PH Balancing Water for Plants

I'm a first time grower, and like most other first time growers, I've made a few mistakes along the way. Yesterday I discovered what I believe to me my biggest mistake of all so far. I'm really embarrassed to admit this but I have to find how how much harm I've done to my plants, so here we go. As soon as I purify water with my water filter, I PH balance the water. That's all well and fine, but like a dummy, when I added nurients to the PH balanced water, I didn't have the common sense to realize that because of the nutrients I added, my water was no longer PH balanced. After I realized my stupid mistake, I tested the water and found out that the PH was between 4.0 and 5.O, far too acidic. Of course I immediately PH balanced all of the water I had nutrients in, but the damage had already been done. My sativa plants are now in the sixth week of 10 weeks of flowering, and the thing is, when I look at the plants, they look healthy and thriving to me. Can anyone tell me what the negative effects on my plants could be before and after they are harvested? For example, could I get a smaller yield, not as good a taste, or worst of all, a lower quality high?

if your plants look fine then you have nothing to worry about, BUT if you are worried and want something to do to fix what you have done just flush them out with PH balanced water and let them dry out before adding more water with nutes in it.

one question tho, after you filter your water, do you add any calmag to your water to replace the calcium and magnesium lost in the filter? i had issues before because of this and couldn't figure out why i had problems till i thought about the filter.

filtering water is great but you do also take goodness out of it which nute companies dont expect you do to, which is why you can get calmag for these situations

Yes, right after I purify the water, I add the calmag and then PH balance it, so at least the water I've been using on my plants without nutrients has been fine.

from now on only ph the water your gonna use and after u add the nutes

I said in my previous comment that as soon as I realized my mistake I PH balanced all of the water I had nutrients in, and you can rest assured that I will continue to do so. Thanks for your concern and your advice, tre274

If it hurt them you would know in a day or two. My water switched to 8.5ph after I did some plumbing at my house. A day after I water with food, all my leaves were wavy and clawed up. Sounds like your fine. This killed my total but not the quality.

Soil is usually very forgiving will actually buffer the water for you in many cases. You will see a lot of folks say they don't even adjust the pH of their water and everything turns out fine. I am assuming your soil is already providing all of the buffer you need, if you had more time to flower I would suggest getting some peletized dolomite lime, works great in providing a buffer, and it also adds in cal/mag, it does not break down as quickly as the liquid cal/mag though so it is something you may consider for your next grow(s)

If your plants are thriving, don't sweat it. Your soil probably helped balance and correct your mistake somewhat. So just Ph correctly the rest of the cycle and enjoy your hard work!

Starwalker said:

Can anyone tell me what the negative effects on my plants could be before and after they are harvested? For example, could I get a smaller yield, not as good a taste, or worst of all, a lower quality high?

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Al of these would happen if you repeatedly made this mistake, however, it sounds as if you learned from it and will be much more careful in the future. I agree with the other posters that the soil buffers the pH, and your plants will probably be just fine.
Keep your grow space cool, and keep your solutions cool. Higher temps = lower pH. Lower temps = higher pH. Temperature is the #1 interference with pH measurement. I'm going to do a search for pH vs temp, if I can find a good pic, I'll post it for you.

You should be OK, if you're that worried flush them with PH right water and don't water them again for 3-4 days. Other than that looks like you are OK.