# Checking PPM in water for soil plant? Do it or skip it? Advise.



## accid (Dec 8, 2009)

Morning all,

I just bought a milwaukee ph/tds/ec meter. My old hanna checker (ph) is giving me all kinds of wacky readings so i spent the extra money on a ppm and ph reader. 

Anyhow, I know a little bit in regards to tds(ppm readings). My question is: *Should i be checking the ppm of my water when i give my plants nutes?*

Normally i add nutes(FF - either big bloom, tiger bloom, grow big) to 1 gallon(distilled) of water the adjust the ph and then feed. I did it this way for a long time because i didnt own a ppm meter. Well now that i have one, *should i be checking the ppm of each gallon or should i skip this?*.

From my understanding of ppm meters, they are mainly for hydroponic setups. From what i read, PPM meters check how many parts per million there are of nutes in the water (not to get into the technical side of ions etc). Is this correct? If so, then when i give my plants nutes,* should i be aiming for a specific ppm even though its a soil based plant..? *is that what you all do or what?

Any and all feedback or suggestions would be highly appreciated. In the meantime i will be reading a bit more about it. Hope you take the time to respond. Thanks


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

some do but i never did..


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## DonJones (Dec 8, 2009)

accid,

PHing water for soil is one of those things that is usually only *necessary* if you have real high PH in the water to start with. What is your PH at your source, I'm assuming at the faucet?

However, it is one of those fine touches that can slightly improve your results, especially if you are growing a heavily manipulate genetics strain.

Another suggestion is to check the ppms in your untreated water to see how hard it is.  With real hard water you may need to worry more about salt/mineral build up in your pots/buckets.

While you probably don't need to make either check, you have the meter, so why not use it?

Good smoking.


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## accid (Dec 8, 2009)

Someone clarify for me what ppm will be checking.* I read that ppm meters check to see how many nutes are in the water. Is this true?* *What do they check for?* 

Im a bit confused cause you say to check the ppm of my faucet water to see if its too hard. My faucet water comes at 8.5ph hardness. However, my guess is that the PPM's are way to high,* but those ppms are not the same as putting nutes in store bought distilled water then checking the ppm are they?
*
*To state it simply, when a meter checks the amount of ppm in the water, is it looking for NUTRIENTS or the crappy minerals that come in water?* I read quite a bit on this but i am baffled at what exactly ppm is looking for.

By the way, i use distilled store bought gallons. My faucet water pushes out 8.5 ph, even if i correct the ph, it screws up my plants im guessing the ppms are too high... 

Thanks


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

total disolved solids...pure water has a PPM of 0...a good RO will give you a PPM of 3-5...tap is usually 100-175..atleast in my area..crappy tapwater WILL screw up your crop for sure...i know first hand. a PPM/TDS meter will read anything disolved in your water supply.


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

i just hit my bong...joy...


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## accid (Dec 8, 2009)

So it isnt checking for nutrients inside the water? i read on a website that with a ppm meter you can determine if you put enough nutrients inside your water or if you should add more based on the ppm.  For example:   hxxp://www.bghydro.com/bgh/static/articles/0406_tdspH.asp 

Chane xx to tt. Scroll half way down the page, there is a list of estimated ppm.




 Thoughts? feedback?


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

this is how it works......say you need 500 PPM's of nutes in your res...dammit !!! i just dragged my arm through a pile of hash...anyway, now lets say i did it again !!!..now lets say your starting(no nutes) PPM's are 125 if you were using tap. you would cut your starting PPM's in half and add nutes until your PPM's read 560...since your using distilled, you'd want it to read 500.


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

do you know the PPM scale for full term marijuana growth ??? as the plant goes through it's different stages, you'll need to raise the PPM's so your plants are fed adequately.


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## accid (Dec 8, 2009)

No I do not know the full spectrum. Based on what you just informed me, it does makes sense a bit more now. However, lets say my ppm is like 1800... what would be the scenario then? my guess is that the water is too hard and is no good at this point?

Back to my original question, should i bother adjusting ppm for soil based grows?   

Any links that would further educate me on ppm and nutrients in regards to marijuana? Let me know, thanks for your quick responses.

Thanks


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

accid said:
			
		

> No I do not know the full spectrum. Based on what you just informed me, it does makes sense a bit more now. However, lets say my ppm is like 1800... what would be the scenario then?


 your plants will be horribly nute burned beyond recognition....:holysheep:


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## PUFF MONKEY (Dec 8, 2009)

accid said:
			
		

> Back to my original question, should i bother adjusting ppm for soil based grows? Thanks


no just mix by the directions (1/2 strength to start) for soil.


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## accid (Dec 8, 2009)

Hrmm.. because the ppms are too high - aka there are too many minerals (nutrients) in the water is that it?


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## Growdude (Dec 8, 2009)

accid said:
			
		

> Hrmm.. because the ppms are too high - aka there are too many minerals (nutrients) in the water is that it?



Correct.
I just use mine instead of using a measuring spoon or cup, dont even own one.

With my WW its been 200-400 ppm for 3-4 " plants
400- 800 for 4 - 8 " plants
800 - 1300 for plants over 12" and full .


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## Tact (Dec 8, 2009)

Hey man, I am new to growing myself and and in my first grow now, I did a quite a bit of research first and had your very same question.

