Deficiency? Help please new grower

[Leesus]

Gotcha on the water Triggle. I got my chem diploma in 3 years doing enviro chem back in the late 80s when I was in my early 30s. Forgot most of it now in my early 60s. Stroke didn't help. lol

Filtering tap water might remove chlorine and some heavy metals but unless you are using something like a Zero Water 5 - stage water filter system all the carbonates etc are still in it and that's the kind of salts that build up in the root ball and throw off all the chemistry happening in there that makes the plant grow.

Most tap water has lots of calcium and magnesium in it so that's why it's a good idea to use calmag with RO or distilled as they have nothing.

If a guy is going to use tap water then a water report is essential to at least know what is actually in the water and the report is free and not hard to get. Every time you water with tap water your plant will use some of the minerals that are in it but very little so the bulk of them stay in the root ball. After a few waterings it builds up. Just like the crusty crap that plugs up your coffee maker or kettle. I only use RO water in my BUNN coffee maker too so it won't get buggered up. Don't want to be replacing a $150 coffee maker every year. The town water here is about 350ppm and heavily chlorinated with chlorine. Many towns use chloramine to keep their water safe and that doesn't evaporate off like chlorine does. If your tap water has chloramine in it you need a special filter to get rid of it. Same with fluoride. Even RO doesn't take fluoride out of the water and it's toxic to all life tho pot plants don't live long enough to get cancer from it.

We don't have town water here and get all our house water from a big dugout on my property. We buy RO water for drinking and get jugs of town water free from a friend for boiling spuds and such. The dugout is 80 x 50 meters and 4 meters deep so no shortages here, That's 16,000 cubic meters or approx 4 million USG for 3 people, one dog, 3 cats and 30 chickens. lol

I make my own colloidal silver and buy 4L jugs of distilled water from the drug store just for that. At $2.99 a jug that's not bad and I have about 7L of CS at hand.

L8r

I wish I would have read this before posting a few moments ago. This is what I have researched and learned. That even if I try to adjust the pH of AN pH perfect I cant. The buffers won't let me. Do I not need to be adding cal mag to the AN nutes? I pay 1.37$ USD for a gallon of RO water. And pay for the same jug over and over cause they never replace them. It's a shame. But you seem to know what your talking about, how could I not trust an old timer such as yourself. I will be going to the store in a few to grab some RO water, gonna add nutes to a gallon and pH the other gallon to 5.8 for plain water in between feedings, correct? Even when only using small amounts of AN such as 300 ppm? I have learned alot from reading your post and I do greatly appreciate you and Triggle picking up on this topic. First time growing anything and the guy at the local place here laughs at me when I have questions. Plus it's to late to be planting tomatoes... for me lol. All the advice is soaked in, I thank you.
Ah almost forgot there is nothing going on underneath just the same spots as the top. The picture with my thumb in it is the bottom side.

 

[OldMedUser]

Glad to be of help Leesus

If you have that Calmag coming you should use it. The more I think about it you should have it with RO water as it has none like tap water would. I'm using it now myself where I just used to add a little epsom salts for the Mg and S. I didn't buy the AN calmag but a much cheaper brand as for that stuff I don't think it makes all that much difference.$20L comapred to $55. That's a no-brainer for a broke old fart like me.

We pay $3.49CAN for a 5gal jug of RO.

L8r

 

[BuddroGreen]

There are pH buffers in the AN pH Perfect, but the buffers only help so much, they are not self adjusting to a certain pH. The way pH perfect works is that it's chelated to allow the plant to uptake nutrient elements outside of the normal pH range, just like a lot of other nutrient lines, they just don't act like it's a big deal like AN, cause it's been around for a long time. If you want a solid pH you will have to monitor & dial it in.

 

[OldMedUser]

I don't know BuddroGreen. You put 20 mls of pH up into a gal of mixed up regular nutes and it's going to push the pH way up over 7 and it didn't budge when I did it. I'm also pretty sure that if those other companies had that kind of technology in their products they would be crowing about it. I used the older AN 3 - part nutes for 12 years and always had to check and adjust the pH before giving it to the plants. Haven't bothered checking the pH in DWC or soilless and not a sign of any deficiencies or other problems with the pH perfect stuff.

Try calling GH and ask them what you need to grow good pot and they'll hang up on you. Call AN and they are happy to talk about pot. On second thought don't call GH, call Miracle Grow. They own GH now and might be more helpful.

L8r

 

[gg grower]

Ph

 

[OldMedUser]

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