well it could be the same reason 1 of my h.longimanus died. some kind of bettle or fly must have laid an egg and the larva got in and eaten it from the inside out. when i discovered it dead it look normal but when i turn it around there was a gaping hole near the genital opecolum.

what made it is still a mystery.

selling high level scorpions to unknown buyers. this debate has rages on since the dawn of the scorpion hobby went commercial.

"no, newbies cant handle high level species until they understand the animal and the risk that is involved" one party might say.

"how do we know when they are able to buy and kept such species" another party might argue.

it's a chicken and egg thing. and basicly arguing about it doesn't bring any good to either parties since there is no agreement on both parties.

on 1 hand there are hobbyist who are "caring" to newbies that they are trying to protect them from the harm of owning a high level species and to protect the hobby itself.

on the other hand there are hobbyist who are keen to share new species which are high level to the community but are put off by the hideous cost, and risk that are involved in bringing the scorpions here. not to mention the backlash they received when trying to cover the cost by selling the species.

like i said earlier it is a chicken or egg scenario.

furthermore when we are trying to educate the public about scorpions, indirectly we are publicizing the hobby. and when things gets publicized there will be interested party who wants to join in. these are the people who can be divided into 2 groups.

a) really interested in keeping scorpions.
b) impulse keepers trying to look cool.

group a we welcome. group be we do not.

so which path should we take. increasingly educate the public and get the hobby more mainstream and draw these 2 kind of people or just let the hobby turn underground so a selective few would enjoy it.

it's our choice gentlemen.

Part 1. understanding toxins

wikipeida give us what toxin is

A toxin (Greek: t??????, toxikon) is a poisonous substance produced by living cells or organisms[1][2] (although humans are technically living organisms, man-made substances created by artificial processes usually aren't considered toxins by this definition).

For a toxic substance not produced by living organisms, "toxicant" is the more appropriate term, and "toxics" is an acceptable plural[citation needed].

why did i bring up toxins in here and not go directly to venom or poison since it is more related to scorpions?

simple

venom is a toxin same as poison.

the different is the place where it originally arrives. is it from animal,plants, or chemicals.

there are a variety of toxins but i'm just going to cover the normal toxins which are normally found in scorpions which are neurotoxins venom and only 1 species that has a hemotoxin venom which is Hemiscorpius lepturus.

to state all the available toxins in a scorpion venom would take a large amount of time and space hence this article is a condense version of what i can find on the internet and through the books and journals that i have read and reading.

what are neurotoxins?

wikipedia give us this definition

A neurotoxin is a toxin that acts specifically on nerve cells (neurons), usually by interacting with membrane proteins such as ion channels.

in short any type of venom or poison that attacks the nerve cells.

most scorpions have neurotoxins and so does snakes,some marine animals, spiders, and other family of animals.

the way that neurotoxin works is by attacking the protein membrane of the nerve cells either by disrupting the transmission and receiving of nerve impulses from the brain or causing the nerve cells to fire their own nerve impulse regardless of the brain own nerve impuls.

in the 1st scenario where the toxin blocks the tranmission and receiving of nerve impluses the most common effects are paralysis in which the envenomate victims loose control over their body and are paralyse yet are concious but unable to speak or move. death is usually cause by the paralyses of the lung and heart tissue.

in the 2nd scenario the toxin cause rapid nerve pulses to be transmitted by all the nerve cells and overloading the spinal chord and brain which usually leads to seizures and passing out. death is usually cause by brain damage but is rare unless the toxin is delivered in a large dose or have a high LD50 number.

for further reading of the way neurotoxins works please go to

how neurotoxins works (caution alot of weird words in there)

what is hemotoxins?

again wikipedia is my soure which gives us

Hemotoxins, haemotoxins or hematotoxins are toxins that destroy red blood cells (that is, cause hemolysis), disrupt blood clotting, and/or cause organ degeneration and generalized tissue damage. The term hemotoxin is to some degree a misnomer since toxins that damage the blood also damage other tissues. Injury from a hemotoxic agent is often very painful and can cause permanent damage. Loss of an affected limb is possible even with prompt treatment.

in simpler terms toxins that destroy cells. the toxins rapidly spreads using the blood stream as a medium as transport and as it travels it will actually destroy cells which willl lead to severe bleeding and necrosis. death usually occours due to the plummeting of the victims blood preasure cause by the bleeding when the cell structures ruptures which stresses the heart which causes cardiac arrest or the toxin reaches the heart and destroys it.

some famous animals that have hematoxins are the viper family,spiders, and the one and only scorpion species which is the Hemiscorpius lepturus which is native to Iran.

if anybody is curios what is necrosis here is a picture of necrosis on a boy that have been bitten by a Fer de Lance(a snake with a nasty hemotoxic venom) and was not treated with antivenin but antibiotic for 2 weeks

.

so end chapter 1 what is toxins. chapter 2. LD50, what is it and how do they get the numbers. please discuss the 1st chapter and any questions or suggestions are appreciated..

the crazy demon.

kuwy86 the picture u see of the really bad necrosis on the leg is cause by the bite form a snake called the Fer deLance (Bothrops lanceolatus). it belongs to the pit viper family.

