What do you do with water run off ?

[sicoroot]

Hello growers !

are you throwing away the run off water from your pots or you feed it back to the plants ?

I have been sucking it up ( not by mouth ) and pouring it back into the plant, until recently when I realized the big difference in EC/PPM of this water that passed through the soil vs the same water before watering the plants.
I recently purchased a pH and EC pen and was surprised by some of the measurements that came out....

I filter my tap water before drinking and for the plants too with a Berkey carbon filter system and the pH ranges from 7.1 to 7.6, ppm500 readings are very low with a value of 10 and the corresponding EC value on the pen shows 0 ( both bluelab pens ).
I was surprised by the EC/ppm level being so low so that I thought the pen was out of calibration, so I did calibrated it just to make sure and the reading came out as wrote above.
I did some other test with water that has some dissolved salts in it and the ppm/EC measurement was way higher....so it seems like the pen is telling the truth.
I thought the low ppm value came from the effect of the carbon filters but after doing a cross check with unfiltered water the results are pretty much the same.
So it seems like water here is very "soft", in fact all my appliances that use water ( kettle, dishwasher etc ) has no traces of salt build up.

Now back to the run off question...I did another pH and EC test on the run off water and realized that the ppm/EC values are waaaay higher. Of course water dissolve minerals as it passes through the soil but I was surprised to see that the EC value went up to 4.6 and ppm500 around 2300.
pH stayed fairly stable to what I feed with ( I lower the pH before watering using earth juice pH down to a 6.7/6.8 value ).
I'm trying to grow organic and it seems like the pH is not so crucial as in other grow styles but I still try to feed with a more correct pH as 7.5 ( as average for my tap water ) is a bit on the alkaline side for what ganja needs.

So after all these discoveries I then thought that pouring the run off water back into the pot is maybe not a good idea considering the amount of salts dissolved in it.....

I'm going to do a slurry test soon just to see where I'm at with the soil itself.

 

[SofaKingHigh]

Hello growers !

are you throwing away the run off water from your pots or you feed it back to the plants ?

I have been sucking it up ( not by mouth ) and pouring it back into the plant, until recently when I realized the big difference in EC/PPM of this water that passed through the soil vs the same water before watering the plants.
I recently purchased a pH and EC pen and was surprised by some of the measurements that came out....

I filter my tap water before drinking and for the plants too with a Berkey carbon filter system and the pH ranges from 7.1 to 7.6, ppm500 readings are very low with a value of 10 and the corresponding EC value on the pen shows 0 ( both bluelab pens ).
I was surprised by the EC/ppm level being so low so that I thought the pen was out of calibration, so I did calibrated it just to make sure and the reading came out as wrote above.
I did some other test with water that has some dissolved salts in it and the ppm/EC measurement was way higher....so it seems like the pen is telling the truth.
I thought the low ppm value came from the effect of the carbon filters but after doing a cross check with unfiltered water the results are pretty much the same.
So it seems like water here is very "soft", in fact all my appliances that use water ( kettle, dishwasher etc ) has no traces of salt build up.

Now back to the run off question...I did another pH and EC test on the run off water and realized that the ppm/EC values are waaaay higher. Of course water dissolve minerals as it passes through the soil but I was surprised to see that the EC value went up to 4.6 and ppm500 around 2300.
pH stayed fairly stable to what I feed with ( I lower the pH before watering using earth juice pH down to a 6.7/6.8 value ).
I'm trying to grow organic and it seems like the pH is not so crucial as in other grow styles but I still try to feed with a more correct pH as 7.5 ( as average for my tap water ) is a bit on the alkaline side for what ganja needs.

So after all these discoveries I then thought that pouring the run off water back into the pot is maybe not a good idea considering the amount of salts dissolved in it.....

I'm going to do a slurry test soon just to see where I'm at with the soil itself.

Definitely not a great idea to do. You will run into salt buildup no doubt. You can however use some run off water to water any other house plants you may have but I would only do that like once a month depending on the plants. I just pump it right into the drain.

