Can you water with bottled spring water?

[Paul Mc]

I'm researching another way to fog my "in progress" terrarium, and the fogger I've been looking at has some issues. A reviewer stated that it did not work sometimes when using distilled water and suggested using bottled spring water.

I currently have a porroglosum, trisetella and will be putting in a scaphosepalum inside of the terrarium. I know that at least two of them are very sensitive about the chemicals in tap water. Would bottled spring water be alright to use instead of distilled?

[Darin]

Spring water typically has more minerals in it than distilled water. the minerals tend to build up on the foggers. When using ultrasonic foggers, I have found that distilled or RO water works best long term. As for the plants, I prefer to use RO or distilled water that I add fertilizers and minerals to. That way, I know what salts/minerals my plants are receiving rather than having to guess what was in the spring water that I gave them.

[Discus]

Depends on the mineral/spring water! Some is almost as pure as RO, some is very heavily salt laden (particularly with Ca). The label should tell your the TDS or EC, upon which you can make your decision - anything under about 50uS/cm should be OK, I suspect.

I've used bottled spring water in a pinch, and regularly used RO water - waiting to find a plumber that can be bothered to get off their ass and install me a T in my plumbing so I can finally install my own RO unit. Arghh. I'd DIY the T, only I'm in a rented property and I'd rather have Water Damage Deniability

[Orchid126]

Bear in mind that not all spring waters are the same. Spring water can come from any spring, any where on earth, and can contain anything, lots or almost no minerals. As Discus says, check the bottle for the TDS (Total Disolved Solids).

RO water, (Reverse Osmosis) is almost, but not quite pure and is almost devoid of any minerals.

Distilled water is absolutely pure, with no minerals whatsoever. As Darin says, when using RO or Distilled water, the minerals, macro and micronutrients must be replaced.