# stingray tail barb



## Arlon (Feb 8, 2005)

I have caught dozens of rays and always "debarb" them. One look at this and you can understand how such a thing into the chest cavity could kill someone..










Larger image HERE.


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## Benelliboss (Feb 20, 2006)

cool pic!


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## FountainJunky (Aug 14, 2007)

That hurts just looking at it!!! Cool pic.


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## capn_billl (Sep 12, 2007)

I got one in the foot 1 time, I wished I was dead!


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## Koru (Sep 25, 2006)

i wonder how you debarb them, i didn't think it was possible. it looks like all bone. amazing when you see it up close like that.


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## Arlon (Feb 8, 2005)

Karen, the barb is bone but it's attached to the tail by a thin layer of cartlidge. Slices off very easily with a fillet knife (holding the barb with pliers)..


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## Arlon (Feb 8, 2005)

capn_billl said:


> I got one in the foot 1 time, I wished I was dead!


I just sliced my finger on one I was trying to remove and it hurt like the blue blazes. I can't imagine getting seriously impaled. I've been stuck by hardheads a few times and they where nothing like just a nick from a stingray barb. I have learned that really hot anything kills the pain of a hardhead almost instantly. Assume the same would hold for the stingray. Venom is a protein that completely breaks down just above our body temp. Got stuck in the thumb and set my thumb on the hood of the car (quite hot) and all pain was gone in 2 minutes. Secondary infection is another thing though...


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## Saltwater Servitude (Mar 18, 2006)

Arlon said:


> Karen, the barb is bone but it's attached to the tail by a thin layer of cartlidge. Slices off very easily with a fillet knife (holding the barb with pliers)..


Actually, it isn't bone. Just a bit denser version of cartilage with calcium deposits which vary in the calcium density species by species. Same thing with their spines. They are primarily cartilage but have calcium deposits as well which are layed down in layers based on the lunar cycle, i.e. 28.3 days or so.

You age sharks and rays the same way you age trees. Cut a cross section of a vertebral section and count the rings.

On a side note, tiger and lemon females are both documented to "shrink" in length as they get older. Thoughts are that the older females may be less efficient at hunting and sacrifice some of their own tissue mass to continually produce offspring.


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