using softened water?

[neophyte]

hi, we just moved to a new house and the new water system uses this huge water softening process. i saw my dad the other day dumping a huge load of salt into the tank and now i'm wondering whether the water is safe to use for the orchids. i know softened water doesn't tastethat much saltier. but will the concentration of sodium become dangerous? because the concentration of ions is what matters in osmosis, not how salty the water tastes. will the new tap water dehydrate the plants?

if I'm not giving enough information about the softening system in order to get a definitive answer please let me know.

[aliceinwl]

Soft water is a no no. It will kill your plants. We have soft water in the house too. I either use hose water from the backyard (not connected to the water softener) or reverse osmosis water from our drinking water system.

[Roberta]

Not only no-no for orchids, also no-no for any other plants (like houseplants) . The calcium in tap water is not a problem for plants... replace it with sodium and it may taste better, no harm to humans that aren't on a low-sodium diet, but for plants, toxic.

[Dollythehun]

You might check to see how you're plumbed. Our cold water doesn't run through the softener. I still filter it (for us at the tap, for the orchids through a pitcher unit, or rainwater) though because it's so hard.

[MarinaDC]

I did not find this to be a huge problem. Some of my phals have not been repotted in 5-8 years, and they bloom every year and grow just fine. Catts are repotted yearly, grow like weeds and bloom profusely.

[Roberta]

How much of a problem the exchange of sodium for calcium is, is at least in part, a matter of "how much" ... if one is exchanging 20 parts per million calcium for an equivalent amount of sodium, probably not a big deal (but at that level, one wouldn't particularly need a water softener anyway) At 150 ppm, it can become a very big deal.