Fertilizer choices and water type

[bil]

Originally Posted by Orchid Whisperer

bil, I will make a guess.

Your fish pond water likely contains dissolved and/or suspended organic matter, dissolved gases, nutrient and microbes (bacteria, algae, protozoa, etc.).

Standard methods require analysis of pH "in the field", meaning at the source and as soon after collecting as possible. The reason is that all of the organic matter, nutrients, gases and microbes in open, circulating water exist in a natural balance.

Suddenly stop circulating that water, by placing it in a bottle, maybe removing it from sunlight, and things change. You could quickly end up with reducing conditions after an hour of storage. I don't know the buffering capacity of your water, but if the buffering capacity is low (like rain water), you can get relatively large pH changes quickly.

I used to run a very hard water with a high KH. It protects the fish and keeps the pond filter healthy. The water was pretty damn clean too. I had an impressive filter system. You could read a newspaper in 8 feet of water.

[Michelle15]

One last question - if I decide to stick with some filtered tap water/straight tap (I looked into it and Cleveland has fairly decent tap water last report done) or spring water, things that already have minerals, should I use the Dyna-Grow at half strength since it has added minerals already? and save full strength for the rain or distilled water? I was also thinking about mixing 50:50 distilled and tap just to tweak the pH a bit.

[Orchid Whisperer]

Originally Posted by bil

I used to run a very hard water with a high KH. It protects the fish and keeps the pond filter healthy. The water was pretty damn clean too. I had an impressive filter system. You could read a newspaper in 8 feet of water.

Didn't the sports section get all wet?

---------- Post added at 06:05 AM ---------- Previous post was at 05:45 AM ----------

Originally Posted by Michelle15

One last question - if I decide to stick with some filtered tap water/straight tap (I looked into it and Cleveland has fairly decent tap water last report done) or spring water, things that already have minerals, should I use the Dyna-Grow at half strength since it has added minerals already? and save full strength for the rain or distilled water? I was also thinking about mixing 50:50 distilled and tap just to tweak the pH a bit.

I Googled "Cleveland water dissolved solids" and see that the TDS is about 175 ppm. You could water Phals with that as-is but it would not be a bad idea to mix 50-50 with rain water.

I would base the amount of fertilizer you apply on the NPK macro nutrients, rather than the other minerals. Ray's website has a fertilizer calculator for tweaking exact concentrations, but I find reducing the fertilizer concentration to 1/4 (or even 1/8) recommended strength improves blooming. Too much nitrogen and you get a lot of leaf growth and fewer flowers. Of course, with really young plants, years from blooming, leaf growth may be just what you need.

[bil]

[QUOTE=Orchid Whisperer;792823]Didn't the sports section get all wet?[COLOR="Silver"]

Just a bit. You have a look in most ponds, and you have a problem seeing which fish is which in 4 feet of water. I have been to ponds where you couldn't tell a kohaku from a pound of sausages in 6 inches of water!

[Ray]

I sure wish folks would get away from discussing dosage in terms of "strength". Telling someone to use "1/4 strength" - or worse, "weakly" - has no meaning.

If referring to "recommended strength", who's doing the recommending? The manufacturer? They tend to know nothing about orchids, and their goal, after all, is to sell fertilizer, not to help you grow better.

As one of the purposes of forums like is to help each other, if we want to communicate useful info in such terms, in addition to the fraction we are using, we need to specify the fertilizer formula and what the recommended rate is. Or...do what professional grower do and use ppm N instead, as that takes the three pieces of info all at once!

(Before anyone jumps on the fact that there is no formula info in that, please consider that a plant is 85% water, 14% carbon, and the remaining 1% is all of the fertilizer components, and that nitrogen is, by far, the largest fraction. Yes, knowing the formula is helpful, but unless it's really lacking in something, the formula is far less important than the nitrogen dosing rate.)

[Orchid Whisperer]

Ray, using the calculator on your website was one of the options I presented.

However, i don't know the OP's level of experience growing orchids, or even which orchids she is growing. I don't even know if she knows what concentration of nutrients she needs to target. Sounds like she has been growing orchids a few years, but I know nothing beyond that - and if I am underestimating her knowledge level, "my bad", and my apologies to her.

