Hey guys, this is a bit outside of my knowledge. I ran a micro extraction on a batch of trim and everything came back ND but then I got a follow up email from the lab (attached below)
Basically everything was under LOD but they picked up a faint trace of Etofenprox which is a cat 1 with a .03 LOD and .03 fail limit. Not enough to qualify as a detection but they see it
My question is I know some pests are more likely to fall off in distillation rather than concentrate due to their weights and flash points. Does anyone have any insight on this particular pest? I’m leaning toward scrapping the buy. Not interested in filtering it out we run way to large to have to do additional filtration.
We distill in a wiper. 175° Evap, 70° condenser at .009mtorr
***In this sample my lab is detecting below LOD levels of Etofenprox, a cat 1 pesticide. At the current level we can’t fully confirm that the pesticide is present, though we are seeing very trace signs of it.
With further concentration (taking this from crude to distillate) there is a chance that the pesticide concentration will increase as well and it could fail for cat 1 pesticide Etofenprox.****
This isn’t a pesticide I’ve dealt with before, so I sadly do not have more info for you in that regard, but what I would first suggest is to go back to the grower and grill them about what they actually sprayed during the plants’ entire life cycle. If you have the option, you may want to pass on this biomass. Having had pesticide contamination unknowingly pollute my concentrate and equipment, I can say it’s a headache you’re better off avoiding.
I’ve had growers lie to me about what they sprayed because they believed it would have degraded and disappeared by the time we extracted. I’ve also had terps come back as weird pesticides and on retest, there were no longer pesticides present. Maybe after a good conversation with the grower, another micro extraction and test is in order.
In my previous experience with personal care products being found in at or below LOD is that they have come from someone using a personal care product and not from a grower getting really interested in using a personal care product on plants.
Etofenprox is for fleas over the counter on dogs and cats. You can use it for other things (like dips on cows and even potentially as a spray for mosquito) but I’m not sure why a grower would have issues with fleas or mosquito and need to spray for them. And people use it on row crops as well.
According to the EPA records, Etofenprox, degrades at around 200F at atmosphere, they are not specific on what it degrades into. So your temperatures should cause degradation, but we still would not know what those degradants would be.
If I was betting on this - after I talked to the grower of course - I would think this is probably from someone who handled the material inappropriately after petting a cat/dog.
Etofenprox doesn’t appear to degrade easily under light or room temperature, so if someone had sprayed it on purpose on a plant you would probably see way more still present as well as seeing remnants of the pests that it had killed, I would expect.
So go with Akoyeh’s recommendation to poke the grower vigorously. Talk to your team about any usage of pet care products. And run another test. If you get two positive tests and you know your team didn’t contaminate then return it. No reason to waste resources cleaning up someone else’s mess.
For me knowing something is over the counter that could be incidental contamination always makes me see things in a different light and give people the benefit of the doubt.
Folks also spray this on mosquito nets/tents/temporary shelters if they’re having problems with mosquitoes. Perhaps someone was camping or has some kind of shelter near an outdoor grow where this may have been used? The fact that it’s a low concentration makes me wonder about some kind of cross-contamination (and others have already described other such situations which could have arisen).
Overspray is a real issue with outdoor cannabis being grown in agriculturally focused areas. They like to use planes here, and the drift can span miles if the wind picks up just right.
Just because the farmer didn’t use it doesn’t mean the neighbors didn’t.
And kudos on doing microextractions prior to just running @robbyc22! I have been recommending that for a long time and so few ever take that advice. This is exactly why.
So your temperatures should cause degradation, but we still would not know what those degradants would be.