LANSING — Remember the canary in the coal mine?

If the caged canary died, that was an urgent early warning for miners that the air was too dangerous to breathe and to get above-ground as quickly as possible.

Now there’s evidence from Southeast Michigan that the American robin can provide an early warning about dangerous lead levels in the soil.

A new study in the journal “Urban Ecosystems” found that high blood lead levels in robins can accurately predict where soil is contaminated.

Exposure of children to lead is linked to damage to their nervous system and brain, learning and behavioral problems, and speech and hearing problems, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

There is relatively little knowledge about the health impacts of blood lead levels on songbirds such as robins. However, prior research found that lead can affect birds’ brain weight, cognition, nestling growth, balance, depth perception, reproduction and aggressive behavior.

The American robin, which is widespread in North America, is known for hunting earthworms in lawns.

“This earthworm specialization results in the ingestion of large amounts of soil” – some of it contaminated with lead, the study said.

The project began when study coauthors Dorothy Zahor of Garden City and Kenneth Glynn of Fowlerville were master’s students at Eastern Michigan University and interested in what urban birds were exposed to because of the crisis in which lead polluted Flint’s water supply. They’re now Ph.D. students at Oregon State University.

Zahor said they were thinking about how and where birds forage.

They initially also looked at several other species before focusing on robins. For example, goldfinches and house sparrows primarily eat seeds above the soil, unlike robins, which had higher blood lead levels, she said.