Pesticides Poisoning

Many of our wild felines, especially jaguars, have been purposefully poisoned with pesticides used in several crops.

The most notorious agent is Carbofuran, marketed under many brand names in Brazil - the best known being Furadan, manufactured by FMC Corporation.

Farmers are well aware of jaguars’ eating habits. The cats kill the prey, hide the carcass and return many times, until they no longer find anything to feed from it. Farmers stuff granulated poison – the worst form of all – into the prey’s carcass and the jaguar will die and extremely painful death. It is common knowledge that “just a handful will sure kill the beast.”

What happens next? How many animal species – birds, reptiles, insects – will be feeding from that same carcass? And after this secondary killing, how many others will be feeding from their carcasses in turn? The environment is thus directly contaminated, and the effects on people and animals can easily be anticipated.

We selected a few testimonies and recent data involving Carbofuran in Brazil and in other countries as well.

FURADAN (Carbamate)

“Of all carbamates, Furadan is the most widely used as nematocide, insecticide and acaricide in the great majority of developing countries - and in some other countries too.

The price this popularity pays is contamination of foodstuff, air and water – therefore with effects on man, mammals and fish. The preference for this pesticide is due to the fact that alternative products, such as organochlorides, have a longer list of toxicity problems with residues, and organophosphates are not only more toxic, but have a well-defined neurotoxic action as well.

The action mechanism of Furadan (cholinesterase inhibitor) causes acute intoxication, generally leading to death from inhalation or contact. All animals that touch a poisoned carcass - vultures, flies or small carnivores - will be killed. When Furadan is applied to crops in high wind – and we may have up to 70% straying – birds, insects, reptiles and even fish are at risk.

A lethal Midas, it will kill whatever it touches.”

Cláudio Tadeu Lopes da Silva - Veterinarian

Jaguar in museum was killed by poison, was the medical opinion.

BELÉM – The Forensic Institute in Pará published the conclusion of the autopsy performed in a jaguar that lived in the Emilio Goeldi Museum and was found dead last May. It was first presumed the jaguar had fallen victim to ingestion of rodent control product, but the institution proved that other products were used for that purpose. The Museum director, Mr. José Malcher, said that high doses of poison were found in the jaguar’s stomach, bladder and blood.

Published by the newspaper “Estado de São Paulo”, in June 24, 2000

Asbestos and pesticides on the list of dangerous products Experts recommend that all forms of asbestos and three pesticides be included in the Rotterdam Convention on dangerous products trade.Campinas, SP – The Rotterdam Convention list of dangerous chemical products must be revised, to include three pesticides and all forms of asbestos among imports/exports subject to Previous Informed Consent.That was the recommendation of an expert committee appointed by the Convention signatory countries in charge of examining and assessing the risks of nearly 70,000 chemicals currently sold in the international market, and the nearly 1,500 launched every year. Inclusion of the four new items shall be discussed at the next international meeting in September.The Rotterdam Convention regulates international trade of dangerous chemical products, requesting importing countries to ban the ones that cannot be safely managed. Once allowed, imports must be labeled and unequivocally identified, ensuring the right to information.

The Convention has already been signed by 73 countries – including Brazil – and ratified by 18. It will come into effect once there are 50 signatory countries.The original products list included 22 organic pesticides considered to be highly toxic, five bromate and chloride industrial chemicals and one asbestos form – the only mineral regulated by the Convention. Of the three pesticides to be included by recommendation of experts, one is monocrotophos, used as insect and acaricide control in cotton, rice, citrus and corn, mainly in Asia. It is highly toxic for birds and mammals and has intoxicated farm workers from respiratory depression.Also Granox TBC and Spinox T, two formulations that mix fungicides and Carbofuran insecticide were included. Carbofuran has already been banned in 25 countries and was found to be the cause of death of Senegal farm workers.The third fungicide is DNOC, a mixture of insecticide, herbicide and fungicide, already banned in Peru and in the European Union. Inclusion of all forms of asbestos in the Rotterdam Convention was influenced by the mineral banning in Australia, Chile and the European Union. Asbestos is carcinogenic and leads to a pulmonary disease called “asbestosis” upon inhalation of particles, when the asbestos is broken. “This decision is a major step towards elimination of asbestos related risks”, said Reiner Arndt, German, head of the experts committee. “Even in countries like mine, where asbestos products were banned a long time ago, we still have problems with decontamination of old buildings and the high costs involved in treatment of people affected by asbestos-related diseases”. In Brazil, asbestos is banned in some States. A motion by the National Environment Council (CONAMA) proposed that asbestos be banned throughout the country in toys, brake linings, clutches and industrial equipment applications by December 31, 2003, while water tanks, roof tiles and pipes would be banned by 2005 and chloride-soda diaphragms by 2008.Environmentalists and occupational health specialists consider this schedule too flexible. In the State of São Paulo, ban on asbestos in brakes and automotive parts started to be enforced in May this year. Liana

