Photos of Taricha torosa sierr........aahhhhhh!! -- pin pin!!

[paris]

i figured id better post these before pin pin attacked me for not doing so....so....ok here is my final project for the outdoor subjects. i used T t sierrae since they are so under represented in pictures. i have alot of good shots i never had time to go over since i was running short on time to turn it in. the first shot had to be full sun, the second cloudy, then 4 with varying composition then 3 with different depths of field (i threw in 2 more though) and finally my best shot last.

tell me this one isnt flipping me the bird!

hopefully these offerings will appease the great volcano god 'pin pin' for a while........

 

[joseph]

Very nice! Was he just out and crawling around as tarichas usually do?

 

[clarence]

Heheh, so stately. I think I saw aphoto of Winston Churchhill that resembles that last photo.

"And now, his honour, Prime Minister Tarichas..."

 

[paris]

joseph -im in colorado these are from the cali/nevada border, they are mine-i used 3 newts to do these pictures so that when one started getting antsy id use another.

 

[pin-pin]

About time there were some Taricha photos!

Those are beautiful! Absolutely heavenly brown.

*volcano god goes back to sleep in the chat room....

 

[paris]

here are some more i cleaned up but didnt use

(Message edited by paris on July 04, 2004)

 

[joeri]

Very nice pictures!

Reminds me of a documentary I saw on national geography last weekend. It featured a Taricha granulosa (Rough-skinned Newt). I saw it being eaten by a giant frog. He swallowed it as a whole, but 2 minutes later the frog was dead, killed by the newts toxics. And then it was pure magic; like Hoodinie the newt escaped from the frogs stomac!

I was wondering if this is common for all Taricha or just the rough skinned.

 

[TJ]

National Geographic? Can you provide the name of the program? That sounds pretty amazing and I'd love to get ahold of a tape of it

 

[paris]

joeri-
the toxic ablities are true for the whole genus Taricha -all of them are highly toxic. i have a little report i did on the toxins...lemme see if i can find it- i think its on my computer at work.

 

[joeri]

Tim, I have no idea; I only saw a fragment of the program. The subject was something with toxics. First I saw some animals using toxics for defense, like the rough skinned newt; and after that came a part in which humans use toxics to heal people.

If I see it again, I'll try to remember the name of the show.

Anyway, now I see why Paris says "don't eat the newts" LOL

 

[paris]

well a few days ago my boss decided to update our computers at work -so my file (along with alot of other important stuff) was lost....but i do have a hard copy of the report-so here it is -.....



ON THE TRAIL OF TTX

It has long been known (~2500 BC Egypt/China)that the Fugu fish, a valued food item in china, were poisonous. Since most people who ate the fish lived, experiments were conducted in 1882 to identify which part of the fish was the source of the poison. It was found that the toxin-called Tetrodotoxin (TTX)-was mostly in the gonads (ovaries).

In 1911 the first isolation of TTX was achieved. Around WWII experiments in taricha toxin (found in North American newts of the genus Taricha) showed it blocked oxygen consumption in brain cells. Before that time it was thought that TTX inhibited glucose metabolism by brain tissue, now it is shown to be linked to sodium ion movement. Observations on those who injested TTX showed that they exhibited consciousness till shortly before death because TTX does'nt cross the blood/brain barrier. It was noted that despite TTX being 10,000 times more lethal than cyanide, it exists in many diverse organisms.

TTX is one of the few animal toxins not to be protein based. There are three mysteries concerning the natural occurrence of TTX. One of these was how it came to exist in animals in 4 different Phyla (chordata, mollusca, arthropoda and echinodermata). Another is why only a few selected species of these phyla contain it. A third mystery centers around the fact that others have similar yet mostly impotent forms.

