Do you adjust pH when watering?

[orchids3]

Actually the MIT instructor/once fertilizer company president, said that there is no chemical that can be added to media to eliminate salt. For my part I will go back to leaching. Just wash out the media with water so often to stop buildup and concentration due to evaporation. Thats all we can do once the salt is in the
media. Will do the same with my CHC.
Salt can be eliminated from water - RO, distillation,
Ion exchange. All require energy levels that cannot be done once the water has been applied.
Thanks to all in this thread, I learned something.

[Ross]

Originally Posted by orchids3

Actually the MIT instructor/once fertilizer company president, said that there is no chemical that can be added to media to eliminate salt. For my part I will go back to leaching. Just wash out the media with water so often to stop buildup and concentration due to evaporation. Thats all we can do once the salt is in the
media. Will do the same with my CHC.
Salt can be eliminated from water - RO, distillation,
Ion exchange. All require energy levels that cannot be done once the water has been applied.
Thanks to all in this thread, I learned something.

Time for an RO unit? Actually the water supply in Cape Coral is a commercial grade RO process taking brackish water and running it through RO processor. Only problem is, the pure water is pretty hard on fixtures that aren't plastic (impossible for domestic water supply) so they complain about pipes rotting out in a few years. A small residential unit like you'd need shouldn't be a problem.

[goodgollymissmolly]

Glad that you got your answer Orchids3. Might I suggest rainwater. RO is really wasteful since roughly half the water supplied is wasted. Rain is free. It works good for me. I have about a thousand plants to take care of. I store about 400 gal inside the greenhouse and have another 200 outside except during winter when it freezes out there.

Forums can be very beneficial for all of us and this was a good exchange. Unfortunately some get out of hand and some are silly.

[Ross]

Originally Posted by goodgollymissmolly

RO is really wasteful since roughly half the water supplied is wasted.

Guess if I were living in Arizona I might be concerned, but here in Michigan water is pretty much in abundance and the waste goes right back to the ground water from wence it came . In Florida, the source is the sea (or Gulf) and the waste goes right back where it came from. Generalizations are often the source of misinformation. There are a lot of civilizations and communities depending on some form of distillation or Reverse Osmosis for domestic water supplies. I find "wasted" to be a subjective term, anyways. Sorry.

[Ray]

I have to agree with Goodgolly on the gypsum, but disagree on the "RO is wasteful" part.

If you have the type of unit that has flush water (mine is 25%, not 50%), but don't use the flush water, it is wasteful. Mine fills a pond and humidifies the greenhouse.

Plus, there are pressurized RO units out there that produce no waste water at all. Yes, you have to replace the membrane more frequently, but that beats the hell out of wasting water!

[Ross]

Originally Posted by Ray

I have to agree with Goodgolly on the gypsum, but disagree on the "RO is wasteful" part.

If you have the type of unit that has flush water (mine is 25%, not 50%), but don't use the flush water, it is wasteful. Mine fills a pond and humidifies the greenhouse.

Plus, there are pressurized RO units out there that produce no waste water at all. Yes, you have to replace the membrane more frequently, but that beats the hell out of wasting water!

I think that was my point!

[orchids3]

Actually my water would be consitered quite good with a TDS around 200ppm. Understand that in Calif the see TDS around 1000 ppm and in Santa Barbers its been as high as 1800 ppm. My water grows most things very well and I dont get tip die back like I saw when I did live in Calif. My pots developed stelagmites out the bottom when I lived there. My only concern is the really salt sensative plants that I have -Cischweinfia's and some of the Tricopelias. Not a novice by the way with around 5000 plants but know that I will always have a lot to learn.

[goodgollymissmolly]

Originally Posted by rsfrid

In Florida, the source is the sea (or Gulf) and the waste goes right back where it came from.

Just for the record Ross as we say down south, "That ain't rite".

The desalination of seawater is a horribly expensive and wasteful exercise due to the high heat of vaporization of water (1000 BTU/lb). The only real examples are on temporary military installations and in a couple of Arab countries with a hell of a lot oil and no fresh water.

Nope, doesn't happen on a scale of city supplies anywhere but in the Arabian peninsula, not the Florida peninsular.

[bodaciousbonsai]

I make things simple and just use a r.o. unit!