JohnSource: http://www.estadao.com.br/ciencia/noticias/

“However, the problem that affects ecosystems most – especially where these have been simplified, like in the State of Paraná – is soil treatment. Herbicides and pesticides are the major threat in that region. Evidence to that is the article – at the same time an outcry and an alert– published in “O Jornal” in June 1983 under the heading “201 victims of pesticides in the Municipality of Maringá alone”. An overview of the pesticide and herbicide contamination problem in the State of Paraná indicates that in 1982/83 there were a total of 1,600 cases of intoxication, and 26 deaths. The most dangerous to health, and also responsible for the shockingly high number of contamination cases were, according to the newspaper: Endrex-20, totaling 187 victims; Nuvacron-400, 145; Furadan, 174; Folidol-60, 168; Azodrin, 149; Metaxystox, 131 cases. The people most subject to contamination are farm workers who move from one harvest to the next.”

Excerpt from “Field of life, field of death”

Source: http://www.rhr.uepg.br/v3n2/zueleide.htm#o_6

Damages in other countries - Carbofuran

Carbofuran is one of the most effective new poisons. Furadan 4-F, a carbofuran product brought to us by FMC Corporation, was the poison that brought down the birds in Bitter Lake. Carbofuran chemicals are estimated to kill at least 1 to 2 million birds each year in the United States alone. In 1994, restrictions were imposed on FMC, but 2 million pounds of the poison in liquid form are still used every year. The active ingredients in the chemical are lethal to birds even when used as per the instructions on the label. According to Birding Magazine, "Perhaps more than any other chemical, carbofuran is used intentionally and illegally to poison birds and other wildlife" (August 2000)

Source: http://taoswebb.com/horsefly/sep00/

Poisoning

The laying of any poisoned bait is illegal, whether it is laid to deliberately kill a bird of prey or whether it is laid for a fox or magpie. A poisoned bait may take the form of an opened up rabbit carcass or piece of meat which has been sprinkled with poison, eggs that have been injected with poison - often discoloring the contents of the egg - or the carcass of a pigeon, sheep etc. Many poisons are fast acting, so that victims are often found close to the baits.

In 2000 alone, 109 poisoning incidents were reported to the RSPB, well over 10% of the total number of reported incidents. Alphachloralose, Carbofuran and aldicarb were the most commonly used poisons, but also used were mevinphos, dichlorovos and strychnine. The use of carbofuran in illegal baits has been growing over recent years, particularly in Scotland.

Poisoned baits are indiscriminate and can be dangerous to wild birds and other animals, and companion animals. Carrion feeding birds such as buzzards and red kites are particularly vulnerable. In 2000, 31 buzzards were known to have been killed, along with 10 red kites, two golden eagles and 15 peregrines. Fifty-one non birds of prey were also killed, the majority of which were owls.

The UK Agricultural Departments run a poison hotline on 0800 321600, on which suspected incidents of poisoning can be reported. If you think you have found poisoned bait or victims, do not touch; warn others to stay away, note the exact location and details of any evidence, cover if possible, but don't destroy the evidence, and phone the above number.

Fonte: http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/default.asp

Poisoning of wildlife reported in January to March 2001:

• Just a week after the seminar, a weakened and hungry Whitebacked Vulture was found in the center of town, Mandume Avenue. Extreme thirst and the debilitated condition of the bird makes poison ingestion a prime possibility. He has recovered well and been released.
• A week later, thanks to publicity received on poisons and pesticides, 150 weakened and very thirsty vultures were reported from north east of Mariental. At a guess, poison - possibly low dose intakes of aldicarb (also known as blougif), were suspected. Mr Haindongo, the MET director for the southern region, was most ready to assist these birds, but the local farming community felt that they were able to provide the suggested assistance themselves. Sheep and springbok were slaughtered and the birds were fed for 4 days. On the fifth day the last of the birds took to the air and, as far as we know, none died.
• During the same week a farmer, approximately 250 km west of the poisoned vulture event, contacted NARREC with a very ill Martial Eagle. A fantastic response from the farmer got the eagle to Windhoek in 4 hours. Two days after the initiation of treatment the bird regurgitated a pellet with granules attached. The granules indicate aldicarb, a highly toxic Carbofuran that is sometimes misused in agriculture and also used illegally as a rodent control. The pellet is being analyzed by the National Forensic Science Institute, in Windhoek. Martial Eagles are not generally scavengers, but this bird is only a two year old. The question remains where did the eagle pick up this poison. (see unregistered aldicarb at the end of this news). The bird has recovered and been released
• A farmer 30 kilometers north of Windhoek is suspected of poisoning dogs belonging to a large community living on neighboring land. According to community leaders, the farmer sent samples of poisoned meat into this community. Many dogs, cats and chickens died. Four people were seriously poisoned through secondary poisoning and had to be hospitalized.

