 Every
agricultural product has unique chemical and agronomic characteristics
that affect it’s longevity in the field. This environmental persistence
determines many important usage variables, such as potential geographic
markets, cropping groups, formulation types, harvest intervals,
crop irrigation allowances, and the total active ingredient registered
on a crop. It is well known that long lived compounds are more
difficult to work with and register through governmental agencies.
In these cases, mitigation measures such as reduced rates, extended
pre-harvest intervals, limits on the number of applications, or
the use of buffer zones in ecologically sensitive areas are often
used to protect the environment.. Pacific Ag Research can assist
with such studies that help determine the specific environmental
half lives of active ingredients. This is accomplished through
a staff of trained field biologists and technicians that work
in the field to support laboratory determinations in soil and
aquatic dissipationstudies, crop and rotational crop residue (RAC)
trials and air monitoring (flux) studies. The equipment inventory
at the San Luis Obispo facility includes a tractor mounted soil
sampling unit for sampling of cores up to 10 m depth, a GLP unit
for RAC studies including current software for electronic notebook
documentation, ample GLP maintained cold storage, and a staff
that include scientists with published work on pesticide residues
in fruits and vegetables. This level of expertise is simply unavailable
outside of a few major Universities or key agrichemical manufacturer’s
laboratories.
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