---

Added on April 14, 2010, 4:21 pmbtw ryo , the picture u showed is a case of the venom being injected intra-subcutaneously which means the venom never actually went into the muscle and it eats away at the skin layers.

my picture of necrosis is a classic example of intra-muscular venom delivery.

This post has been edited by akagidemon: Apr 14 2010, 04:21 PM

damaged my left finger. nearly cut the finger off. article on ld50 will be on hold for awhile since i can only type with 1 hand. will try my best to finish it asap.

the tail looks like a hairy penis.

better dont even think of doing it if u have no idea on how to milk them. u can either

a: kill them

or

b: kill urself

in the process.

somehow, no matter how many times i try to keep in my mind that this is a scorpion it still looks like a piece of coal with legs on it.

have to back of from the drugs i think.

confirm dead and has been preserve with either formalin or alcohol. can see the discoloration on the joints due to immersion in such chemicals

Ld50. wtf is it and why it is there.

let start from the beginning. in the times before LD50, it was hard for scientist and doctor to know the lethality of drugs and medicines use to treat patiences. so a fellow named J.W Trevan develope the LD50 test in 1927 and since using "death" as the target allows comparisson between chemicals that poison the body in very different ways. since 1927 there are other types of methods in determining the median lethal dose which are far more accurate and faster the the one develope by J.W. Trevan.

What does LD50 means.

LD50 is an acronym for lethal dose 50%. some call it median lethal dose. but what ever they call it it means a simple thing. a lethal dose that was given to a number of test subject that killed 50% of the test subjects. usually mice and rats.While LD50 is great to determine the median lethal dose it only measures short term potential of a certain chemical. LD50 is usually expressed in mg/kg to the body weight of the test animals.

You may ask "but mice and rats are only a few hundreds gram in weight per subject". that is true but the solution is simple just weight the total weight if the rats and u get the kg part of the ld50 equation.

How ld50 test gets done.

In nearly all cases, LD50 tests are performed using a pure form of the chemical. Mixtures are rarely studied. just pure chemical forms except for venom research.

The chemical may be given to the animals by mouth (oral); by applying on the skin (dermal); by injection at sites such as the blood veins (i.v.- intravenous), muscles (i.m. - intramuscular) or into the abdominal cavity (i.p. - intraperitoneal).

The LD50 value obtained at the end of the experiment is identified as the LD50 (oral), LD50 (skin), LD50 (i.v.), etc., as appropriate. Researchers can do the test with any animal species but they use rats or mice most often. Other species include dogs, hamsters, cats, guinea-pigs, rabbits, and monkeys. In each case, the LD50 value is expressed as the weight of chemical administered per kilogram body weight of the animal and it states the test animal used and route of exposure or administration; e.g., LD50 (oral, rat) - 5 mg/kg, LD50 (skin, rabbit) - 5 g/kg. So, the example "LD50 (oral, rat) 5 mg/kg" means that 5 milligrams of that chemical for every 1 kilogram body weight of the rat, when administered in one dose by mouth, causes the death of 50% of the test group.

so is everyone clear on the concept of LD50?

good. if not please re-read the article slowly.


so how is ld50 important to us?

in simple terms it let us know how lethal a certain species of animal or chemical is. and it also helps the doctors to come up with a treatment plan for us if we ever had the unfortunate luck to be stung or poison.

i'm sorry for the delay of my article. i had work and my health was failing me. i hope any question can be answered by the comunity.

akagidemon signing off.

did sumone say longimanus...

i'm interested to see any picture of the specimen.

ermmm remember the risk of allergic reaction to the venom.even a hetrometrus spinifer can kill u if ur allergic to the venom.

can i butt in the arguement. as a trained 1st aider under the malaysian red cross, there are times when elevating a sting or bite area is necessary.

but in the case of c.excluda i dont think there will be any difference if u raise or not the area which have been stung since the venom is injected subdermal which means it is injected under the skin and into muscle tissue and not into blood veins. so the risk of the poison spreading through the blood vessels are slim unless you are unlucky enough to be stung intravenously in which the poison can travel very rapidly around the body.

one reason i can think of why they recommend elevating the stung area is to reduce blood flow to the area in order to negate additional swelling cause by the poison.