Does Tap water Significantly lower yeilds.

Hello growers. This is my first post ever, glad to be here! Usually i just always read post for answers.Would love to get some good insight to a matter of mine. I use tap water, I don't let it sit for 24 hours. p.h. is not a issue. I grow in soil and coco. i was told by a pro-grower that tap water also has other beneficial trace elements, that R.O. water doesn't have. But he also said that it contains fluoride and chlorine, which are both harmful to plants. will my yields increase significantly if i switch to r.o. water, or even letting it air out. This is my 3rd grow now. and i am going for a perpetual harvest. so its kind of hard to buy enough distilled or getting r.o. water set up.(I'm using about 8 gallons a day as of now.) first harvest was a good yield and have got better with each grow.if switching my water is much better then I'm all for it. thanks for reading!

I have not seen any like for like comparison grows however chlorine is a well known issue for plants. Just let the water sit for 24h open to the air and the chlorine will disperse and your plants will thank you for it.

ive never had any probs with my tap. I don't let it air out goes from tap to plant

wow thanks for the quick reply arcaned and grorite! my yeilds are getting good too with only tap. just was looking for anytips to get them even better.

Well I have done both commercially. It is true that tap has nasty chems that do somewhat hinder preformance. I live in a place where the water is very good. However, it still contains flor, and clor. The difference in yield between RO vs. Tap is very close though. Still I use RO. I like my water to be just that, H2O. Good luck!

You are in soil/coco, so there is a good chance that you are going to want to innoculate your roots with some kind of a stimulator, beneficial bacteria or fungi. With this said, you are going to want to remove the fluoride, chlorine, and chloramines from the water. The biological activity in the root zone, or nutrient solution for the root zone, will be killed (or at least mostly all killed) by the chlorine and chloramines in the water.

The "pro-grower" you talked to is correct that there are minerals in the water that provide a benefit to your plants (calcium, magnesium, iron, etc.). However, you are going to want to keep that stuff in there and remove the chlorine with a simple De-Chlorinator/ Sediment filter.

Especially if you do not want to spend the money on an RO system, just get a simple hose-end water filter. They are good for 35,000 gallons and only cost about $40. Well worth the money, and plus you will be able to keep your beneficials alive and roots happy from not scrubbing out the natural minerals. Hope this helps

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imo the chlorine issue is pure hype. I have added chlorine to my res almost every time I get root issues, with absolutely no ill effect. In most places tap water is just fine, it depends what's in it. Where i live my tap water is almost 1 ec with a ph of 8.2. I have had issues from using ro in coco (needs cal mag) but none from using tap water, even though the water here obviously leaves alot to be desired.

There are two common claims about chlorine with plants. One is that it will burn the plants. this is completely untrue at the levels of chlorine found in tap water of @1-2ppm. In fact 4-5 ppm still wont show any burn imo (probably much higher is still safe). The second is that chlorine will destroy the beneficial microorganisms in the soil, and significantly effects the health of the plant. This is arguable, but it's a fairly disingenuous (or ignorant) argument imho. when chlorine comes into contact with organic material (dead plant mater, urea or ammonia type n...) it forms other chlorine chemicals which are much less efficient at killing microorganisms. On top of that, the amount of chlorine in tap water is very low to begin with.

I have personally seen 1 cup of mg cause eutrophication in the swimming pool of several homeowners, who abused or neglected their dogs, to such an extent that their pool cleaner was forced to drain and refill their pool. they simply could not add enough chlorine to clean it without damaging the pump and filter. Even 10-20-30 ppm of chlorine wouldn't do jack to the algae/bacteria growing in their pool. I do not see how 1-2 ppm could do much in a pot with 3-5 gallons of organic matter in it (coco or soil).

That said I use ro about 70-80% of the time because it allows me to run lower total ppm. hth

I also use Tap, and also right out of the tap, but we got REALLY clean water in Denmark, ground water, sits in lime stone so PH is a bit high (7,4) but by law there is no chlorine in it, and Ppl. are right, with RO water you will need to replace the micro`s yourself, like iron and calcium aso a filter is a option, so is H2O2

http://joemacho.hubpages.com/hub/Hydrogen-Peroxide-for-Plants

if you let it sit out for 24 hrs make sure it don't sit to hot, water can hold most oxygen at 15-20C with 18C as optimal , some use a air stone to keep a good amount of oxygen as lack of that is what actually is referred to as over watering (=no or to little oxygen in the root zone)

chlorine has been known to be used for sterilization. in any amount it is still not preferable. it might not kill your plants, but you probably would not want to use it with a supersoil/microlife/organic mix. it might not be super harmful but you can do better. dont settle just because its easy. evolve and always strive to be better then you were before.

Well I'm kind a a nerd when it comes to spending money, it has to put cash in my pocket or make things easier before I implement it into my system. I have ran tap water for almost 20 years until this Christmas when I was gifted a R/O unit. I removed the unit at the end of may knowing that it did not increase my yield when compared to previous crops. I also was not too happy wasting that much water, most units are a 3:1 ratio which means 1 litre in my res and 3 litres down the drain! Why? I'm sure for certain situations where the water is an issue like well water or from a dug out it is necessary but if your tap water is under 400 ppm I would bet the farm your just pouring money down the drain...literally.

Tap water significantly lowers yield... if you do not give any to your plants

I set mine out usually, but not always. I water my outside plants straight from the hose and my veggies turn out great. Most of the crap that would get killed by the chlorine are non=beneficial and the bennies recover fast enough. I do let it sit out when I make a tea, but only for a couple of hours with a bubbler before I put my goodies in.

Tap water is fine I have always used tap water.
But I do leave it for 24hrs minimum with a air stone to get the chlorine out.
In some medium its not necessary to do that, but I grow in super soil, so if I don't let it sit it kills off the beneficial microbes in the soil.
I have watered plants using de-chlorinated water side by side with plants that I watered right out of the tap.
I did see a difference in the plants, the ones I let the water sit and evaporate the chlorine off had much better root balls and looked slightly more healthy.
So if your using soil I say let the water de-chlorinate the beneficial bacteria and microbes will not flourish with chlorine present.

Letting it sites a waste of time and decreases the dissolved oxygen levels present straight out of the tap.

if you have soft water, you will likely need to supplement ca and mg but other than that it is fine.

no, but ph adjusted water with oxidation is going to be better

karousing said:

chlorine has been known to be used for sterilization. in any amount it is still not preferable.

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If your water had less than one parts per million of chlorine, is that a problem?

It is all about dose. I drink arsenic every day in my tap water, but it is in such small amounts that it is not harmful.

karousing said:

it might not kill your plants, but you probably would not want to use it with a supersoil/microlife/organic mix. it might not be super harmful but you can do better. dont settle just because its easy. evolve and always strive to be better then you were before.

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Again, dose.
The soil probably would eliminate the tiny amount of chlorine/chloramids in the water before it could do any harm. If you are nervous, put a small bit of soil in the water, stir it a bit and wait a while. The chlorine/chloramids will attach to the soil and be broken down.

You would need a lot of chlorine to eliminate all the microbacterial life in your soil. It might be a bit easier in hydro to kill the microbes. I am not really sure about microbes in hydro. Some hydro fert ratios make life impossible for microbes.