Project Number: 5310-12130-008-00
Project Type: Appropriated

Start Date: May 16, 2007
End Date: Jul 31, 2010

Objective:
Discover and test alternatives to methyl bromide for controlling pests in strawberry and vegetable production. Quantify mechanisms and processes that affect exchange of pesticides and fumigants between soil, plants and air, and that affect pesticide transport to surface and ground water. Develop and test pesticide transport models. Develop and test new pesticide management practices that improve agricultural production while reducing contamination of the atmosphere, surface water, ground water, and nearby ecosystems.

Approach:
Laboratory, lysimeter and field experiments will be conducted to examine how the important physical, chemical, and biological processes affect the fate and transport of pesticides in soil-water-air systems. Studies will be conducted at various scales with replicated treatments and under highly controlled conditions. Typical measurements include: fractio of pesticide volatilized or tranported below the root zone; soil gas and liquid-phase concentration as a function of time; degradation products; a measurement of pathogen mortality; along with numerous measurement of soil and environmental conditions. Sufficient information will be collected for the simulation of pesticide transport. Mathematical simulations will be conducted to develop improved methods for managing agricultural pesticides which minimize non-target transport into surface water, ground water, and the atmosphere. Improved pesticide transport models will be developed. This information will be used to reduce the risk that pesticides will contaminate sensitive ecosystems. Replaces 5310-12130-007-00D (5/07).