Can I grow a plant with only water?
- Thread starter SeekKnowledge
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electro gypsy
New Member
distilled water carries a curse lol. even if it makes no difference it causes more arguments than dang near any topic i have ever seen. in cannabis some say it causes droop. others say it speeds up grows. personally i think there are other factors that are not considered in these reports. the truth is that it is mostly de-mineralized. that can be good or bad depending on the situation. in this case of no or little ferts it could lead to troubles.. maybe. in more normal circumstances we tend to add nutes so the benefit would be a lack of impurities like chlorine or fluoride found in tap water. i'm fortunate that i am on a well with excellent quality water. haven't had to deal with water issues for many years.
CAT345longsti
Well-Known Member
I would letem dry out until they r light to pick up
KidGrow420
New Member
Slight over nuting is good. When the very, very, very tips are yellow. The size of a pin head but visible with the naked eye is best, but not when their young (0-3 weeks old)
(TIP ALERT 
)
Plants require water, light, air, nutrition, and something to hold their roots in place.
There are multiple choices in each category - even the air!
Water can be 'just water' and also used to hold the nutrition.
Soil can be used as a source of nutrition and is always something to hold the roots in place.
Some nutrients can be absorbed through the leaves but most nutrition comes through the roots
Water and/or soil will feed the roots.
- - -
Feeding roots through water is simple and immediate. Calculating and maintaining the balance of nutrients is manual and can be difficult.
The biological activity in feeding roots through soil can be complex, but natural systems provide the balance of nutrients so it works without much help from the grower.
A lot of time, the nutrients in soil are not being used because nutrients are supplied via water poured through the soil. In the forms most commonly sold, these nutrients kill the living systems and flush many of the nutrients out of the soil.
It takes a bit of research and experiment to feed your plants nutrition at the correct levels OR to create a"living" nutient rich soil.
Almost everything sold at indoor growing stores is incompatible with watering with 'just water' and using soil to feed nutrients to plants.
- - -
This, and most of my plants, are grown with nutrient rich 'living' soil and ph adjusted tap water. At this point, this works for me.
There are multiple choices in each category - even the air!
Water can be 'just water' and also used to hold the nutrition.
Soil can be used as a source of nutrition and is always something to hold the roots in place.
Some nutrients can be absorbed through the leaves but most nutrition comes through the roots
Water and/or soil will feed the roots.
- - -
Feeding roots through water is simple and immediate. Calculating and maintaining the balance of nutrients is manual and can be difficult.
The biological activity in feeding roots through soil can be complex, but natural systems provide the balance of nutrients so it works without much help from the grower.
A lot of time, the nutrients in soil are not being used because nutrients are supplied via water poured through the soil. In the forms most commonly sold, these nutrients kill the living systems and flush many of the nutrients out of the soil.
It takes a bit of research and experiment to feed your plants nutrition at the correct levels OR to create a"living" nutient rich soil.
Almost everything sold at indoor growing stores is incompatible with watering with 'just water' and using soil to feed nutrients to plants.
- - -
This, and most of my plants, are grown with nutrient rich 'living' soil and ph adjusted tap water. At this point, this works for me.
Stanciulord3
New Member
I know plants will grow in a constant flow of water with fish in it.
Chrondocious
Well-Known Member
Yes. Living soil and KNF. Look em up. Theres a guy on here explaining how he makes his stuff. Sorry I cant temember his name. Look up bokashi on here.
My garden is water only. I dont ph. Was in city water now on well. No issues. My latest
Fenderbender
Well-Known Member
For me it was a life saver... the tap water here causes problems, that plus nutes unhappy plant.. since switching to mostly distilled, happy plants.distilled water carries a curse lol. even if it makes no difference it causes more arguments than dang near any topic i have ever seen. in cannabis some say it causes droop. others say it speeds up grows. personally i think there are other factors that are not considered in these reports. the truth is that it is mostly de-mineralized. that can be good or bad depending on the situation. in this case of no or little ferts it could lead to troubles.. maybe. in more normal circumstances we tend to add nutes so the benefit would be a lack of impurities like chlorine or fluoride found in tap water. i'm fortunate that i am on a well with excellent quality water. haven't had to deal with water issues for many years.
Of course I add stuff back into it... If I were to use water to just water plants I'd not pick the distilled one as that has nothing to offer, you'd at least want some mineral content.
I agree with @bluter you can get a really really good 5 stage RO system for 200-250$ and it’s probably the single best investment I’ve made for my family. Our cooking, cleaning, and drinking all taste and appear much cleaner and crisper. That’s without even talking about how much easier it makes it to control your water quality for growing.
I love my RO system. I’ll never go without it again. If you don’t want the whole 5 stage system with a 5 gallon tank for storage then you can buy cheaper 2 and 3 stage systems as well.
I use pure water (0 ppm) with Dolomite lime aerated in it to bring it to 50 ppms and feed that to my plants for their entire lifecycle except the last 2 weeks of flower.
seaofgreen18
Well-Known Member
Wouldn't be fair to the plant don't want to starve it to DEATH!
Fenderbender
Well-Known Member
oh well, I'm still having conversations I started decades ago with people IRL.. time is but an illusion, lunchtime doubly so.
I have looked into it, but if I did I need to treat the incoming water to the three flats as that would benefit all the taps and washing machines etc..
I’ve never heard the lunchtime part before. It made me laugh out loud
They make systems for entire houses versus just one tap/sink. It’s not cheap though, however if you’re a landlord that’s quite an edge for a rental “my units come with completely pollutant/toxin/heavy metal free water that can be both seen and measured” I’d pay extra for it as a renter
