In article ,
Nick Apostolakis wrote:

lets say that we have a vegetable that is sprayed with a pesticide.
the pesticide says that after 15 days it gets degraded to non toxic
elements.

Well, it SAYS that.

i think that it is a common case among the various pesticides and
fungucides.

It is a common CLAIM.

if i pick up a vegetable 2 days before the pesticide deadline finishes
and store it in a refigerator is the pesticide going to dissolve as if
the vegetable was on the plant?

the point of my question is that i do not know what exactly the term
degrade means for the various agro chemicals.

They vary. In practice, the 15 days is not a hard deadline, but
when the concentration will have dropped to a 'safe' level. Also,
the breakdown products are not always as harmless as is made out.
The conditions will make a considerable difference to the breakdown
rate, but what those conditions are I don't know (except that it
will vary, and often involves bacteria).

None of the pesticides that you can buy for domestic use are
seriously toxic to humans, nor are their breakdown products, so it
isn't a major matter. But, if you are worried about such things,
use only genuinely harmless (to humans) pesticides.

Soft soap (or detergent) is one such, and pyrethrum is close. It
is the best thing for aphids on beans, for example. You can spray
the day you pick. Simple copper salts are OK, too, provided that
you wash them off to ensure that you eat only a small amount (the
odd milligram at most). Sulphur is safe, too. And, though it is
not an approved pesticide, bleach is also safe.

In all cases, getting them in your eyes or in a concentrated form
on other mucous membranes or sensitive skin is a Bad Idea. But
eating them diluted is not a problem.

Pete the Troll is probably inedible, anyway, so ignore him.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.