Comparative evaluation of second generation anticoagulant rodenticides against <italic>Mus musculus</italic>

Abstract

An investigation was carried out at the Animal House cum Rodent Laboratory, Department of Entomology, Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat during 2013-14 to evaluate the efficacy of four anticoagulant rodenticides against commensal rodent, <italic>Mus musculus</italic>. The efficacy of anticoagulant rodenticides viz., brodifacoum, flocoumafen and difenacoum along with bromadiolone were evaluated against <italic>Mus musculus</italic> under no-choice and choice feeding trial. In both choice and nochoice feeding trials the efficacy of brodifacoum (0.005%) wax block was significantly better than flocoumafen (0.005%) and difenacoum (0.005%) but at par with bromadiolone (0.005%). In no-choice feeding trial, 100 per cent mortality was achieved with brodifacoum and bromadiolone within 4-7 days observation period but significantly lower mortality was recorded in flocoumafen (80%) and difenacoum (60%). The wax block formulation of difenacoum showed poor palatability as more consumption of plain bait was recorded over poison bait against test animals. Under no-choice test, the poison ingested between male and female were not significant in case of all the toxicants. The consumption of poison bait by the test animals of both the sexes under choice test was reduced in comparison to no-choice test because of availability of an alternate plain food along with the poison bait. The post treatment consumption of bait was significantly lower in case of brodifacoum and bromadiolone in comparison to flocoumafen and difenacoum. This shows the effectiveness of these two rodenticides <italic>viz</italic>. brodifacoum and bromadiolone against rodent species.