Organic soil and RO water

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Grow311

Active Member
Hey, so I got this RO bc I dont want to kill off the microorganisms in my fox farm/wormcastings/dr. Earth dry amendments soil, but a buddy just said that I shouldn't use straight RO water, not even with organic soil.

I boil egg shells once every week or so and also have an organic seaweed fertilizer I sometimes use, but should I get an additional calmag product for the daily waterings? It has to be organic. I dont want to use tap water at all (not even the 1 part tap, 2 parts RO) because I just dont trust the quality here and I spent all this money to make quality living soil, but I also dont want to deplete them of anything they need in the water.

I'm probably overthinking it but yea... what y'all think?
 
Wattzzup

Wattzzup

Well-Known Member
The EWG's 'Skin Deep' database is cited quite often as a source for information about ingredient safety. However, what consumers often don't know is how biased and problematic their recommendations are, due to a poor interpretation of data and also bias. They are sort of like the PETA of sunscreens.

Their status as a non profit has been challenged due to the amount of political ties that they have:
 
Richard Drysift

Richard Drysift

Well-Known Member
Grow311 said:
Hey, so I got this RO bc I dont want to kill off the microorganisms in my fox farm/wormcastings/dr. Earth dry amendments soil, but a buddy just said that I shouldn't use straight RO water, not even with organic soil.

I boil egg shells once every week or so and also have an organic seaweed fertilizer I sometimes use, but should I get an additional calmag product for the daily waterings? It has to be organic. I dont want to use tap water at all (not even the 1 part tap, 2 parts RO) because I just dont trust the quality here and I spent all this money to make quality living soil, but I also dont want to deplete them of anything they need in the water.

I'm probably overthinking it but yea... what y'all think?
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Your buddy is correct. I had nothing but problems with my own municipal tap water and so have other local growers around here that I know. We all grow in living soil. Once had an RO filter but it exploded in the cold of winter some years ago. FYI don’t install an RO system in an uninsulated room connected to an outside hose.
The immediate and permanent solution for me was to use the water collected from a dehumidifier; I augment this w/ collected rain/snow runoff and natural spring water. Dehumidifier water is stark; 30 ppm. So for a long time I added an organic cal/mag; General Organics Cal/Mag plus. It’s expensive but works. Rain, snow, and spring water contains macronutrients and microbes so no need to add anything. Putting out a couple buckets is not as hard as it seems it’s just remembering to do it that’s a challenge.
It’s actually not that easy to provide soluble forms of calcium and magnesium which assist w/absorption of other nutrients. So you need a long term and many pronged approach in order to finally get away from giving liquid cal/mag. Amending the soil with oyster shell flour, garden gypsum, and D-lime adds macros and are great ph buffers too.
For long term organic calcium eggshells are the best thing but they forever to break down and become available in soil. I compost all the eggshells I can in a worm bin but even worms don’t break them down all the way. After a year of doing this I was able to get off the calmag plus.
Here is a link that might help; gonna try this...

Eggshell WCA (Water-Soluble Calcium)

Info Requested By - @meangreengrowinmachine If you have been growing cannabis for very long then you know by now that every problem can be solved by adding Cal/Mag. While in reality Cal/Mag may not solve every issue it is still a very impotent component for the plants to build strong cell...
www.rollitup.org
 
