Fertigation: Buffering base fluid?

R

RedSkip

Well-known member
Curious if anyone tests their pH before adding nutrients to determine if they need to buffer (lower/raise the pH) of their base water before feeding?

I watched a video around hydroponics and those guys buffer everything before feeding, which makes sense, but I’m curious if anyone is doing it for figs in our soil based media?

The reason for buffering is that nutrient absorption has an ideal range for plants and being too high or low can reduce the absorption effectiveness.
 
RedSkip said:
Curious if anyone tests their pH before adding nutrients to determine if they need to buffer (lower/raise the pH) of their base water before feeding?

I watched a video around hydroponics and those guys buffer everything before feeding, which makes sense, but I’m curious if anyone is doing it for figs in our soil based media?

The reason for buffering is that nutrient absorption has an ideal range for plants and being too high or low can reduce the absorption effectiveness.
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Add pellet lime to your top dressing not powdered lime. Most soils now are made from peat moss which is acidic. The pellet lime will slowly dissolve with waterings and balance out your pots.
 
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I fertigate and to answer your question, I don't buffer. I'm not a scientist or expert but here's my rational. Your soil should be balanced to start with. So you should or would only be buffering your supply water. If your water supply was too far off from neutral you should have a home water treatment system, which would be in effect a buffer but you shouldn't need to specifically buffer your plants water supply.
 
DCallahan said:
I fertigate and to answer your question, I don't buffer. I'm not a scientist or expert but here's my rational. Your soil should be balanced to start with. So you should or would only be buffering your supply water. If your water supply was too far off from neutral you should have a home water treatment system, which would be in effect a buffer but you shouldn't need to specifically buffer your plants water supply.
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Yeah my HTown water runs high 7.6-8.2, pretty hard actually. We don’t have a water treatment system and likely won’t add one. However, I could see myself adding pH down to my watering regimen to help with feedings.

Perhaps over time a water treatment system would offset the potential cost of pH down - 😂 .
 
RedSkip said:
Yeah my HTown water runs high 7.6-8.2, pretty hard actually. We don’t have a water treatment system and likely won’t add one. However, I could see myself adding pH down to my watering regimen to help with feedings.

Perhaps over time a water treatment system would offset the potential cost of pH down - 😂 .
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Add soil acidifier which is usually used for berries or certain flowers. Mix it into your top dressing if you are running basic. Way easier than adding ph down to your water.
 
If you are fertigating you can simply put the PH down in your stock tank.

You could also get fancy with it and start varying your PH outputs to periodically hit the prime PH points for the different element uptake points
 
DCallahan said:
If you are fertigating you can simply put the PH down in your stock tank.

You could also get fancy with it and start varying your PH outputs to periodically hit the prime PH points for the different element uptake points
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I like the way you think, more to tinker with!
 
RedSkip said:
I don’t. I haven’t determined how to convince my manager at home to accept a 55 gallon “rain barrel” as landscaping decor… 🧐
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If you talking about a barrel. I'm guessing you are considering an injector like Dosatron or Mixrite. They are definitely the way to go in my opinion. That is what professional growers and nurseries use.
You don't need a 55 gallon stock tank. It's all relative to the total water application, concentration you mix the stock tank, ratio of the injection ,and how often you want to mix the stock tank solution.
I have two separate fertigation systems the big system runs the orchard and the patio system handles pots close to the house. Same injector but the tanks are 55 and 6 gallons respectfully.
Dosatron has a great mixing calculator on their website. I even use it to figure out my hand watering ratios.
 
I never knew this was even a thing.... So I guess my answer is no. My drip system is on Toronto municipal water until I can get my ground water reservoirs set up... one day... I hope.

Our PH out of the tap is generally around 7.5.

I have had issues with the PH in my hydroponics. I've never been able to figure out what's in PH up/down. Nowadays, I just use baking soda or white vinegar depending on which way I want to go. Seems to work well and it's cheap.
 
TorontoJoe said:
I never knew this was even a thing.... So I guess my answer is no. My drip system is on Toronto municipal water until I can get my ground water reservoirs set up... one day... I hope.

Our PH out of the tap is generally around 7.5.

I have had issues with the PH in my hydroponics. I've never been able to figure out what's in PH up/down. Nowadays, I just use baking soda or white vinegar depending on which way I want to go. Seems to work well and it's cheap.
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IS the ph issue in the hydroponics a product of Plant material and the water being a closed loop system?
 
