Applications of equilibrium passive samplers to monitor pesticides in water bodies during a locust control event - Quilpie 2002. Australian Plague Locust Commission Research Report

Abstract

Guidelines used to protect aquatic ecosystems are only available for a small number of common pesticides and are generally based on the analytical limits of detection. To avoid contamination of waterways during it’s locust control operations, the Australian Plague Locust Commission (APLC) employs conservative downwind buffer zones between a spray target and a water body of ~1500m. To date the APLC does not collect regular environmental monitoring data in relation to these buffer zones, primarily because the use of active air and water sampling methodologies is labour intensive and requires significant numbers of samples to be taken for the time integration of residue data. Currently, this falls outside the resources available during locust control campaigns. Therefore, if off target residue data is to be collected as part of a structure environmental monitoring program, sampling methodologies need to be developed that enable adequate spatial and temporal scaling of residue sampling within the current resource constraints experienced by the APLC.