 

[sicoroot]

Definitely not a great idea to do. You will run into salt buildup no doubt. You can however use some run off water to water any other house plants you may have but I would only do that like once a month depending on the plants. I just pump it right into the drain.

thanks for confirming this..I'm not sure if I rememebr correctly but in the book True Living Organics by The Rev I thought I read something about pouring that water back into the pot. I may have mixed up my memories of that. In fact using the pH and EC pen really helped to get a better idea of the whole system I'm dealing with

 

[Skunk199]

If you’re growing organic, you shouldn’t want water runoff.

 

[Peat_Phreak]

Feed it to my flowers, shrubs, bushes, etc. Toss it down the drain in the winter.

 

[sicoroot]

If you’re growing organic, you shouldn’t want water runoff.

yes you right, it just happens that I always pour a little bit to much...I should just learn to be more patient and add little by little. I water concentrically from the stem outward, the water that hit the internal pot's wall runs down faster along the wall. With fabric pots this happen less, which is why I may switch to those on the next indoor run

 

[Skunk199]

yes you right, it just happens that I always pour a little bit to much...I should just learn to be more patient and add little by little. I water concentrically from the stem outward, the water that hit the internal pot's wall runs down faster along the wall. With fabric pots this happen less, which is why I may switch to those on the next indoor run

How big are the pots?

 

[sicoroot]

How big are the pots?

5 gallons , plastic

 

[mikeross]

It just goes down the drain. It's actually not as wasteful as you think. Once you got your schedule down and nutes dialed in you don't need that much runoff IMO. I do have about 5% runoff daily, just goes down the drain.

 

[Saul.Goodman]

I just let it evaporate. My tray is always dry by the next time I have to water, so I've always let it sit. My pots are raised so there is air getting under them and to the surface of the run off too.

 

[SSgrower]

When in a pinch I need to reuse water I'll use run-off water but most of it goes to Pecan & Pear trees. I've had rain water this whole grow so I use that and don't re use it. Cheers SS

 

[TryingToGrow]

No I don’t throw away water and try to water organic just to the point of run off.

 

[Chip.Douglas]

Hello growers !

are you throwing away the run off water from your pots or you feed it back to the plants ?

I have been sucking it up ( not by mouth ) and pouring it back into the plant, until recently when I realized the big difference in EC/PPM of this water that passed through the soil vs the same water before watering the plants.
I recently purchased a pH and EC pen and was surprised by some of the measurements that came out....

I filter my tap water before drinking and for the plants too with a Berkey carbon filter system and the pH ranges from 7.1 to 7.6, ppm500 readings are very low with a value of 10 and the corresponding EC value on the pen shows 0 ( both bluelab pens ).
I was surprised by the EC/ppm level being so low so that I thought the pen was out of calibration, so I did calibrated it just to make sure and the reading came out as wrote above.
I did some other test with water that has some dissolved salts in it and the ppm/EC measurement was way higher....so it seems like the pen is telling the truth.
I thought the low ppm value came from the effect of the carbon filters but after doing a cross check with unfiltered water the results are pretty much the same.
So it seems like water here is very "soft", in fact all my appliances that use water ( kettle, dishwasher etc ) has no traces of salt build up.

Now back to the run off question...I did another pH and EC test on the run off water and realized that the ppm/EC values are waaaay higher. Of course water dissolve minerals as it passes through the soil but I was surprised to see that the EC value went up to 4.6 and ppm500 around 2300.
pH stayed fairly stable to what I feed with ( I lower the pH before watering using earth juice pH down to a 6.7/6.8 value ).
I'm trying to grow organic and it seems like the pH is not so crucial as in other grow styles but I still try to feed with a more correct pH as 7.5 ( as average for my tap water ) is a bit on the alkaline side for what ganja needs.

So after all these discoveries I then thought that pouring the run off water back into the pot is maybe not a good idea considering the amount of salts dissolved in it.....

I'm going to do a slurry test soon just to see where I'm at with the soil itself.

I reuse it for next watering