Fonte: http://green.namweb.com.na/mail-archive/
2001/Mar/att-0020/01-microsoft_pp_update.doc.

An Avenging Angel on the Trail of the Pigeons Poisoner
NewYork Times-Jan 13,2000 By ROBIN FINN
NEW YORK -- As sympathetic victims, common urban pigeons -- even those murdered by the elusive poison-wielding serial killer who has been stalking them in Manhattan for the past two years -- are a tough sell.

Mark MacDonald, a detective for the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, who has become the guardian angel of all living local pigeons and an avenging angel for the deceased, accepts that the 8 million or so pigeons that use New York as their personal coop-and-poop receptacle will never be mistaken for man's best friend.

The ancient Egyptians and Romans found pigeons most useful when cooked; Venice recently dealt with its pigeon overpopulation problem by gassing 20,000 birds. In New York, exterminators can use avitrol, a legal poison, to eliminate nuisance birds who befoul the terraces, windows and canopies of the city's luxury abodes. MacDonald bemoans but accepts that, too.

"For every 50 pigeons killed today, there's 50 more born tomorrow," he says. But propagation isn't the point. What MacDonald doesn't accept is mean-spirited murder, especially murder with a domino effect that has also killed hawks, peregrines, sparrows, bluejays and a pair of Central Park mallards: "This Mr. Evil is never going to make pigeons an endangered species," asserts the gray-muzzled MacDonald, who slicks his hair back Eddie Munster-style and whose investigative mode is equal parts DeNiro, Columbo and Dumbo (he says it helps to play dumb when you're about to confiscate an illegal or battered pet or to collar the ringleaders and patrons at pit-bull and cock fights).

Against the pigeon killer, though, MacDonald is trying to play it smart. He has to: "He's going to make my life miserable until he makes a mistake and we catch him, and God forbid the poison does trickle down to a child or a domestic pet before we get him."

“With or without public sympathy, but with the support of "National Geographic Explorer," which ran a special about his efforts last Sunday on CNBC (it will be rebroadcast on Saturday), MacDonald is staying his course. There's a killer on the loose, and he intends to find him, cuff him and charge him with animal cruelty, now a felony that commands a four-year jail term and $2,500 fine.

It's an unsolved metropolitan mystery where the trail has turned cold after more than a thousand deaths. The detective has nightmares about the elusive bird-hater who continues to toss an illegal and terribly toxic poison, carbofuran, into city streets and parks where pigeons congregate. Accustomed to achieving closure in his cases, MacDonald has become obsessed by his inability to do so with this one, now in its third year.”

Source:http://www.urbanwildlifesociety.org/
pigeons/MorPjPsngs/NY-AvngAnglvPjPsnr.html

Though the entire concept of Rid-A-Bird is just sick, there is another pesticide that is more dangerous to nature. Called the black plague of pesticides, it is carbofuran, and it kills an estimated 2 million birds a year. The poison is extremely, extremely toxic: once, a sheep rancher put out some to kill coyotes he thought were killing his sheep. Several coyotes came and ate the poison. They died within minutes. Later, some eagles came to eat the coyotes. They died with their heads still in the coyote's bodies. Scattered around were several magpies which had also tried to eat the coyotes. The terrifying thing about all these poisons is that they are ALL PERFECTLY LEGAL. In fact, the government encourages uses of many of them, and spends most of its research money discovering new ways to kill innocent animals. It has banned a few dangerous pesticides for use in the US, but continues to export them to other countries.

Source: http://worldkids.net/clubs/green/letter10.html

Effects on Birds

Carbofuran is highly toxic to birds. One granule is sufficient to kill a small bird. Bird kills have occurred when birds ingested carbofuran granules, which resemble grain seeds in size and shape, or when predatory or scavenging birds have ingested small birds or mammals which had eaten carbofuran pellets.

