<p>Matt Winters</p>

A 1909 news brief in Dads hometown newspaper, the Bellingham (Wash.) Herald, filled me with a warm glow of professional envy.

MULE KICKS HIMSELF INTO ETERNITY

Because a mule kicked him, Clarence Eddellman, 27, Bellinghams dwarf expressman, gained revenge by putting a dose of strychnine in the mules feed, which proved to be the knock-out drop. His friends cannot account for his actions. Stub was in the employ of the Old Whatcom transfer barn at the time and was driving the mule daily… A warrant has been sworn out for his arrest.

Not to be insensitive to the plight of either man or beast, but how often in a career does a newspaperman get to report on a mule-murdering dwarf fleeing justice on very short legs? This has to go down in the annals of bizarre Pacific Northwest crimes. (My version abridges the original.)

Aside from sheer tabloid sleaziness, this story and several others from the same period caught my attention for what they reveal about changing fashions in suicide and homicide. Writing of a newfound interest in poison might be enough to set the police pounding on my door, but I hasten to add that Im neither depressed nor murderous. Its just curious that deliberate poisoning of one kind or another was commonplace a century ago but is hardly heard of now.

Its a good thing strychnine was an especially gruesome way to die. The processed seeds of a tropical Asian tree, it once was an ordinary household product used to control mice and other pests. As always, its a bad idea to place deadly substances or mechanisms within easy reach of persons with imperfect impulse control.

Pursuing this topic has led up and down all sorts of fascinating trails. If only I had Sherlock Holmes email address, we could have an engaging chat about antagonistic interference with sodium ion channels.

As it is, I continued by looking into whether any members of the Strychnos genus of plants grow in the Pacific Northwest. It appears not, as they need more consistent warmth than we get. In contrast, poison hemlock is a noxious weed throughout the Northwest, though neither the Oregon or Washington weed boards identifies any in Clatsop or Pacific counties. This likely is simply for lack of thoroughly looking, as we have the right conditions for this notorious killer of Socrates.

This inquiry about plants in turn led to the question of whether any of our native frogs produce poison, as is often the case for tropical species. Again, the answer is no, but we do have one startlingly deadly animal right at our feet.

Rough-skinned newts, gentle orange-bellied creatures that can be observed on any forest walk, are arguably among the most toxic animals known to science. At least this is true of many newts living in Oregon; their otherwise identical cousins living in southwest British Columbia have almost no poison. The tetrodotoxin in newts is 10,000 times more deadly than cyanide. It is the same substance that makes pufferfish so dangerous to Japanese gourmets.

In what has been called an evolutionary arms race, the toxicity of Oregon newts is directly linked with the common garter snakes that enjoy eating them. A 2008 article in the scientific journal PLOS Biology (http://tinyurl.com/mdrjbtb) lays out the technical details. In essence, to avoid being eaten by snakes, newts from parts of Oregon and a few other hotspots have built up so much poison in their skins that a single individual contains enough to kill 25,000 mice. Meanwhile, the snakes build up increasing levels of immunity to newt poison.

Of local interest, the newts of Warrenton and Chinook, Wash., are particularly poisonous, but our snakes have achieved a near perfect equilibrium of immunity.

Newts are nice little animals, harmless to everything except the insects and worms they eat, and any bullfrogs or herons stupid enough to try to eat them. Theyre safe to handle, but you should wash up before touching your eyes. Best advice is let them go their way.

A single newt contains easily enough toxin to kill a human, as a drunken 29-year-old Coos Bay man discovered in 1981 after eating one on a dare. Unless youre a garter snake, they reputedly taste absolutely awful. Youre not going to get away with slipping one into your mules feedbag or your landlords tea.

M.S.W.

Matt Winters is editor of the Chinook Observer and Columbia River Business Journal