What do you do with water run off ?

sicoroot · Feb 16, 2022

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 · Feb 16, 2022

sicoroot said:
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 · Feb 16, 2022

SofaKingHigh said:
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 · Feb 20, 2022

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

Peat_Phreak · Feb 20, 2022

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

sicoroot · Feb 20, 2022

Skunk199 said:
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 · Feb 20, 2022

sicoroot said:
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 · Feb 20, 2022

Skunk199 said:
How big are the pots?

5 gallons , plastic

mikeross · Feb 21, 2022

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 · Feb 21, 2022

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 · Feb 21, 2022

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 · Mar 13, 2022

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

Chip.Douglas · Mar 13, 2022

sicoroot said:
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

What do you do with water run off ?

What do you do with water run off ?

sicoroot

SofaKingHigh

sicoroot

Skunk199

Peat_Phreak

sicoroot

Skunk199

sicoroot

mikeross

Saul.Goodman

I just wet my plants...

SSgrower

TryingToGrow

Chip.Douglas

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