Enhancement Idea: Catfsh stings

[catfishchaos]

I was on arachnoboards (I keep a few tarantulas) and was checking out the scorpion sting report forum, would a forum of a similar nature be a good idea? People could report the Sting or injury, side effects, species, how it happened ect...

I'm not saying people should play darts with Corydoras sp, but I think it would be a good resource to get an Idea of what to expect from different species.

Just an Idea though!

Regards
James

[Bas Pels]

The idea might be sensible, but I think not that much knowledge can be found. For instance, I once picked up a wild Corydoras paleatus from the Rio Uruguay wrongly, and it burned for an hour.

But it was a high dorsal one, and might very well one day turn out to be another species. Further, had you made the same mistake, it might have burned for two hours, or half an hour - I think we humans are not that similar.

Further, there are people who like to show off with pets. I would hate it when people would keep a certain kind of catfish just because it has highly toxic venom - as seems to be common with snakes. I would prefer not to help them.

[catfishchaos]

All good points!

I know reactions differ from person to person and that there are those people out their who try to make themselves more interesting through keeping dangerous animals (Not saying that people with venomous animals don't care about them, I'm just acknowledging a audience in the venomous community).

Just an idea though.

[Jools]

It's not something I directly plan to add (as pretty much all catfish can sting) however I will make sure the dangerous ones are noted.

There will also be a "catfish defence" article posted to Shane's World later this year which covers the topic in more detail. It is being published in PFK magazine, next month.

Jools