - The fish disease you can catch!
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2003-07/sp/feature/index.htm - * Be sure to check this out *


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## hyphen

good read. i vaguely remember reading about zoas being poisonous, but i still handled mine without gloves. this is a good precaution to take though if you have other lives that could be in danger.

i'm going to pin this in the reef section


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## jman785

Thanks hyphen,

I have handled zoo's on numerous occasions without gloves...but its only a matter of time before a slip of the rock, and you cut yourself and have an open wound...then you could have a problem with bacterial infections, Palytoxin, etc.

I tried to update the links last night as some were not working, they should all be fine now.


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## Grosse Gurke

Thanks Jared. The only thing I had heard of was the posibility of being bitten by a worm...


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## hyphen

Grosse Gurke said:


> Thanks Jared. The only thing I had heard of was the posibility of being bitten by a worm...


probably referring to bristleworms. big ones can be pretty nasty if you try to pick it up bare handed. never done so myself but i've seen some big ones and was never inclined to try to handle it, lol.


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## His Majesty

thanks for posting this.
was a good read.


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## jman785

Bristleworms are something I totally forgot to mention on there. There sting is nasty. It hurts tremendously...especially big ones. I went diving with a buddy, we were collecting tropicals for our reefs on some steel culverts and he placed his hand on the culvert and I noticed the worms and pointed to him, but it was too late....the pain didn't start right away as we were at about 115 feet and it was chilly, as we were surfacing and got to around 40', the water started to warm up and I heard him screaming underwater and looked at his hands and there were clear indications of the worm stings.


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## His Majesty

nothing is worse than being stung underwater while diving. totally ruins the dive for you.
ive been stung by jellys many a time. went diving while it was breeding season. what a mistake.
my hands and my face were all stung. ruined the whole dive, especially afterwords


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## ballistic

k you just scared the shiet out of me..LOL might as well stick to live rocks..LOL

well read and understood..
thanks man


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