Metabolism of Anticoagulant Rodenticides

FIGURE 11.2 Loss of flocoumafen residues from quail liver. Depletion of radioactivity from Japanese quail after a single oral dose (14 mg/kg). Data are presented as microgram equivalents of/per gram of tissue and are mean values of two animals. Data collected at day 7 and day 12 were from four animals and three animals, respectively (from Huckle et al. 1989). 

Organic Pollutants An Ecotoxicological Perspective, Second Edition 

Two contrasting uses of ARs have caused environmental problems. First, their widespread employment on farms and in areas of human habitation to control rodents second, their use to control rats and mammalian predators, which pose a threat to other species in conserved areas (Howald et al. 1999 Eason et al. 2002). These two scenarios will now be considered in the order given. 

When used in this controlled way, there is still concern that these compounds may be transferred via rodents to terrestrial predators and scavengers that feed 

One study conducted in Britain between 1983 and 1989 was of barn owls found dead in the field 10% of the sample of 145 birds contained anticoagulant rodenticide residues in their livers, and difenacoum and brodifacoum were prominent among them (Newton et al. 1990). In another study, barn owls were fed rats that had been dosed with flocoumafen. It was found that a substantial proportion of the rodenticide ingested by owls was eliminated in pellets (Eadsforth et al. 1991). The authors suggest that exposure of owls to rodenticides in the field may be monitored by analysis of pellets dropped at roosts or regular perching places. 

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