Dissipation of parathion and paraoxon on citrus foliage dust and dry soil surfaces in a treated orchard.

Pesticides applied to an orchard may be transported via dust from the orchard floor to the foliage. The dust containing the pesticide facilitates oxygen analog formation. This study involves the evaluation of existing methods and new procedures for measuring pesticide fate (parathion and paraoxon) on soil surfaces in a field environment; the results were correlated with dislodgeable foliar residues. Residues in soil dust removed from the ground floor via vacuum varied considerably and did not correlate with dislodgeable foliar residues. Although residues found on masonite plates coated with a thin layer of soil were different from dislodgeable foliar residues, the ratios of paraoxon to parathion was very similar for the first 14 to 21 days. The thin-layer soil on the plates had serious deficiencies including difficulty of preparation in the field, handling of the coated plates, and physical movement of the soil from the plate due to environmental forces including rain. Soil tags prepared from fine mesh window screen saturated with soil resulted in approximately the same residue as the soil plates and at the same time avoided most of the deficiencies experienced with the plates. They were very resistant to physical forces, easy to prepare in the field, and not affected by environmental forces except appreciable quantities of rain. The results should encourage the use of soil screen tags, not in lieu of but along with other methods when conducting field studies with pesticides involving worker safety.