Speaking of Conus striatus and contact stings,...

In my last years in the Navy, I kept two aquariums with different venomous cones
in each. One had several C. textile and was used to empty other shells by way of
feeding the cones.

The other had a C. striatus which lived in it for more than a year before I took
it back to the ocean. In the time it was there, I fed it several 'skipper' fish;
these could be found in the splash zone and caught rather easily.

As Kay Peterson described, its initial feeding pattern was by hunting through
the aquarium with its waving siphon and extended proboscis out in front as it
went. When the tip of its proboscis touched the fish, it blasted its harpoon
into its prey incredibly quick. It held onto the radular tooth while the fish
bolted and twitched; that last very few seconds, and was clear testimony to the
potentcy of the venom! Then, as already described, it extended its gut and
engulfed the now quiescent meal. It remained partly buried in the sand for two
or three weeks before disgorging a mucus-encapsulated blob (for lack of a better
word).

The odd part of its behaviour showed about 6 months later,... On spearing its
meal, it let go of the fish! Then, it clamly moved about the aquarium until it
located the paralyzed fish and took it in for digesting. The cone, it seems, was
"aware" that it was in a closed area from which the prey could not escape,
either. I certainly was amazed to see this apparent display of "consciousness"
on the part of a marine snail!

Saving an even odder event for last,... Before "learning" to let go of its
harpoon, there was a case where it was stalking a meal in the tank, with siphon
out and flared open, proboscis at the ready. As it got close to the fish, both
siphon and proboscis were moving about when,.... Pow!, it shot its own siphon!
As if that wasn't laughable enough, it next tried to pull itself into its own
stomach. This has to sound absurd (in the early '70s, video cameras were not
available and I have no footage to back it up) but the C. striatus did not
poison itself. I had to leave for duty and when I returned just over 4 hours
later, the fish was gone. The cone was partly buried in the sand and it own
radular tooth was sticking through the base of its siphon. About three weeks
later, it disappeared from the siphon and this cone apparently "learned" to be
more careful when hunting because it never made that mistake again.

Aloha,

Bob Dayle (a.k.a., makuabob)
http://www.cowrys.org/capcowry/
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Quoting Kay Peterson <[log in to unmask]>:

> My father brought some live Conus back from the South Pacific for a study of
> the venom at the University of Southern California (back in the early
> 1960's,
> I believe.)  He photographed one C. striatus which he had placed in a tank
> with a few minnows.
> The first-contact picture was late--so the harpoon didn't show, but the
> gravel was still suspended in the water!  The rest of the sequence was
> interesting.
>  The beautifully-colored mantle (?) was extended, enveloped the fish, and
> was
> pulled shut like it had a drawstring.  It was then pulled back into the
> shell.  Dad said that the animal didn't move around for quite a while after
> feeding.  The slides were pretty good for a one-armed amateur photographer!
> I used
> them with my shell club for years.
>
> Kay
>
>
>

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