Any way to keep ph balanced without testing first?

So right now I have a female doing pretty well and seems overall healthy. There are a few large bottom shade leaves that have turned yellow and died off but 98% of the plant looks healthy, especially the top 80% of the plant. I started out with high quality ph balanced nute free organic soil. But a lot of the soil is approaching three months old. The cheapest ph meter I can find locally is $80. I know I could order one from ebay for about $30. Not to mention, if I get the meter it's another step I have to learn and do right. If there is something I can add to soil that balances ph whether it needs to go up or down that's what I would like to do. Is there anything out there that eases ph into a neutral direction either way your soil needs to go? I've read a little and it seems like everything is specific to the direction you need your ph to go but I thought I'd ask just in case there is something. I'm trying not to overfeed the plant and cause a lockout or burn and I go ahead and spray with neem oil every 5 days to keep bugs and mold honest. So at this point the only thing I feel I can run into is a ph problem that causes a lockout and that's what I'm trying to avoid.

Thanks

By the way, where are instructions on how to post a pic?

VirginHarvester said:

If there is something I can add to soil that balances ph whether it needs to go up or down that's what I would like to do. Is there anything out there that eases ph into a neutral direction either way your soil needs to go?

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I've said it before, I have to say it again. I'll keep on saying the same thing until people finally understand what it actually means.

Compost is self ph buffering, you do not need to adjust your water/nutrient ph - the compost will do it for you. You'll cause more harm than good by using acidic ph up and down acids which kill the soil micro fauna.

If you're using soft water then a little dolomite lime or calcified seaweed added to the compost at potting up time will assist in the compost ph buffering.

Don't beleive me? Look at my grow journal - I've never ph'd my water, as I don't own a ph meter.

eggshells like five of them crushed up per pot....
I don't have a ph meter all tho they say you dont need to worry about ph in soil....

But dont you use RO water?

babygro said:

I've said it before, I have to say it again. I'll keep on saying the same thing until people finally understand what it actually means.

Compost is self ph buffering, you do not need to adjust your water/nutrient ph - the compost will do it for you. You'll cause more harm than good by using acidic ph up and down acids which kill the soil micro fauna.

If you're using soft water then a little dolomite lime or calcified seaweed added to the compost at potting up time will assist in the compost ph buffering.

Don't beleive me? Look at my grow journal - I've never ph'd my water, as I don't own a ph meter.

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babygro said:

I've said it before, I have to say it again. I'll keep on saying the same thing until people finally understand what it actually means.

Compost is self ph buffering, you do not need to adjust your water/nutrient ph - the compost will do it for you. You'll cause more harm than good by using acidic ph up and down acids which kill the soil micro fauna.

If you're using soft water then a little dolomite lime or calcified seaweed added to the compost at potting up time will assist in the compost ph buffering.

Don't beleive me? Look at my grow journal - I've never ph'd my water, as I don't own a ph meter.

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Seroiusly, I never heard that, sounds like less work, I always Ph my water.

Greenmonster22 said:

But dont you use RO water?

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Yes I do.

And..?

Gygax1974 said:

Seroiusly, I never heard that, sounds like less work, I always Ph my water.

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Well I hope you don't use ph up and down to adjust it.

babygro said:

Well I hope you don't use ph up and down to adjust it.

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I do after I add the nutes, but I just realized you said compost...sorry I misread

And, you have no idea that he uses domolite lime, or anything else, yet you tell him not to worry about ph? That sounds like advice leading to a sure disaster. He obviously didnt mention using it.
Where will you be when his plants die?

babygro said:

Yes I do.

And..?

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Greenmonster22 said:

And, you have no idea that he uses domolite lime, or anything else, yet you tell him not to worry about ph?

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Yes I do and am telling him not to worry about ph, are you going to disagree with me? If so where's your reasoning, apart from - his plants are going to die?!

I use RO water for a different reason to ph issues, clearly something you're incapable of understanding. My tap water contains too much sodium which can lock out certain nutrients from the root zone - Magnesium being a good example.

RO water 'should have' a neutral ph of 7.0, but it has no ph buffering abilities of its own and therefore as soon as something else is added to it it will take on the ph value of that rather than it's own 7.0. I use my RO in about 80/20 proportions with tap water - therefore the ph will raise or lower to the ph of the tap water.

My tap water is hard, therefore it's Alkaline - with a ph over 7.0. I have no idea of the exact ph, because I've never measured it, but I'm guessing it's somewhere in the region of 7.5-8.0 which is the typical ph of hard Alkaline water. When you add nutrients, the acidity of those nutrients will generally lower the ph of the solution - but nothing like enough to bring my water into the ideal 6.0 -7.0 ph range required for growing Canna successfully.

So why aren't my plants dead when I'm feeding it irrigation water of 7.5 - 8.0 ph?

Either come up with some reasoning or fuck off and stop wasting my time.

Nice healthy attitude. No-where in his post does he say he used domolite lime. Personally I think your a fucking liar about using water with a ph of 8.
You sound like someone who is deadset on being correct, no matter if you have to lie to do so, or even give out shit advise. So long as you have the last word.
So far as wasting your time, I wouldnt worry it that either, it obviously has little value.

babygro said:

Yes I do and am telling him not to worry about ph, are you going to disagree with me? If so where's your reasoning, apart from - his plants are going to die?!