She had suggested using half strength at some times, full strength at other times. Most fertilizers recommend applying too much fertilizer. It is a reasonable assumption to go with "less is more" and just cut the application rate by a fraction of what the manufacturer suggested, as an alternative to doing a more precise determination of the ideal fertilizer solution concentration. Especially if you don't know what "ideal" should be. This simplified approach works for a lot of growers.

[Ray]

I suppose my "issue" is that the information can be so easily misinterpreted by other growers.

If the OP had a 5% N fertilizer, then using it at "full strength" is likely not an issue (although it would still be good to know exactly what that is, in numbers), but if another person reads that and concludes that "full strength" of their 30% N formula is OK - especially if it's something like Miracle Gro that recommends a tablespoon per gallon on some of their formulas - then that is a problem.

I'll add to my previous post that knowing how often one feeds is also an important piece of information.

[Michelle15]

More info - I have just bought Dyna Grow Orchid Pro which is 7-8-6. The dosing instructions are 1/2 tsp per gallon. I had been using Green Jungle whcih is 1-0-1 with dosing directions of 2 TBS per gallon.
I have a variety but seem to do best and have the most of - phals, catts, and dendrobiums (one nobile and a microchip that is happily budding like crazy right now). I suck at oncidiums and intergenerics, not sure why, I think I under water and dehydrate them and then don't get them back well. And I have a bollopetalum that is not happy at the moment but that's another thread, not enough humidity is the general consensus.
Have had orchids for about 4 yrs but only really getting into them for past 2 yrs. (i.e. I stopped killing them and started to get good results)

So I looked at Ray's website about ppm N. In winter my house is on the drier side with the heat on. I have a whole house humidistat set at 50% but do not get that high, RH ranges in the 40s, even with humidity trays (the egg crate kind, not pebbles). I'll get above 50% on wet days outside.
In winter I water most orchids every 7 to 10 days. I fertilize every time I water and flush with plain water once a month or so.
Looking at the ppm N that is listed on the website it says 100-150 ppm per week for most orchids is good. So if I only water once a week, using the calculator, I would need 1 tsp of the 7% nitrogen per gallon, double the recommended dose, is that correct?

Also I got a TDS meter, not a very expensive one but I thought just to compare. My tap water was ~150, the PUR filter water 124, and a 50:50 tap/distilled water was 87. I collected rain water and it was 7. What I found interesting was bottled distilled water was 15 and bottled spring water was 7 (with a pH of 6.3, same as rain water).
I know the TDS meter isn't 100% but why would distilled be higher? Brand new just opened bottles for both.
Based on these readings I'm going to stick with the rain and spring water (Wal-mart brand in case you're wondering). This is plain, haven't checked with fertilizer in it yet.

[terryros]

I am a long term Green Jungle (Orchids Limited) user alternating with K-Lite. The formula is mandated to be rounded so the zero isn't really zero and the 1s aren't exactly one. However, using the exact formula for the fertilizer, 2 tablespoons of Green Jungle per gallon of water will be 100 ppm N. Green Jungle is a very carefully created complete fertilizer with more things in it than are on the label. I know it is more expensive than some others, but I have had success with it. This is the fertilizer that Orchids Limited uses on all of their orchids.

Using the 7% N fertilizer solution, you would use 1 teaspoon per gallon to get to 100 ppm N. 100 ppm would be acceptable for many orchids, depending on other growing conditions. Some excellent growers use less and some use more.

With a good desktop reverse osmosis filter and a good TDS meter I get about 3 ppm which translates to an EC of about 0.06 (omitting the units) confirmed by calibration solutions. My tap water is around 80-100 ppm where I live. Apparently, your distilled water isn't quite as "pure" as standard RO water.




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[Helene]

I cant figure out this water thing, so I just use a little less amount of fertilizer to make sure I dont overdo it.

I dont know how to figure out what my water is. Gonna try to read some more.

I used tapwater from 2008-2014, and starting using rainwater after reading its good for the plant.

I checked the water quality here, but I have no idea what to look for. I think the water is very clean- we actually bottle water in Norway and sell.
The hardness is 3 degree clark, so its soft enough.

Looking at this list it says the ph is 8, that seems high- but I assume it change when adding nutrition. The thing is that my plant seem to be fine- with both tapwater and rainwater.

The column to the right is the water we have in our place.
Anyone understand it (its norwegian, but some words are pretty much the same)- would you use tapwater or rainwater?