Strychnine poisoning in nontarget species in western Canada: A retrospective case series (2014 to 2023).
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background: Strychnine is a highly toxic, plant-derived alkaloid. It has historically been used in western Canada as a rodenticide for control of Richardson's ground squirrels; and in Alberta, as a predacide against wolves, coyotes, black bears, and skunks. However, nontarget species poisonings with strychnine have been widely documented in Canada and elsewhere. Poisonings manifest as acute neuroexcitation and are usually fatal. In March 2023, strychnine was banned in Canada for control of Richardson's ground squirrels, with concerns over wildlife poisonings cited. However, fatal poisonings have occurred in animals since the ban. Objective: To retrospectively characterize cases of nontarget species poisoning by strychnine in western Canada (British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba) based on diagnostic case records. Procedure: Diagnostic information from confirmed cases of strychnine poisoning from 2014 to 2023 was compiled from the records of Prairie Diagnostic Services (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan). Where available, epidemiologic data pertaining to year and month of submission, province, location of submitting veterinary clinic/enforcement office, species/breed, age, sample submitted, strychnine concentration, and case history were collected. Results: = 9). Poisoning in dogs occurred predominantly in medium and large breeds and in smaller population centers. Poisonings were diagnosed after the national ban was in effect. Conclusion and clinical relevance: This paper highlights the prevalence of nontarget species strychnine toxicosis in western Canada. Despite the recent national ban of strychnine, poisonings of nontarget species have continued.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.003 | 0.005 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.003 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".