Toxicant ejectors have been important in coyote control since the late 1930s when the coyote getter (CG) was introduced into Governmental wildlife damage management programs in the western United States. The CG was replaced during 1968-1970 by the similar but safer, spring-activated M-44 device that remains in use today. Significant aspects of this history include the private development and manufacture of the CG, first called the Humane Fur Getter, in the 1930s; adoption of the CG by governmental and private predator hunters; technical performance problems with CGs (and later M-44s) and their cyanide cartridges and capsules; governmental efforts to resolve these problems; development of competing toxicant ejector models, and evaluations of them compared to the CG; human injuries from CG accidents, leading to development and adoption of the safer M-44 ejector; the 1972 ban on sodium cyanide (NaCN) and other predacides; resumption of NaCN use in M-44s experimentally in 1974, followed by EPA registration in 1975; evaluation of alternate toxicants compared to NaCN; and the many minor but collectively important changes that have resulted in today’s improved M-44. The invention and technical evolution of CG and M-44 devices is described chronologically, with emphasis on the development, manufacture, and use of these devices in Federal/cooperative animal damage control programs.

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Compound 1080® is a man-made sodium salt of fluoroacetic acid or fluoroacetate, which occurs in nature as the toxin in many species of poisonous plants. The toxicity of such plants had long been recognized, but the toxic agent was not identified as fluoroacetate until 1944. By that time, the pesticidal potential of synthesized sodium fluoroacetate (code number 1080-44) was being explored in the United States in wartime, crash program aimed at finding new rodenticides. Compound 1080, the main product of that program, proved to be the best rodenticide known up to that time. It was found to be even more toxic to canids than to rodents, so was used experimentally for coyote control beginning in November 1944. Compound 1080 was authorized for operational use in governmental predator control in 1946. Large meat baits, or bait stations, injected with 1080 solution and placed on livestock ranges in winter quickly became a preferred method for reducing coyote populations that preyed on sheep and cattle. The use of 1080 bait stations peaked in Fiscal Year (FY) 1963, when over 16,000 stations were placed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Predator and Rodent Control program. After 1963, numbers of 1080 stations declined year by year to 1972 when the use of 1080 and other predacides on Federal lands and in Federal programs was stopped by President Nixon’s Executive Order 11643, followed by Environmental Protection Agency suspension and cancellation of registrations for 1080 and other predacides. The 1080 cancellation was based partly on high potential hazard to humans, even though no human had ever been killed or seriously injured in connection with the use of this toxicant in coyote control. Paradoxically, most of the political agitation over Compound 1080 focused on its use in predator control, even though much greater amounts were used for rodent control. The total amount of 1080 sold in the U.S. during 1968-1972, the last 5 years in which 1080 bait stations were used, was approximately 10,003 lb. Only 1.3% (129 lb) of that amount was used for predator control. The largest amount of 1080 used for coyote control in the United States in any one year was about 42.4 lb, in FY 1963.

The USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) surveyed U.S. sheep producers to determine the kinds of non-lethal (NL) predator control measures they used in 1994. An analysis of responses from 8,451 sheep producers showed that 34% of the nation’s sheep producers used fencing, 25% used husbandry, 20% used guard animals, 4% used frightening tactics, 0.3% used aversion, and 3% used other methods. Because NL methods tended to be used more in large sheep operations than on small farms, the percentages of sheep protected by each NL control method were higher than the percentages of sheep producers using the method. Approximately 33% of all sheep in the U.S. were protected by fencing, 40% by husbandry, 39% by guard animals, 12% by frightening tactics, 2% by aversion, and 5% by other methods. Overall, 55% of U.S. sheep producers used one or more NL predator control methods in 1974, and 70% of the nation’s sheep were protected by one or more NL methods.