On my way to work this morning, I was reading an article in the latest Vogue by Lynn Yaeger, titled “Wild Kingdom.” The sole photo in the article is of a woman’s face covered in fish eggs. Apparently it is just one of several new and unconventional ingredients (treatments) for skin care. A couple others mentioned in the article are having a live snail crawl across your face, and using bee venom.

According to Paul Cox, PhD, who is quoted a lot in this article, not only does salmon-roe contain a lot of omega-6, which is just good for your body in general, if applied to the skin, “an enzyme in the roe – released while baby salmon are hatching – …act[s] like an ultra-gentle exfoliant” that doesn’t irritate or dry your skin out. You can find salmon-roe extract in Perricone MD’s Blue Plasma ($95, perriconemd.com).

What are the benefits of having a snail crawl across your face leaving mucus? Apparently mucus contains a “collagen-style protein” that, as many of you should know, ccan help restore elasticity to skin and improve the appearance of wrinkles. Snail mucus has been found to have restorative properties as well. Napoleon Perdis’ Auto Pilot BBB Cream ($45, Nordstrom.com) contains this such ingredient.

How does one extract venom from bees to use as a skin care ingredient? “By subjecting bees to tiny electric shocks, inducing them to drop a dot of precious venum,” or from collecting dried venom “from the bottom of a beehive.” According to the article, bee venom has the ability to diminish the appearance of wrinkles by plumping the skin, and help control and treat acne. Rodial Bee Venom 24 Carat Gold Super Essence ($470, skinstore.com) is on the expensive side, but is supposed to be amazing.

The article also goes on to discuss botulinum toxin (botox), and how even though it toxic for your body, people still do it. While the idea of putting any of these “treatments” onto my face is revolting to me, I would be more inclined to try them as long as they were in a small part of a whole rather than just being the whole thing. And, if I had to choose between which of the three above to try, I probably would try the salmon-roe extract. It sounds much more appealing than the other two.