G

Grow311

Active Member
Richard Drysift said:
Your buddy is correct. I had nothing but problems with my own municipal tap water and so have other local growers around here that I know. We all grow in living soil. Once had an RO filter but it exploded in the cold of winter some years ago. FYI don’t install an RO system in an uninsulated room connected to an outside hose.
The immediate and permanent solution for me was to use the water collected from a dehumidifier; I augment this w/ collected rain/snow runoff and natural spring water. Dehumidifier water is stark; 30 ppm. So for a long time I added an organic cal/mag; General Organics Cal/Mag plus. It’s expensive but works. Rain, snow, and spring water contains macronutrients and microbes so no need to add anything. Putting out a couple buckets is not as hard as it seems it’s just remembering to do it that’s a challenge.
It’s actually not that easy to provide soluble forms of calcium and magnesium which assist w/absorption of other nutrients. So you need a long term and many pronged approach in order to finally get away from giving liquid cal/mag. Amending the soil with oyster shell flour, garden gypsum, and D-lime adds macros and are great ph buffers too.
For long term organic calcium eggshells are the best thing but they forever to break down and become available in soil. I compost all the eggshells I can in a worm bin but even worms don’t break them down all the way. After a year of doing this I was able to get off the calmag plus.
Here is a link that might help; gonna try this...

Eggshell WCA (Water-Soluble Calcium)

Info Requested By - @meangreengrowinmachine If you have been growing cannabis for very long then you know by now that every problem can be solved by adding Cal/Mag. While in reality Cal/Mag may not solve every issue it is still a very impotent component for the plants to build strong cell...
www.rollitup.org
Click to expand...
Thanks Richard, I spent most of yesterday trying to find a solution to this. The rainwater and dehumidifier solutions are not really an option for me since we dont get a lot of rain or humidity in LA.
:(
I read that ground oyster shells are water soluble and ordered some last night to try to mix into my RO water and/or topdress my soil with. I have the seaweed fertilizer, molasses, and also dr. Earth organic liquid solution concentrate 3-3-3 and boiled egg shells a few times. I might also try to soak wormcastings in it over night. I'm just looking for something organic I can put into my RO water every day to remineralize it just a little bit. For the drinking water, I bought trace minerals and just use about 20 drops per gallon. Just looking for something similar for the ladies. Might have to get General Organics Cal/Mag plus if it is really organic. I'm not sure it is. But you've used it with living soil and it hasn't caused any issues to your microlife in the soil, yea? The egg shell/vinegar project also seems promising. Just use a bit of the infused vinegar in the RO water every day? Will take a while and I have to eat a bunch of eggs first but I'll start the tast today too lol
 
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Richard Drysift

Richard Drysift

Well-Known Member
I hear ya. Oyster shell flour is a soil amendment Btw. Put a handful into the container when you build your pots. It with best as a ph buffer in close proximity to the roots but you can also just toss it in the mix globally. Takes some time to become available as calcium; it’s like subsequent grows will benefit. I should have added that Gen Organics calmag plus is OMRI rated safe for living soils. Used it for years in my organic grows. The organic calmag method J.James has posted looks promising; imma try it myself when I get a minute.
 
G

Grow311

Active Member
Ima call it a day and order Gen Organics calmag +. I've spent too much time on this topic already lol. Will also start the eggshell process. Thanks for giving me peace of mind that someone actually used the calmag with the living soil already and no issues with the microlife. And yea, the oyster shell is a soil amendment, but I saw this one post where this person mentioned dissolving oyster shell flour or limestone in water too.

(Gen organics, calmag: Ugh, the bottle says not for organic gardening in California, I'll have to get over it :‐/)
 
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OldMedUser

OldMedUser

Well-Known Member
Grow311 said:
Ima call it a day and order Gen Organics calmag +. I've spent too much time on this topic already lol. Will also start the eggshell process. Thanks for giving me peace of mind that someone actually used the calmag with the living soil already and no issues with the microlife. And yea, the oyster shell is a soil amendment, but I saw this one post where this person mentioned dissolving oyster shell flour or limestone in water too.

(Gen organics, calmag: Ugh, the bottle says not for organic gardening in California, I'll have to get over it :‐/)
Click to expand...
We already buy our RO water for drinking as we get our tap water from a dugout on my property. RO won't hurt an organic grow one bit and is way better than using iffy tap water. High ppm or hard water will fuck up any grow eventually as minerals from the water build up in the soil after repeated waterings. Generally that causes the pH to be too high and almost impossible to correct leading to micro-nutrient lockouts and all sorts of other problems.