Carbofuran is very toxic to pheasants, chickens, fulvous tree ducks and Japanese quail. Red shouldered hawks have been poisoned after eating prey from carbofuran treated fields (J. Wildlife Manage. 47(4):1129. 1983). Levels of carbofuran occurring in Kansas fields have been high enough to cause a reduction in the weight, food intake and ability to move of adult male bobwhites (Arch. Environ. Contam. Toxicol. 11(5):611-615.1982).

Effects on Fish

Carbofuran may be teratogenic to frogs (Toxicol. Lett. 22(1):7- 13.1984). It is very toxic to trout, Coho salmon, perch (Hdbk. Acut. Tox. Chem. Fish & Aqua. Invert. 1980), bluegills (8), and catfish (Toxicology 23(4):337-345.1982). The 96-hour LD50 for fish is 150 ug/L.

Full text at http://pmep.cce.cornell.edu/profiles/extoxnet/
carbaryl-dicrotophos/carbofuran-ext.html

FURADAN WILL BE BANNED AFTER 1998, so alternate pesticides are being tested for control of rice water weevils under the leadership of Dr. M.O. (Mo) Way, entomologist at Texas A&M's Agricultural Research and Extension Center, Beaumont. Furadan was banned because its misuse has caused bird kills.

Furadan has long been the most effective pesticide for control of water weevils, the number one insect pest of rice in Texas. But the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has banned use of the insecticide, whose chemical name is carbofuran, after 1998 because its misuse has resulted in bird kills.

"We're evaluating pesticides to replace Furadan," says Dr. M.O. (Mo) Way, entomologist at the Texas A&M University Agricultural Research and Extension Center at Beaumont.

Source:http://www.agcomintl.com/pestici.htm

Carbofuran-LETHAL EFFECTS

In acute toxicity tests with aquatic organisms, LC-50 (96h) values, with only one exception, exceeded 130 ppb. The exception was the larva of a marine crab with an LC-50 (96h) value of 2.5 ppb. In tests of longer duration with fish, safe concentrations were estimated to range between 15 and 23 ppb. Among the most sensitive species of birds tested, the acute oral LD-50 was 238 ppb (?g/kg body weight), the dietary carbofuran LD-50 value was 190 ppm, dermal LD-50's exceeded 100 ppm, and the LC-100 value in drinking water was 2 ppm. Mammals were comparatively resistant, having LD-50 acute oral toxicities >2 ppm, a dietary LD-38 of 100 ppm after 8 months, and dermal LD-50's >120 ppm. However, only 2 ppb as an aerosol killed 50% of rhesus monkeys in 6 hours, and 40 ppb killed all pheasants within 5 minutes. Bees and earthworms were relatively sensitive to carbofuran, but test conditions were sufficiently different to preclude a strict comparison with vertebrate species. Among photosynthetic species, concentrations of 200 ppm carbofuran partly inhibited germination of rice seeds, but not other species tested, after exposure for 24 hours. Effects of carbofuran on plants are considered negligible when contrasted to faunal damage effects.

Carbofuran administered to birds in the diet for 5 days, plus 3 days postexposure on an untreated diet, produced 50% kill values of 140 to 1459 ppm dietary carbofuran; younger birds were more sensitive than older ones (Table 5). Food consumption in groups of Japanese quail (Coturnix japonica) with high carbofuran-induced mortality was markedly depressed during the first 3 days of treatment (Hill and Camardese 1982). Red-winged blackbirds, the most sensitive bird species tested in food repellency tests, consumed a normal ration of food contaminated with carbofuran (Schafer et al. 1983). As a result, carbofuran has a high potential for causing acute poisoning episodes in birds (Schafer et al. 1983). Field application of carbofuran granules to corn, at planting, in Maryland during 1980 was presumed to be responsible for deaths of songbirds (order Passeriformes) and white-footed mice (Peromyscus leucopus); all organisms contained high levels of carbofuran in the gastrointestinal tract and liver, suggesting extensive feeding in treated fields (Balcomb et al. 1984a). A similar situation occurred in Perry, Florida, after treatment of pine seed orchards (Overgaard et al. 1983). Laboratory studies with house sparrows (Passer domesticus) and red-winged blackbirds demonstrated that ingestion of a single carbofuran granule is fatal to either species (Balcomb et al. 1984a,b). In groups of old-field mice (Peromyscus polionotus) fed 100 ppm dietary carbofuran for 8 months, mortality was 38%; however, growth, development and behavior was normal among survivors from this group and their offspring (Wolfe and Esher 1980). In a preliminary study with rats and old-field mice fed 100 ppm of dietary carbofuran, parents lost weight (but none died), and the survival of young was reduced (Wolfe and Esher 1980)

Source: http://www.pwrc.usgs.gov