I use RO water for a different reason to ph issues, clearly something you're incapable of understanding. My tap water contains too much sodium which can lock out certain nutrients from the root zone - Magnesium being a good example.

RO water 'should have' a neutral ph of 7.0, but it has no ph buffering abilities of its own and therefore as soon as something else is added to it it will take on the ph value of that rather than it's own 7.0. I use my RO in about 80/20 proportions with tap water - therefore the ph will raise or lower to the ph of the tap water.

My tap water is hard, therefore it's Alkaline - with a ph over 7.0. I have no idea of the exact ph, because I've never measured it, but I'm guessing it's somewhere in the region of 7.5-8.0 which is the typical ph of hard Alkaline water. When you add nutrients, the acidity of those nutrients will generally lower the ph of the solution - but nothing like enough to bring my water into the ideal 6.0 -7.0 ph range required for growing Canna successfully.

So why aren't my plants dead when I'm feeding it irrigation water of 7.5 - 8.0 ph?

Either come up with some reasoning or fuck off and stop wasting my time.

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Greenmonster22 said:

No-where in his post does he say he used domolite lime.

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And nowhere in my reply to him did I say he did. Do you have problems with basic reading and English comprehension?

Greenmonster22 said:

Personally I think your a fucking liar about using water with a ph of 8..

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How can I be a liar when I've already stated quite clearly that I have no idea what the ph of my tap water is, because I've never measured it? I'm guessing at what it is. Now go away and look up the likely ph level of hard Alkaline tap water and then call me a fucking liar again.

Greenmonster22 said:

You sound like someone who is deadset on being correct, no matter if you have to lie to do so, or even give out shit advise. So long as you have the last word. So far as wasting your time, I wouldnt worry it that either, it obviously has little value.

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As I said before and I'll say it again, do you have any reasoning or anything at all substantive to add to this discussion? If not, why the fuck are you participating in it?

When was the last time you saw a little old lady watering her potted plants inside and outside using a ph meter to make sure the water is at the correct ph level?

In your post #10, you clearly corrected me, saying you did know he used domolite lime,
Do you have problems with basic reading and English comprehension?

The acceptable range ph range for cannabis is 6.3 to 6.8 in soil.

Now I can see why the owner of this forum has to threaten me to stay here, and censor my questions, he has to! He can take his infraction and your misinformation and stuff em.

Greenmonster22 said:

In your post #10, you clearly corrected me, saying you did know he used domolite lime, Do you have problems with basic reading and English comprehension?

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Would you like to point out where I've 'clearly corrected' you regarding his use of dolomite lime? I've never once stated here that he uses dolomite lime.

I said yes I do (don't ph my water) and am telling him he doesn't need to ph his water in compost. That has nothing whatsoever to do with dolomite lime. Your understanding of English comprehension is clearly quite poor, English your second language is it?

If you read back to my second post to him, you'll cearly see I said IF YOU HAVE SOFT WATER....

Did you miss that part? If I already thought he was using Dolomite lime why would I say if you're using soft water?

Greenmonster22 said:

IThe acceptable range ph range for cannabis is 6.3 to 6.8 in soil.

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The acceptable range of ph in soil is whatever the soil/compost buffers it to and that depends soley on what the starting ph of the soil/compost you use is - you cannot move the ph of soil with your irrigation water, which is why it's a waste of time phing it. A lot depends on the quality of the soil/compost used, but if you use crap quality compost then you deserve all you get.

You clearly do not understand the ph buffering qualities of soil/compost - this comes with its own ph value and you cannot change it with irrigation water.

Greenmonster22 said:

Now I can see why the owner of this forum has to threaten me to stay here, and censor my questions, he has to! He can take his infraction and your misinformation and stuff em.

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I have no idea what the owner of this site has said to you, but if you are who I think you are, I'm amazed you and all the bogus identities you keep creating to cause problems on here haven't been banned.

Somehow if you keep it up that's probably exactly what's going to happen.

If you want to discuss, rationally, soil/compost ph buffering, please do so, if not fuck off and stop wasting everyones time.

I did point it out and it was very clear, you like to change the facts?

It is obviously you who does not understand soil ph, you test the run off, not the water or the soil.

babygro said:

Would you like to point out where I've 'clearly corrected' you regarding his use of dolomite lime? I've never once stated here that he uses dolomite lime.



The acceptable range of ph in soil is whatever the soil/compost buffers it to and that depends soley on what the starting ph of the soil/compost you use is - you cannot move the ph of soil with your irrigation water, which is why it's a waste of time phing it. A lot depends on the quality of the soil/compost used, but if you use crap quality compost then you deserve all you get.

You clearly do not understand the ph buffering qualities of soil/compost - this comes with its own ph value and you cannot change it with irrigation water.

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Greenmonster22 said:

It is obviously you who does not understand soil ph, you test the run off, not the water or the soil.

