Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Grenåvej 14, 8410 Rønde, Denmark.
Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Grenåvej 14, 8410 Rønde, Denmark.
Sci Total Environ. 2020 May 1;715:136977. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.136977. Epub 2020 Jan 28.
Although risk assessments for pesticides involve quantifying exposure routes for animals, little empirical evidence exists on how individuals use areas where pesticides were used. Further, the European Food Safety Authority guidelines for the risk assessment of birds and mammals currently only include direct dietary uptake from exposed plants as important pathway for pesticides, arguing that dermal exposure is generally negligible. Here, we use the European hare (Lepus europaeus) as a model of a farmland specialist to investigate if (1) hares adjust habitat use in response to pesticide spraying, using GPS data, and (2) calculate the pesticide exposure and uptake over different pathways, i.e. foraging uptake versus overspray and subsequent oral grooming, using an agent-based modelling approach. Apart from avoidance of sprayed fields on the spraying day by inactive hares, which was likely caused by the mechanical disturbance rather than the pesticide itself, we found no evidence that hares reduced the use of pesticide-sprayed fields compared to control observations where no pesticides were applied. Our simulation showed that both the proportion of exposed individuals and the pesticide uptake were related to the pathway of exposure (foraging versus overspray/oral grooming), and depended on the age class and the vegetation type. We found that pesticide uptake via overspray/oral grooming might be 7-fold higher compared to foraging and might thus be an important pathway of pesticide exposure in hares. Our findings emphasize that policy makers, specifically the European Food Safety Authority, should incorporate alternative pathways of pesticide exposure for birds and mammals, such as overspray and oral grooming, when conducting environmental risk assessments and take variation in vegetation structure and age-related animal behavior into account, because these factors might affect pesticide exposure. Interactions between pesticide application and vegetation structure may both increase or decrease exposure but can be predicted using a simulation approach.
尽管农药风险评估涉及量化动物的暴露途径，但关于个体如何使用喷洒过农药的区域，几乎没有实证证据。此外，欧洲食品安全局（European Food Safety Authority）目前针对鸟类和哺乳动物风险评估的指南仅将直接从暴露植物中摄取食物作为农药的重要途径，认为皮肤接触通常可以忽略不计。在这里，我们以欧洲野兔（Lepus europaeus）为农田专家模型，研究（1）野兔是否会根据 GPS 数据调整栖息地使用情况以应对喷洒农药，以及（2）是否通过基于代理的建模方法来计算不同途径（即觅食摄取与喷雾和随后的口腔梳理）的农药暴露和摄取情况。除了因机械干扰而非农药本身而导致处于静止状态的野兔在喷洒日避免喷洒的田地之外，我们没有发现任何证据表明与无农药喷洒的对照观察相比，野兔减少了对喷洒过农药田地的使用。我们的模拟表明，暴露个体的比例和农药摄取量都与暴露途径（觅食与喷雾/口腔梳理）有关，并且取决于年龄类别和植被类型。我们发现，通过喷雾/口腔梳理摄取的农药可能比觅食高出 7 倍，因此可能是野兔暴露于农药的重要途径。我们的研究结果强调，政策制定者，特别是欧洲食品安全局，在进行环境风险评估时应将鸟类和哺乳动物的其他暴露途径（如喷雾和口腔梳理）纳入其中，并考虑植被结构和与年龄相关的动物行为的变化，因为这些因素可能会影响农药暴露。农药应用与植被结构之间的相互作用可能会增加或减少暴露，但可以使用模拟方法进行预测。