I finally bought all the parts needed to build my own custom 150gal/day RO unit. Just need a day to set it all up.

You should contact your water supplier and get a proper analysis of your water to know exactly what's in it. Should be free and can likely be emailed to you. When I lived in town I just went to the town office and they printed it out for me. Told her I was gonna brew beer and needed to know about the water. Claiming you want to start aquariums is another good excuse but they really don't need to know why.

RO water gives you a clean slate to work with so you'll know that water isn't the problem if issues show up with your plants down the road.

:peace:
 
Richard Drysift

Richard Drysift

Well-Known Member
Grow311 said:
Ima call it a day and order Gen Organics calmag +. I've spent too much time on this topic already lol. Will also start the eggshell process. Thanks for giving me peace of mind that someone actually used the calmag with the living soil already and no issues with the microlife. And yea, the oyster shell is a soil amendment, but I saw this one post where this person mentioned dissolving oyster shell flour or limestone in water too.

(Gen organics, calmag: Ugh, the bottle says not for organic gardening in California, I'll have to get over it :‐/)
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Oh ok never heard of that but if you pulverized it and hydrated I could see that working faster. You guys on the west coast sure are weird...lol
 
G

Grow311

Active Member
OldMedUser said:
We already buy our RO water for drinking as we get our tap water from a dugout on my property. RO won't hurt an organic grow one bit and is way better than using iffy tap water. High ppm or hard water will fuck up any grow eventually as minerals from the water build up in the soil after repeated waterings. Generally that causes the pH to be too high and almost impossible to correct leading to micro-nutrient lockouts and all sorts of other problems.

I finally bought all the parts needed to build my own custom 150gal/day RO unit. Just need a day to set it all up.

You should contact your water supplier and get a proper analysis of your water to know exactly what's in it. Should be free and can likely be emailed to you. When I lived in town I just went to the town office and they printed it out for me. Told her I was gonna brew beer and needed to know about the water. Claiming you want to start aquariums is another good excuse but they really don't need to know why.

RO water gives you a clean slate to work with so you'll know that water isn't the problem if issues show up with your plants down the road.

:peace:
Click to expand...
Great response brother. My leaves started yelowing/browning a lot the first weeks of flower during my last run and I suspected nute lockout due to ph down overuse to try to get the tap into the correct range as well as nute burn from partially synthetic fox farm products.

Thats what made me look into all this RO, living soil, dry amendments stuff in the first place. I just didnt want to use any ph down anymore after my soil runoff came out at 5.4.

Looking into my tent today, I see lots of growth and they seem to be happy with just RO and the seaweed/molasses stuff I've been mixing into it.

The soil amendments are probably also starting to do their thing, so hopefully it all stays this way.
 

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OldMedUser

OldMedUser

Well-Known Member
Grow311 said:
My leaves started yelowing/browning a lot the first weeks of flower during my last run and I suspected nute lockout due to ph down overuse to try to get the tap into the correct range as well as nute burn from partially synthetic fox farm products.
Click to expand...
Sounds more like toxic salts buildup to me. Did the leaves get thick and crispy when they did that? Lack of nutes with just yellowing the leaves are soft and pliable not hard and crispy. Try feeding a little less all thru veg to prevent that. Better a few leaves go yellow to tell you they want more than burn up in flower from buildup.

:peace:
 
G

Grow311

Active Member
OldMedUser said:
Sounds more like toxic salts buildup to me. Did the leaves get thick and crispy when they did that? Lack of nutes with just yellowing the leaves are soft and pliable not hard and crispy. Try feeding a little less all thru veg to prevent that. Better a few leaves go yellow to tell you they want more than burn up in flower from buildup.

:peace:
Click to expand...
I didnt even use that much of the foxfarm stuff, but yea they were kind of dry and crispy at the top. Others were yellow and soft towards the bottom. And not feeding any of it this time. Dry amendments, wormcastings, and all the stuff mentioned above instead.
 
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