Effects of Herbicide on the Environmental Ecosystem in Subtropics

Herbicides play a very important role in modern agriculture. However, the herbicide applied to the agricultural field may accumulate in the field, converting the advantages to environment pollution. Many small animals in the ecosystem such as alderfly, earthworm, butterfly, loach, frog, firefly, some birds and aquatic organisms have been known to disappear gradually. In addition, several behavior of herbicides including adsorption by soil, movement by water, photodecomposition, volatilization to air, absorption by plant, metabolism by soil microorganisms and so on, are proceeded while the herbicide remained in the environment. In this review, fate and behavior of herbicides in the environment and their effect on ecosystem after their application are focused on four aspects : the first is the absorption and metabolism of herbicides by plant; the second is the residues of herbicides in soil and water environments: the third is the accumulation and release of herbicides in aquatic organisms and the fourth is the translocation of herbicides in model agricultural ecosystem. Many factors may affect the behavior and fate of herbicides after their application, climatic conditions and soil properties seem to be the most important. Therefore, the fate and behavior of herbicide in Taiwan, located on subtropical region, may differ from those in Korea.