Sometimes when I’m out looking for insects to photograph, I see other things. Imagine a creature sporting a neurotoxin hundreds of times more deadly than cyanide in sufficient quantities to kill a full grown man. And it’s common in our area.
The Rough Skinned Newt (Taricha granulosa) sports the same toxin that makes the pufferfish and harlequin poison-dart frogs so deadly, tetrodotoxin. I wasn’t at all familiar with this species until I had the pleasure of seeing several in a slackwater portion of the Van Duzen River periodically surface, breathe and almost disappear among the dead leaves lining the riverbed.
According to the Seattle Times, a 29-year-old man in Oregon swallowed one on a dare and died within hours. The toxin interferes with the transmission of nerve impulses, causing progressive numbness, paralysis and eventually cardio pulmonary failure. There is no known antidote. Fortunately, the toxin does not transmit through skin, which is why children have played with them with no ill effect. It is totally a defensive weapon.
The newts have two known natural enemies: the common garter snake and other larger rough skinned newts, both of which have a limited tolerance for the poison.
So, if you’re out and about and see a dark-backed, orange-bellied salamander, keep your pets and kids away from it — all in all it’s probably best for everyone to just let it go its own way.
This article appears in Bluffing.
A scientist scratched back of tdx newt,poked himself,his arm went numb.a Mexican soldier handled guts of puffer fish went into coma.an author wade Davis wrote ethnopharmacological basis of zombies,another scientist found tdx to be analgesic like morphine.davis said witch(boker) sells toxin to abused wife,abusive man dies.boker goes to grave(in Haiti they bury them promptly) hammers ground with giant mallet,dead wakes up for a 1st meal of sweet potato with scopolomine(Yerba de diablo,jimsonweed,tolovachi, lives rest of life,maintained on scopolomine,disassociated,as a zombie cutting sugar cane.japanese eat puffer(fugu) and get high.one woke up on trolley into creamatorium.giglamesh found plant that restores youth.phytoplankton.
Book:secrete life of plants..proves plants and humans share telepathic powers.