Thanks for the tag @Dxbbred
Great post, lost of information and looks like you have been reading and trying to learn quite a bit.
Beardless has you covered here on the technical aspect but I’ll chime in anyways, hopefully you learn something.
PH and TDS/PPM are different but they both matter, the more ppm the stronger a PH bond is.
So if I took water that was 2000ppm and ph’d it to 6.9 then my plant would be unhappy, because that water is going to turn that soil to 6.9ph and 2000ppm (but let’s say the plants hungry and the nutrients are such they don’t burn a plant at that ppm).
Removing chlorine is important
PH’ing is important
Ppm of nutrients and water is important.
If the ppm number is low (let’s use very clean tap water at say 120ppm) and runs through a charcoal chlorine filter then that water can be given to your plant without worry because the bond to that PH is fairly weak when you consider that the ppm in your soil is much more. However over a long period of time balance will happen, that’s why it’s important to monitor all the variables.
So I would suggest you check the ppm of your water source, if it’s under 150 then feed it without PH’ing if it’s over then ph it correctly.
When plants are small it’s good practice to get a tds of your soil Durring a soil slurry the same time as getting a PH (ensure you do this with distilled water for accuracy)
Side note it’s very very rare we see a nutrient deficiency or an toxicity that isn’t:
Nitrogen
Calcium
Magnesium
Phosphorus
Potassium
Also I’m a big fan of FIM’ing rather than topping here is a post about it:
That’s awesome information thank you, I just checked the unadjusted-chlorine evaporated water and the Ppm at the 500 scale is at 10… Can that be right?
That’s clearly very low but to your advice, that would help me be able to feed without adjusting?
It depends on your tds meter, either that water source is mostly RO/distilled water (both have 0 ppm) or that tds meter is reading wrong/being read wrong.
My first ever tds meter had a tiny little x in the corner of the screen which I later learned read x10
So when my tds meter would read 120 it meant to say 1200.
However tds meters are very simple technology and rarely do they not work correctly… That being said I dunked mine and need a new one
The tap, then left out to evaporate the chlorine for 24 hrs, I tested it in some water with soil mixed in and it jumped to 300 so not sure if the calibration is off but I have an old one lying around too, I’ll check again when I’m back home
If you live in a city I would strongly recommend finding your last public water service test.
Google your towns name + water test (maybe add the word public if that doesn’t work)
Should show the last time they tested the water in your town from the source. Should be a pdf you cna screen shot, black out the town name and zip code and post it we can go over it if you wish including the ppm.
Then it has to run through pipes which unless you live in a very modern area they will be older pipes and it all adds to increasing the minerals in the water (total dissolved solids aka minerals).
I’m not really bothered if people know the rough area I am in, maybe someone else looking for the same information will come across this and it will be useful!
I could only find this and to be honest it doesn’t mean much to me:
Not sure if that is useful at all, I’m happy to find an organic way to lower the pH before feeding if I have to, but would be good to know for sure if I have to!
I’ve not used coast of maine potting soil but i know others who have and liked it. I do like their compost and lobster meal. Your ppms will be high in organic soil. A lab soil test is a more accurate measurement of nutrient levels in a living soil.
Ph does matter but not as much in living soil. The microbes and plant root exudates in the rhizosphere keep things in balance. I beleive they can only buffer so much though. Water should be from a good source. If your soil is too acidic, dolomite lime can be mixed in. I’ve seen baking soda used too but haven’t myself so i cant advise on it. If your soil ph is high, sphagnum peat will lower it. If course none of that will be of benefit for a cup of soil
Starting with a proven recipe helped me take the guesswork out of it while learning.
Yeah i wasn’t really sure about the base soil but live and learn so let’s see how this grow goes, where did you get your proven recipe from? What would you use instead of coast of maine for example?
I have build a soil 3.0 in some of my pots and in my 1 of my Earthbox’s. I also mixed my own with 1 part oly mountain compost and worm castings.
1 part aeration of crushed lava rock and pumice. 1 part old reused and flushed happy frog soil which is peat moss based. Then i add my nutrients and minerals from a recipe on the Build a Soil website. I also added worms and mykos. Build a Soil has a you tube channel that is very informative, you may wanna check out.
