Run off water

L

LeeTaurus

Member
Hello. My runoff water was 6.2 I’m growing in a mixed soil of happy frog and roots organic and 30% perlite. What should the ph of my next nute feed water be?
 
Testing the pH of soil runoff water is kind of pointless. If you want to know the pH of your soil, then take a sample of the soil (not just off the top), make a slurry with it, and test that. I personally never pH test my nutrient feed, because I only usually feed no more than once a week. Just keep the pH of your waterings in check and you should be fine.
 
TreeFarmerCharlie said:
Testing the pH of soil runoff water is kind of pointless. If you want to know the pH of your soil, then take a sample of the soil (not just off the top), make a slurry with it, and test that. I personally never pH test my nutrient feed, because I only usually feed no more than once a week. Just keep the pH of your waterings in check and you should be fine.
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Yes I feed once a week and when the soil dries I give a regular watering. Sometimes the soil takes 5-6 days to dry, so how would I go by watering? The way I am or every time the soil dries give it another nutrient feed?
 
OP I check mine every time because I’m anal. It helps tell what the plant is doing IMO. I check tds and ph of runoff.
 
I believe testing runoff has its place, same as slurry, or root zone with a probe.
Its whichever the op has to work with, and preference in my opinion.
FF
 
I’ll see if I can find the article I read awhile back, but is suggested that testing runoff produced inaccurate results with regards to the actual soil pH.
 
This article is pretty much in line with what I recall. What is basically says is that, if you test runoff often, it will help you catch an issue when you see the runoff pH is more than 0.5pH off from the water going in, but it’s not a good indicator of the actual pH value of the soil at the root zone. I will concede, however, that I could’ve chosen a better word than “pointless”, because it does have its uses.

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Runoff pH: Explaining the Bro Science | Curious Cultivations

Runoff pH is used to check the health of plants, but much misinformation exists about its proper use. Let's dive in to how to make the best of this tool.
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TreeFarmerCharlie said:
I’ll see if I can find the article I read awhile back, but is suggested that testing runoff produced inaccurate results with regards to the actual soil pH.
Click to expand...
Run off ph and soil ph aren’t always the same. When the runoff ph gets way off of water going in there is a problem.
 
I never test my runoff neither. Always keep in check what I put in. I believe to answer this question best is to determine if the soil you are using has Nutes in it already? I know u said happy frog and roots organic, but are they already full of Nutes? If so, feeding anything extra is kind of an overkill. Just ph’d water is all you need, and maybe occasionally molasses here and there, ( unsulphured blackstrap ). If they don’t have Nutes, and you are only feeding once a week, I think you’re starving the poor girl/girls a bit. Water/feed/water/feed is a good schedule in my past grows.

I’m strictly soil with dry amendments now. No hassle with measuring Nutes, I got tired of that. Now it’s just ph’d water with Calmag and I’m good. Of course I still have to ph my water but that’s about as technical as it gets.
 
If you're checking runoff because you're plants have issues then you are not feeding your plants properly. Runoff pH is not an accurate method of measuring the pH of the soil at the root zone. You have no idea what's being washed out of the soil. All you have is a measurement of what washed out in the runoff. I know people meticulously monitor their runoff but they waste time doing other unnecessary things as well. Runoff pH is broscience. I've been growing for decades and have never once bothered checking runoff pH or TDS. Most of that nonsense comes from people watching some crappy grower on youtube. Or have never grown anything other than cannabis and have only been doing that for a short amount of time.
 
No argument there, Freddi. Just because I don’t do it doesn’t mean testing runoff doesn’t have its place in the grow room. I do however understand the need for some to do it.
 
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