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Testing the run off water ph will tell you nothing. The only way to know what the ph of the rootzone is to take a sample of water from the soil/compost in the rootzone several hours after watering.

Run off water is affected by all manner of things - including plant wastes, chelated fertiliser nutrient acids and microbial activity wastes which can affect the ph of the run off water.

Next?

This is silly, I Ph my water and do not have problems. Babygro does not and his plants are fine. However, he does have an RO which isn't exactly tap water. I was told that Ph would kill the helpful bacteria but I also use this stuff called Hydroguard which promotes the growth of helpful bacteria it is made by Botanicare. I'm sure I will get attcked for this but what is wrong with Phing water? We Ph hydro water does that mean there is no bacteria in hydro water? I don't know.... I'm asking I also add hydroguard to my hydro units. I have never had a problem Phing my water...now if you are adding tons of Ph up and Down then I could see where BG is coming from but if you are just adding a little Ph up/down to adjust then I see no problems.

It's like a freaking competition....this site is supposed to help people learn to grow and there are many different ways and many different results....

i give my babies evian spring water it has a lot of minerals in it no chlorine. I also got a container that collects rain water. So i can use this myself I dont drink tap water myself so i cant feed it to my babies now can i.

Dont worry to much but if u gonna use tap water leave it in a jug opened for 24-48 hrs this should evaporate the chlorine in the water. They put all kind of shit in our tap water fluoride is another aswell as chlorine. I use rain water and mineral water never tap water but thats just me.

I heard from someone that soil that is higher in alkaline will more likely to produce females than males. I havent heard anyone else mention this before has anyone heard similar stories.

I use strictly distilled water...IDK if this helps any

Gygax1974 said:

This is silly, I Ph my water and do not have problems. Babygro does not and his plants are fine. However, he does have an RO which isn't exactly tap water.

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I use RO water because I have to use RO water - I would much rather use water straight from the tap, also my use of RO water has nothing whatsoever to do with ph issues - so let's get that clear straight away.

My tap water is hard, which means it contains very high quantities of dissolved solids - particularly Sodium Carbonate. Canna does not like high levels of sodium and this can cause various nutrient lockouts - particularly Magnesium, which plagued my early grows - that's the only reason I switched over to using RO water.

RO water or distilled water should have a 0 EC reading or 0 ppm, because of this it has almost no ph buffering capabilites of it's own and will take on the ph of whatever is added to it - I add about 20% tap water to my RO water and therefore the RO and Tap water combination has the ph value of water straight from the tap - but 80% less total dissolved solids.

Gygax1974 said:

I was told that Ph would kill the helpful bacteria but I also use this stuff called Hydroguard which promotes the growth of helpful bacteria it is made by Botanicare. I'm sure I will get attcked for this but what is wrong with Phing water?

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There's nothing wrong with ph'ing water as long as you use a 'bacteria' friendly method of doing so and not the nitric and phosphoric acids used in ph up and down which are too aggressive and will kill soil friendly bacteria as will too low a soil/compost ph.

The point I continue to make is that you don't have to do it - as the compost/soil will self buffer itself to the compost/soil ph and not the ph of the irrigation water you use. In other words, you're pretty much wasting your time phing water because it won't make the slightest bit of difference to the compost/soil ph in the vast majority of cases. Obviously if you're going to be feeding water with a ph of 10 or over or 3 or 4 and under then you're at risk of slowly moving the soil/compost ph in that direction over time.

Gygax1974 said:

We Ph hydro water does that mean there is no bacteria in hydro water?

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Growing hydroponically isn't the same as soil growing is it? And I don't intend to go into a comparison of the differences either and no, there are no friendly bacteria in hydro - unless YOU put them there and they will suffer the same fate in hydro as they will in soil if you use excessive quantities of nitric and phosphoric acids to move your ph. Try adding Advanced Nutrients Voodoo juice, Tarantula and Piranha to your hydro reservoir and see what happens to the ph.

Gygax1974 said:

I have never had a problem Phing my water...now if you are adding tons of Ph up and Down then I could see where BG is coming from but if you are just adding a little Ph up/down to adjust then I see no problems.

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But you're not just using a little are you? If you ph up and down each time you water - those acids will build up to a level that will be toxic to the beneficial soil organisms.

My growing method is organic, and therefore people have to read what I say on here with that in mind. Using excessive quantities of ph up and down in an organic grow will slowly kill the millions of beneficial organisms that exist in the rhizosphere - these organisms are needed in organic grows to help chelate and break down organic nutrients into plant useable forms - if you're killing them all on a regular basis you're affecting the nutrient uptake of your plants in doing something I've repeatedly stated you don't have to do.

If you're using chemical nutrients in soil - it really doesn't matter what you do to be perfectly honest, but if you're using organic nutrients (as I and many others do) phing your water with ph up and down will cause it a lot more damage than if you simply left the ph alone. If people were as concerned about TDS and EC of their water and feeds as they are about ph they'd probably get far better results.

Gygax1974 said:

It's like a freaking competition....this site is supposed to help people learn to grow and there are many different ways and many different results....

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Point taken, perhaps I'll stay quiet in future and let people continue in their ignorance and let them suffer when their plants have problems.