History Main / CanaryInACoalMine

See also EvilDetectingDog, ForebodingFleeingFlock, and RedAlert. Not to be confused with ComatoseCanary, a key witness whose heartbeat on an EKG when questioned serves to confirm the truth.

* ''ComicBook/{{Nodwick}}'' makes a lot of jokes that one of the jobs of a henchman is to be the proverbial canary. Nodwick gets sent out in front of the party he works for on a regular basis so that he'll be the one triggering all the traps and attacked by all the monsters. He's [[ThisIsGonnaSuck resigned]] to it.

* ''WebVideo/LifeSMP'': In the first four seasons so far, [[spoiler:Jimmy]] was the first to die permanently in the DeadlyGame and [[AnimalMotifs is referred to as a canary]] in the fandom -- a warning for the other players that things had gotten serious as this was the first point people were being KilledOffForReal. Season 4, Limited Life, [[AscendedFanon makes a nod]] to this:

* In the ''WesternAnimation/BlazingDragons'' LicensedGame for the [[UsefulNotes/PlayStation PS1]] and UsefulNotes/SegaSaturn, a canary works at Sir George's coal mine to warn the workers of gas leaks. When Flicker discovers he's tired, he must get him to read a magazine with a copy of King All-Fire's coronation speech [[NapInducingSpeak to get him to fall asleep]], tricking the workers into thinking he's dead and run away so Flicker can take the pickaxe they left behind.

* "C.E.D'oh" combines this trope with TheScapegoat - for liability reasons, the C. M Burns that legally owns the Springfield Power Plant isn't Montgomery Burns, but a canary bird named Canary M. Burns, who will suffer the legal consequences of the human Burns' comprehensive list of safety violations if they're discovered. As part of a plan to take over the Plant, Homer breaks into Mr. Burns's office and frees the bird.
--> '''Homer''': Off you go, to the Canary Islands!
--> '''Canary''': *flies back through the window, looks up the location of the islands on a globe, then flies off again*

** One episode has Bart, Homer, Flanders and his kids out at sea on a raft. Homer thinks they're too far from shore, Flanders sees a gull and declares that they're saved, as gulls only come out to sea to die. [[InstantlyProvenWrong The gull is then heard cawing and dropping dead in the water.]] Homer gloats that he was right and Flanders wasn't, and they're eventually rescued when they run into an offshore oil rig.

* In ''WesternAnimation/PorkyPig's Haunted Holiday'', [[WesternAnimation/SylvesterTheCatAndTweetyBird Tweety Bird]] (in his monster form from "Hyde and Go Tweet") serves as the boss of the AbandonedMine.

* ''Website/SCPFoundation'', [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-2608 SCP-2608 ("Anomalous Indicator Species")]]. SCP-2608 are an unusual type of mayfly that start dying off when they get close to an anomalous (super science, magical, etc.) item. They can be used to detect anomalous objects by moving them around and noting when they start to die.

* Music/ThePolice song [[Music/ZenyattaMondatta "Canary in a Coalmine"]] compares the subject of the song to one of these (as if you couldn't tell from the title) due to his or her neurosis.

* [[Music/VanHalen Van Halen's]] infamous "No brown [=M&Ms=]" tour rider clause turned said candies into this trope. If the band members discovered brown [=M&Ms=] backstage, it was a sure sign that a promoter had not read the rider thoroughly and had almost certainly overlooked other requirements - ones that were actually critical to the band's safety.

* Music/TheCraneWives song "Canary in a Coal Mine" is built on this- it's sung from the point of view of the canary, begging the miners to not forget how she saved their lives at the cost of her own.

* ''WebOriginal/{{Serina}}'': Said word-for-word when a mass extinction is caused by a literal (if highly derived) canary in a coal mine. [[DisasterDominoes The fleeing canary kicked up coal dust into an already out-of-control fire, causing a massive conflagration throughout the entirety of the northern continent's coal seams, leading to runaway global warming and mass die-offs]], which actually prolonged the habitable period of the titular planet due to staving off the apocalyptic ice age for a couple more tens of millions of years.

** Referenced in one strip, where a worker who was a former coal miner gets reassigned so he's close to Wally. An observing Dilbert says, "Better get a canary." Creator/ScottAdams clarified this punchline in one of his anthologies, noting that "miners use canaries to sense [[{{Gasshole}} gas]]..."

* In ''Literature/TheWiseMansFear'', Kvothe tries to convince Maer Alveron that he is being poisoned through his medicine. To test his conclusions, he suggests giving small doses of the medicine to a little bird, called a sipquick, sure that the poison would kill them. One week later, the bird is still alive, proving his theory false... until they find out that the Maer's faithful manservant Stapes has actually been replacing them as they die. ''Several'' of them have already been killed by the poison at that point.

* ''LightNovel/GoblinSlayer'': In the Water Town arc, the titular Goblin Slayer purchases a canary in preparation for DeadlyGas that the goblins may use, which turns out to be the case.

The Canary in a Coal Mine is a plot device used to detect danger. Historical works, period pieces, or fantasy settings that focus around mining might use the birds themselves, but the trope can be represented by anything that reacts to the presence of dangerous elements.

See also EvilDetectingDog, ForebodingFleeingFlock. Not to be confused with ComatoseCanary, a key witness whose heartbeat on an EKG when questioned serves to confirm the truth.

See also EvilDetectingDog, ForebodingFleeingFlock.

Back before there were more technological means of detection and prevention, coal miners would iconically bring along canaries or other small birds with them as a form of early warning system to detect the presence of carbon monoxide. The bird's rapid breathing rate, small size, and high metabolism (compared to the miners) would result in them succumbing to poisonous gases before the miners, thereby giving them time to take action.

* [[https://twitter.com/ASmallFiction/status/965483556376948736 This tweet]] by ''Blog/ASmallFictio''n tells of a canary brought into a mine to test for danger, only the danger turns out to be [[DugTooDeep of an unusual kind]].

* Referenced in ''Literature/SoulMusic'' during a passage that explains how wizards act as natural [[WeirdnessMagnet weirdness magnets.]] Likening them to either mine canaries or lightning rods, the narration explains that if anything strange was happening, it would happen to the wizards first. While no one dies, the Faculty of Unseen University are the first ones who get sucked into Music With Rocks In lifestyle before the craze takes the entire city.