The biogenesis of TTX is a matter of much controversy and is still unknown in most. It was observed that captive fish lost their toxicity in areas of high concentration, the livers and gonads, but their bodies manifested it in skin and muscle tissue in small amounts. This pointed to the assumption that they obtained TTX from their environment. The food chain was the major suspect for this and this was supported by the fact that predatory species had some of the highest concentrations. This assumption didn't however explain why some related species had it and others didn't.

The discovery of a new bacterium recently that produces TTX helps to support the food chain/concentration theory. It was questioned then that perhaps then it was not just the food chain it was the animals own gut bio-warfare involved. A new strain was isolated from bacteria cultures from the Fugu fish intestines. To date no bacteria has been named in newts or other non-marine species that 'produce' TTX.

The toxin TTX is now moving from the status of deadly poison to therapeutic drug. The classification of TTX as a neurotoxin allows for it to be used in such research as epilepsy, neurogenic pain and multiple sclerosis.

 

[TJ]

I was doing some work today relating to a case of pufferfish poisoning in Indonesia and came across this mention on a U.S. Food & Drug Administration site of a case of somebody having died from swallowing a Taricha

"There have been several reported poisonings from mislabelled pufferfish and at least one report of a fatal episode when an individual swallowed a California newt."

http://vm.cfsan.fda.gov/~mow/chap39.html

 

[TJ]

S. G. Bradley, and L. J. Klika
A fatal poisoning from the Oregon rough-skinned newt (Taricha granulosa)
Journal of the American Medical Association 246: 247.

(Message edited by TJ on July 21, 2004)

 

[nesaraj]

Awesome pics! Cute newts! They seem to enjoy posing!

 

[liz]

Paris, that is a really nice summary of how little is known about TTX. Some evidence suggests bacteria are a source in puffer fish and maybe some other species, but it's hotly debated. My research shows that there are no bacteria at living within the toxic tissues of Taricha granulosa so bacteria are unlikely the source of TTX in newts. Newts also don't lose their toxicity in captivity like some puffer fish, so it sure seems like they probably make it on their own somehow.

 

[nesaraj]

I thought this list of references I compiled (albeit in a rush) should help those who are interested in TTX. In general, the articles support the claim that newts synthesize their own TTX, and that they affect NA+ channels.


(1) Tsuruda K, Arakawa O, Kawatsu K, Hamano Y, Takatani T, Noguchi T.
"Secretory glands of tetrodotoxin in the skin of the Japanese newt Cynops pyrrhogaster."
Toxicon. 2002 Feb;40(2):131-6.

(2) Huey RB, Moody WJ.
"Neuroscience and evolution. Snake sodium channels resist TTX arrest."
Science. 2002 Aug 23;297(5585):1289-90.

(3) Hanifin CT, Brodie ED 3rd, Brodie ED Jr.
"A predictive model to estimate total skin tetrodotoxin in the newt Taricha granulosa."
Toxicon. 2004 Mar 1;43(3):243-9.

(4) Hanifin CT, Brodie ED 3rd, Brodie ED Jr.
"A predictive model to estimate total skin tetrodotoxin in the newt Taricha granulosa."
Toxicon. 2004 Mar 1;43(3):243-9.



(5) Kaneko Y, Matsumoto G, Hanyu Y.
"TTX resistivity of Na+ channel in newt retinal neuron".
Biochem Biophys Res Commun. 1997 Nov 26;240(3):651-6.

 

[TJ]

Also check the references on toxicity at Beth Skwarecki's site:

http://www.loxosceles.org/newts/disease.shtml

 

[larah]

Hi, I'm not sure if it's the same National Geographic program you're thinking of, but I saw the clip you're talking about where the bullfrog eats the taricha. The show I saw it on was National Geographic's Most Amazing Moments - Unexpected Killers. They count down the top ten, and it's things like baboons eating flamingos, hornets killing bees, weird stuff like that. #3 is the bullfrog eating birds, mice, scorpions, etc. and then #2 is the bullfrog eating the taricha, dying, and the taricha walking out of it's mouth. I think #1 was something about hippos.