Clothianidin in the Tropical Sugarcane Ecosystem: Soil Persistence and Environmental Risk Assessment Under Different Organic Manuring

Clothianidin is drenched at planting to manage the termites of sugarcane. The application of organic manures at planting is also in vogue to conserve the soil moisture in the tropical ecosystem. Hence, the persistence behaviour of clothianidin was studied in the sandy clay loam soil of tropical sugarcane ecosystem under different organic manuring. The clothianidin residues persisted up to 90th DAT and reached below the limit of quantification (LOQ = 0.005 µg/g) on 105th DAT both in the manurial and non-manurial soils. The half-lives of clothianidin were in the range of 22.4–24.8 days in the manurial soils as against 21 days in the non-manurial soil, indicating the insignificant positive impact of organic manures on the soil persistence of clothianidin. The clothianidin residues in the soil were predicted to pose unacceptable to medium level of risk to earthworms during the course of its dissipation in the tropical sugarcane environment.