Hydrogen peroxide

Hi, I’ve been reading up on what could give more oxygen to roots and most of my sources lead me to peroxide. So does anyone have any information on if it can actually kill pest, promote root growth, etc?

Adding hydrogen peroxide to hydroponics
The recommended amount of 3% solution of peroxide per gallon of water in hydroponics is around 3ml per liter or 2-3 teaspoons per gallon of reservoir water. Please note that we are talking about the diluted solution, NOT the 35% concentrated peroxide

LoudKing19 said:

Hi, I’ve been reading up on what could give more oxygen to roots and most of my sources lead me to peroxide. So does anyone have any information on if it can actually kill pest, promote root growth, etc?

Click to expand...

Kill pest - for certain. I use H2O2 for Powdery Mildew & bugs during flower
promote root growth - I don't see how, the O2 added to the atmosphere would be negligible (IMO).

Take note as well...if it kills the bad, the good dies too.
FF

Reintroduce beneficial bennies afterward.
FF

LoudKing19 said:

Hi, I’ve been reading up on what could give more oxygen to roots and most of my sources lead me to peroxide. So does anyone have any information on if it can actually kill pest, promote root growth, etc?

Click to expand...

I run 3ml/gallon of 35% h202 in hydroponic reservoirs for sterility when root issues present themselves. It's highly effective. If you are running organic soil it is an absolute last resort. It will kill your beneficial bacteria along with the bad bacteria. There are much cheaper options for sterility. Southern AG's biological friendly fungicide @1ml/10 gallons of solution. It is highly concentrated. Same product as hydrogaurd, but much cheaper and more concentrated. Generally speaking h202 is only useful when you have root problems. I had a bucket that began to stink. Bad bacteria some how took hold which is rare in my garden. I then mixed up a 32 gallon res of fertilizer with 3ml/gallon of 35% h202 applied. Cleared up the root issue and smell by the 2nd day after 2 water cycles. Wear gloves if you're handling it. It will bleach your skin and chemically burn you. Goggles are not a bad idea either. Quick easy way to blind yourself if you're the clumsy unsafe type. I love mixing up 10% solutions of the 35% for general cleaning. I use it in the bathroom frequently. I hate the smell of bleach. 35% h202 diluted down to a 10% solution makes a cleaner stronger than bleach. Love keeping a good stock of h202 around the house, but I can only find the 34% recently.

Good information. I was told to use hydrogen peroxide to get rid of the green growing on my grow rock, now I will find another solution. Thanks for your input!

If you are using pebble and getting algae, just cover it with black plastic. Algae needs light to grow. Then using some southern AG gff in your res. Should be all set.

Thank you! I will give it a shot!!

H202 in your roots is similar to you taking antibiotics. All the bad "yuck" is wiped out, but so are all the beneficial microbes and bacteria.

I do it to wipe out fungus gnats in my coco, and if I see too many springtails in my runoff.

I'm hopefully finishing up a major little war I currently have with a swarm of gnats and I thought I'd share my experience.

I grow in soil. I have a small grow room and the last several years I've had an issue with gnats. In the past I'd just put out sticky traps and keep the soil dry and they would eventually go away.

This year started out the same. Only they didn't go away. The problem blew up before I realized how bad it was. And I ended up having hundreds of the little bastards flying around my small room. That was a little over two weeks ago. Since then I have used 17 quarts of hydrogen peroxide. And now I'm down to a very small number of them.

I know this kind of brute force approach might not work with everybody. But in my case it appears to be working well. The plants are doing fine. I grow organically. And I try to promote a "living" type soil. But I have no idea what's actually happening there. So I'm not sure one way or another what effect the peroxide has on that situation.

Basically I found that a three tiered attack worked best. Here's what I did for my setup.

1. I use 5 gallon pots. I gave each plant 1.5 liter of mix every two days. The mix was 25% hydrogen peroxide (3% strength) and 75% water. I made sure to spread the mix around as I was pouring so that 100% of the soil was "fizzing". This kills the gnat eggs and larvae.

2. I setup two 12 inch oscillating fans to blow over my five flower pots. Part of the fans where blowing over the top of the soil. And part was blowing over the pots and the exposed drainage holes at the bottom. This is important because it dries out the soil quickly after watering and gnats like damp soil. The fans also ruin their day because they can't leisurely fly around in circles and bug me.

3. Placed a yellow sticky trap at ground level on each flower pot. This kills the adult gnats.

You need to do all three of the above in order to kill the gnats in all stages of their life. And make there miserable little lives even worse than they already are.

I found that 1/4 cup of 35% H2O2 per gallon of nutes applied as a volume-limited soil drench at least every 5 days, effectively killed gnats in potting mix. Indoor plants were treated with H202 after transplant into infected potting mix and throughout remaining vegetative period and first 2 weeks of bloom. Gnats had spread throughout house and sink drain traps were also infected with gnats. This treatment appeared to eliminate all gnats.