I have a question on purple dye.  My experience with Atlantic moon snails
(_Palinices duplicatus_) taught me never to pick up a live one and put it in
my pocket.  Though there is no purple apparent in the shell or the
invertebrate inside, I got an immediate purple dye to whatever I was
wearing, and it is permanent, believe me.

Does this mean that they carry something like a sac containing purple dye as
a defense weapon, like the squid and its ink? Therefore, like blueberries,
if you consistently wash, you will eventually wash all the ink or dye out of
the animal?

Also, contact with the animal of a Janthina will dye your hands, but does
not seem as permanent.  I've been successful in washing these stains out.

Comment: never had experience with Murex dye.

Sylvia S. Edwards
Huntsville, Alabama
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I've never tried to deliverately make dye from the animals.  Has anyone
else?
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Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 1999 2:36 PM
Subject: Re: [CONCH-L] Lost in the Weekend vacuum??


> Thank you, David Campbell! I notice that when I wash a bowl stained with
> blueberries (Vaccinium spp.), the water is colored blue, then green, then
a
> light yellow as the dye is diluted. Possibly a similar phenomenon to that
> of shell dyes, though less permanent.
>
> The Portuguese man-o'-war (Physalia spp., a siphonophore) yields a similar
> range of colors when stranded on the beach. Caution is certainly advised
in
> handling them, as the stingers can be painful and dangerous.
>
> The purple seasnail (Janthina spp.) yields apparently the same colors on
> the beach. Is this all one dye?
>
> Andrew K. Rindsberg
> Geological Survey of Alabama
>