Fertility control in vertebrate pest species

The potential of fertility control in the management of pest mammalian and avian species is discussed as a tool additional to the conventional methods based on poisons. There are several advantages in the use fertility control methods, and many chemical compounds are already available that disrupt fertility and act through different mechanisms. The chemicals more effective are those with long-lasting effects acting on both sexes. This article briefly synthesizes the knowledge gathered on the use of chemicals disrupting male fertility. Models suggest that such an approach can be effective for population control of pest vertebrates. However, the efficacy of sterilizing males has been positively tested so far only in species in which females mate with territorial or dominant males. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.