DCallahan said:
IS the ph issue in the hydroponics a product of Plant material and the water being a closed loop system?
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I think that’s definitely a factor. One thing I noticed was that if I let the plants grow too long and let the root system got too old, it would drive the pH way down. Harvesting the greens younger and adding a big aeration stone solved a lot of problems. I rarely have to adjust the pH anymore.
 
pH and Eh is huge when it comes to nutrient availability. You do want a sweet spot for all nutrients to be available. If you go too high, some nutrients are completely blocked out, if you go too low, you can have toxicity or lockout as well.

Eh is the one most don’t know about and it affects nutrient availability as well, even if pH is correct. But it’s a more complicated subject and harder for people to monitor. You need to go more by growing practice for this one. The type of nutrients used affects it greatly as well as watering consistency.

IMG_4117.jpeg

One reason plants do better with rain water is because the pH is ideal, another reason is because it isn’t full of minerals. It allows soil nutrients to become water soluble and then plant available.

pH matters most for chemical inputs than it does for organic ones. So that is where much of the concern comes from with hydroponics and with cannabis growers.

All of that said, I do not buffer my water. It’s too much work, especially for the amount of trees I have. I have well water with a high pH, so I have no problem adding more acidic inputs for nutrients. Most people have water with a high pH, it’s just certain areas where it can be lower.

It is better for the pH to be kept consistent than to constantly alter it. The reason being is that plants will adapt to the environment they are put in. Their root exudates affect the pH around the root system. If we keep changing it, the plant cannot effectively adapt.

I try to be aware of the pH more for my foliar sprays than for watering. Though I would totally install a garden RO system for watering if I could. It just isn’t feasible here being in a drought area on a well.
 
RosyPosy said:
pH and Eh is huge when it comes to nutrient availability. You do want a sweet spot for all nutrients to be available. If you go too high, some nutrients are completely blocked out, if you go too low, you can have toxicity or lockout as well.

Eh is the one most don’t know about and it affects nutrient availability as well, even if pH is correct. But it’s a more complicated subject and harder for people to monitor. You need to go more by growing practice for this one. The type of nutrients used affects it greatly as well as watering consistency.

View attachment 19392

One reason plants do better with rain water is because the pH is ideal, another reason is because it isn’t full of minerals. It allows soil nutrients to become water soluble and then plant available.

pH matters most for chemical inputs than it does for organic ones. So that is where much of the concern comes from with hydroponics and with cannabis growers.

All of that said, I do not buffer my water. It’s too much work, especially for the amount of trees I have. I have well water with a high pH, so I have no problem adding more acidic inputs for nutrients. Most people have water with a high pH, it’s just certain areas where it can be lower.

It is better for the pH to be kept consistent than to constantly alter it. The reason being is that plants will adapt to the environment they are put in. Their root exudates affect the pH around the root system. If we keep changing it, the plant cannot effectively adapt.

I try to be aware of the pH more for my foliar sprays than for watering. Though I would totally install a garden RO system for watering if I could. It just isn’t feasible here being in a drought area on a well.
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Interesting... I have a small still and used to use exclusively distilled water in my hydro system.... Ultimately I got tired of distilling 4 liters of water nearly every day to add so I opted to put a float valve in the reservoir and use tap water. It was more stable before. I wonder if I could put an RO filter in before the float valve. Something I should look into.
 
RosyPosy said:
It is better for the pH to be kept consistent than to constantly alter it. The reason being is that plants will adapt to the environment they are put in. Their root exudates affect the pH around the root system. If we keep changing it, the plant cannot effectively adapt.
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I appreciate your detailed response. As a new fig grower my collection is not nearly that extensive, and my thought was to buffer the nutrient solution after mixing to help the trees. I don't think this will be too much trouble to stay consistent, however, I wonder if this could be detrimental over the long game (years out)? If the trees are adjusted to a pH of say 6.3-6.5 their first few years, and my collection gets out of hand where buffered feedings no longer makes sense, perhaps it's better to just remain unbuffered initially rather than switching to unbuffered feedings a year or two from.

More to ponder...thanks again for taking the time to respond! I have the same chart, but my black/white version isn't as eye catching as the colored one!
 
TorontoJoe said:
Interesting... I have a small still and used to use exclusively distilled water in my hydro system.... Ultimately I got tired of distilling 4 liters of water nearly every day to add so I opted to put a float valve in the reservoir and use tap water. It was more stable before. I wonder if I could put an RO filter in before the float valve. Something I should look into.
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"Don't' sell, don't tell..." 🤐
 
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