PPM can be looked at as measuring the amount in your water that is NOT h20, therefore you take your water, tap, RO (reverse osmosis) or distilled, and you measure the pH, and PPM. These two numbers are important for this reason, pH lock out nutrients uptake of your MJ plants when they dip below 6.3 and rise above 6.8 in soil growth, different things get 'locked' out at different pH levels so it is imperative you keep it around 6.5 or in between 6.3-6.8. My natural pH from tap is a staggering 9.8, which would straight kill my MJ plants if I didn't know that and used it freely with watering without adjusting the pH down, most people in the country have tap between 6 and 7.5, which would be less severe but still a nagging deterrent to healthy growing MJ, but it would grow, though not anywhere near ideally and can also show symptoms of nutrient deficiencies even though you are giving it plenty of nutes, due to the lockout from high/low pH.

Another important thing, measure the pH of the water going in the when you water, and then measure the water runoff coming out of the pots, this can help diagnose the general pH of your soil. If the pH of your water going in is 6.8 and the runoff is 6.0 your soil is slightly acidic, dragging down the pH of the water you poured into the plants. If the soil-runoff measures 7.3, the soil is slightly alkaline, using pH medium managers like dolomite sweet lime (finely ground), in with your soil can help stabilize the pH so it flucuates less from the point of watering, to the soil run off pH levels.

On to your PPM question:

PPM below 300 is critically important, anything above 300 ppm usually indicate well water, or extremely treated city water. Most likely your PPM will be between 100-200 though, mine is 245 and I have city water, this is still acceptable but not ideal. More important though is the use of PPM as a measurement tool when giving nutrients, say you measure your PPM and it is 200, well there is nutrient guides that stipulate how much PPM you should give your plants in nutrient solution. So say your nutrient schedule (available online at most any nutrient manufacturers website) stipulates a PPM of nutrients solution of 150, you would want to put in your nutes, measure PPM and say it shows up 325 ppm, deduct your initial PPM of 200, and your PPM of nutrient solution is roughly 125 ppm, add slightly more nutes until the PPM measures out to 350.

Does that make sense? PPM meters will not delineate what the PPM in the water is, but just how much of the contents of your bucket is not water itself.

* A side note, you can call your local water provider, whoever sends your bill, and ask them if they use chlorine, or chloramine to treat your water. If you are using tap, if they use chlorine let your water sit out for a day or two and a chemical reaction with the air will cause the volatile chlorine to turn into a gas and rise out of your water and into the air, you can speed this up by using an aquarium bubbler that will force oxygen into the bottom of the bucket of water and up out of the bucket within a half hour. If you have chloramine as I do, you can use a product sold at Petsmart/Pet co, for aquarium enthusiasts that breaks the much more chemically-stable chloramine down into less stable components, a bottle which will last me for maybe a year was $6 dollars on sale at Pet Co. Both chlorine and chloramine are bad for MJ, assume if you live in a medium-large city one or the other will be present.

Copy-paste from wiki regarding chloramine:

Aquarium owners must remove the chloramine from their tap water because it is toxic to fish. Aging the water for a few days removes chlorine but not the more stable chloramine, which can be neutralised using products available at pet stores.

Many animals are sensitive to chloramine and it must be removed from water given to many animals in zoos.


Chloramine must also be removed from the water prior to use in kidney dialysis machines, as it would come in contact with the bloodstream across a permeable membrane. However, since chloramine is neutralized by the digestive process, kidney dialysis patients can still safely drink chloramine-treated water.


Home brewers use reducing agents such as sodium metabisulfite or potassium metabisulfite to remove chloramine from brewing liquor as it, unlike chlorine, cannot be removed by boiling (A.J. DeLange). Residual sodium can cause off flavors in beer (See Brewing, Michael Lewis) so potassium metabisulfite is preferred.


Chloramine can be removed from bathwater and birthing tubs by adding 1000 mg of vitamin C per 75 gallons of water. Human-grade nutraceutical vitamin C reduces the pH of the water less than commercial tablets sold for this specific purpose.


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## legalize_freedom (Dec 8, 2009)

solid info from Tact!  nice post man!


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## Growdude (Dec 8, 2009)

Good post Tact but I dont agree with the subtraction of the initial ppm of the water,  Most times its calcium, iron, Mg and other things but they are micro nutes for a plant and cant be disregarded, especially if its a high PPM for the tap water.

If its in your water you have to count it.


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## legalize_freedom (Dec 8, 2009)

Growdude said:
			
		

> Good post Tact but I dont agree with the subtraction of the initial ppm of the water, Most times its calcium, iron, Mg and other things but they are micro nutes for a plant and cant be disregarded, especially if its a high PPM for the tap water.
> 
> If its in your water you have to count it.


 
Yeah...this is true...alot of goodies in the tap water, along with alot of the bad stuff...I think this is where it gets hard for the untrained eye, trying to decide wehter they are haveing say a mag defeciency...when in reality it could be something else that is in the water.  Thats why I like distilled water, or RO or something where you know you have a fairly clean slate to start from. did this make any sense???...lol...I fell off the wagon and smoked a bowl today


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## accid (Dec 10, 2009)

Yes, Thanks tact! Superb.

Looking forward to learning more about this in the near future.

Thanks all


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