Parameters affecting extraction of selected fungicides from vineyard soils

This paper describes a sensitive method for the simultaneous quantification of eight commonly used grapevine fungicides in vineyard soils: cyprodinil, fludioxonil, metalaxyl, penconazole, pyrimethanil, procymidone, tebuconazole, and vinclozolin. The fungicides are extracted from the soil sample by sonication with water followed by shaking with ethyl acetate and are quantified by gas chromatography with mass spectrometry. Average extraction efficiencies in a sample of seven spiked, previously fungicide-free soils were greater than or equal to79% for all of the analytes, method precisions were greater than or equal to17%, and quantification limits were greater than or equal to50 mug/kg. However, because recoveries varied considerably from soil to soil, there is a need to control for soil matrix differences (mainly soil pH and exchangeable calcium content); as a consequence, soil fungicide contents must be quantified by the standard additions method. When the method was applied in this way to soil samples from vineyards belonging to the specified wine-growing region of Rfas Baixas (Galicia, northwestern Spain) taken at the beginning of October (1 month after the crop's final treatment), levels of fludioxonil as high as 991 mug/kg were found, but at the start of the season (9 months after the previous crop's final treatment) only fludioxonil was detected at levels higher than its limit of quantification (45 and 52 mug/kg).