Say a venomous snake, or a stalk of giant hogweed, dies and its matter decomposes. Do the toxins simply leach into the environment where they have a risk of polluting the environment or harming the organisms, including plants and other animals, around it? Or do the toxins just eventually break down into non-toxic components themselves?
In: Biology
A venomous snake has venom. Venoms are mostly various forms of amino acid chains (peptides and proteins), and like any biological material they break down (usually harmless when digested since the stomach acid and enzymes in saliva/bile/stomach acid will cut them into harmless amino acids).
Giant hogweeds contain furanocoumarins. This is a complex organic compound, and like most organic compounds it will break down due to oxidation (reacting with oxygen) or hydrolysis (reacting with water).
Some very extreme organic compounds can linger around for a few years before being broken down, but venoms will break down in a matter of hours if exposed and organic poisons tend to break down in days or weeks.
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