Calcium Glucoheptonate for hydroponics/general fertilizer?

So, I have some CaliMagic, comes well recommended around here and I love the stuff! On my bottle, the very first ingredient listed is:

Calcium Glucoheptonate


I'm googling this, but not a lot on it. Is this a good thing? Not a whole lot on it. The next ingredient, being the only other calcium one, is calcium nitrate. That too me sounds good as our plants need nitrate. And I think that Calimagic before was just calcium nitrate (when I google its ingredients this is all that shows up on the calcium side). So that is this Calcium Glucoheptonate? A good thing or a bad thing?

Thanks!!!

Picture? My calimagic contains only "calcium carbonate, calcium nitrate, magnesium nitrate, iron DPTA". Is this new or old calimagic? Mine is a 2019 bottle.

It's just another calcium source btw, I highly doubt the organic part could have any additional effect on the plant.

Yep, here you go TrippleDip! My bottle is real new, like got it a month or so ago. Its weird, when I google the ingredients, all I see is a label like your with no Calcium Glucoheptonate on it!

Bump for thoughts on this apparent odditity!!!

Its a very mild one. 1 part nitrogen.

OGHomeslice said:

So, I have some CaliMagic, comes well recommended around here and I love the stuff! On my bottle, the very first ingredient listed is:

Calcium Glucoheptonate


I'm googling this, but not a lot on it. Is this a good thing? Not a whole lot on it. The next ingredient, being the only other calcium one, is calcium nitrate. That too me sounds good as our plants need nitrate. And I think that Calimagic before was just calcium nitrate (when I google its ingredients this is all that shows up on the calcium side). So that is this Calcium Glucoheptonate? A good thing or a bad thing?

Thanks!!!

Click to expand...

Glucoheptonate is a chelating agent that is bound to the Calcium in concentrate form. It is made up by causing Hydrocyanic Acid (Hydrogen Cyanide and water) to act on a solution of Glucose.

I suspect the company changed formations to reduce the level of Nitrogen, by replacing the Calcium Nitrate with the Calcium Glucoheptonate. The Nitrate is also a chelating agent.

This is how they get the calcium in the calimagic without having so much nitrogen as other brands of calmag.

Calimagic is the only calmag product I would buy.

AgriCal Ftw when dealing with cal issues. Or just plain old semi course limestone..crazy cheap and well...as far as balanced nutient lines they all need more cal and im still using Green planets line with city water, no issues so far in grodans and HP promix

Liquid cal doesnt really do exactly what the snake oils claim...its doesn't disperse and leachate hydrogion ions and its hardly balances out cec as that ion just bonds lower in the soil. Generally having the same affect as before...

spek9 said:

Glucoheptonate is a chelating agent that is bound to the Calcium in concentrate form. It is made up by causing Hydrocyanic Acid (Hydrogen Cyanide and water) to act on a solution of Glucose.

I suspect the company changed formations to reduce the level of Nitrogen, by replacing the Calcium Nitrate with the Calcium Glucoheptonate. The Nitrate is also a chelating agent.

Click to expand...

Thanks for that explanation. It's still hard, a couple years later now, to find much info on it.
It's true that the old Calimagic contained calcium carbonate and the newer stuff contains glucoheptonate. The overall amount of N with both formulas is 1%, with the entirety being in Nitrate form.

I can share some weird info. I got a tiny bit of it on my tongue from peeling off the seal with my teeth. The taste is still there as I type this. It's kinda nasty. Reading that hydrogen cyanide is involved makes me think about the scouring faces of the naughty WW2 people who took the ampules of it to self-delete.