A review: poisoning by anticoagulant rodenticides in non-target animals globally

Abstract

Worldwide use of anticoagulant rodenticides (ARs) for rodents control has frequently led to secondary poisoning of non-target animals, especially raptors. In spite of the occurrence of many incidents of primary or secondary AR-exposure and poisoning of non-target animals, these incidents have been reported only for individual countries, and there has been no comprehensive worldwide study or review. Furthermore, the AR exposure pathway in raptors has not yet been clearly identified. The aim of this review is therefore to comprehensively analyze the global incidence of primary and secondary AR-exposure in non-target animals, and to explore the exposure pathways. We reviewed the published literature, which reported AR residues in the non-target animals between 1998 and 2015, indicated that various raptor species had over 60% AR- detection rate and have a risk of AR poisoning. According to several papers studied on diets of raptor species, although rodents are the most common diets of raptors, some raptor species prey mainly on non-rodents. Therefore, preying on targeted rodents does not necessarily explain all causes of secondary AR-exposure of raptors. Since AR residue-detection was also reported in non-target mammals, birds, reptiles and invertebrates, which are the dominant prey of some raptors, AR residues in these animals, as well as in target rodents, could be the exposure source of ARs to raptors.

Anticoagulant Rodenticides, Islands and Animal Welfare Accountancy

“…In the mid–late 1990s, research investigating the connection between anticoagulant rodenticide use and poisoning mortality of nontarget wildlife was being published from around the world [55,56,57,58]. Research and monitoring has since demonstrated that globally, use of anticoagulant rodenticides is resulting in environmental transfer of residual concentrations of anticoagulants through trophic pathways and consequent mortality or morbidity in nontarget wildlife [59,60,61,62]. Identification of residual anticoagulant concentrations in freshwater and marine aquatic environments [63,64,65] indicates that unwanted effects of the use of anticoagulants for rodent management are not limited to terrestrial environments.…”

Micro QuEChERS-based method for the simultaneous biomonitoring in whole blood of 360 toxicologically relevant pollutants for wildlife

“…Therefore, in wildlife samples, it is also interesting to monitor not only legal but also frequently employed banned compounds (Luzardo et al, 2014c). A special case of pesticides is that of rodenticides, which are employed extensively around the world, leading to unintended exposure of non-target animals, especially raptors (Nakayama et al, 2019;Ruiz-Suarez et al, 2014).…”

Baiting location affects anticoagulant rodenticide exposure of non‐target small mammals on farms

“…There are two pathways of exposure of non‐target taxa: (i) primary exposure when bait is consumed directly 19 because non‐target species are able to enter bait stations as it is the case for small mammals 20,21 and small birds, 22 (ii) secondary exposure when target or non‐target animals that have fed on AR bait are consumed by predators or scavengers 23 . Numerous examples demonstrate exposure of non‐target species including small mammals, 20,22,24 terrestrial predators and scavengers, 25–27 predatory birds 28 (reviewed in Nakayama et al 29 30 ) and fish (reviewed in Regnery et al 31 …”