bigGdelta said:
I know the blue ring, like the puffer fish, gets its tetrodotoxin from colonies of symbiotic bacteria. Is this the case with other cephs and do they all use tetrodotoxin or do some manufacture their own venom? and how does the toxicity of the bacteria stand up to the varieties that live in puffers and salmanders? what keeps other bacteria from colonizing the glands?
I believe that the TTX (tetrodotoxin) in bluerings is identical to that in the puffers and salamaders, and comes from the same bacteria. (This is from memory from a wilderness emergency medical reference). I'm pretty sure that the blue ring is the only ceph known to use TTX, and most cephs make another venom (cephalotoxin or something like that) that's very effective on crustaceans but not so much on vertebrates. I'm sure some of the experts around will provide a lot more info, though.... googling for cephalotoxin provides a lot of information if you want to wade through that.
Another question I have is how common the ttx-making bacteria are, and if, for example, you had a tank-raised blue ring, if you could keep it from getting exposed to the bacteria, so its glands would never get the bacteria colonies that make the ttx. Of course, I wouldn't want to be the guy that checks to see if it's lethal or not...