Proceedings of the Vertebrate Pest Conference

Private industry plays an important role in the development and registration of new materials as vertebrate pesticides. The challenges of screening candidate compounds are discussed. In regard to vertebrate pests, toxicity can vary widely, even among closely related species. The challenges of identifying repellents or attractants are even greater than for finding toxicants, while from the private sector standpoint, commercially successful materials must have sufficiently wide application to be economically profitable. Case histories of industry’s contributions to the development of current rodenticides are discussed. Among current challenges are to find active ingredients that are more species-specific, to identify and develop effective repellents against rodents and other mammals that are non-toxic and environmentally appropriate, and to find materials to solve growing bird damage problems.