Best way to keep nutrient mix “clean”

Currently my grow room is upstairs. We have no source of water upstairs.

I have a room where i mix all my nutes up and then usually toss my pump in the bucket with the hose in my Res and fill it like that.

But I usually have to fill up 2, 5 gallon buckets every other day. Gets a bit old, but whatever.

Could I make like 6 buckets full of my nute mix for that week and just leave them covered, then use when i need? Or would they need an air stone to keep some air and circulation?

Just to try and save me some time.

What kind of system are you running? I top off my res with two clear 7 gallon containers every week. They stand in still water at 1/8 strength. I run things sterile and always add 2ppm of residual chlorine to everything thing that goes into the tank/reservoir.

Keeping it for a week would probably not be a problem either way, especially if you sterilize the solution. RO water will also help to slow down any fungal or bacterial growth.

trapdevil said:

Currently my grow room is upstairs. We have no source of water upstairs.

I have a room where i mix all my nutes up and then usually toss my pump in the bucket with the hose in my Res and fill it like that.

But I usually have to fill up 2, 5 gallon buckets every other day. Gets a bit old, but whatever.

Could I make like 6 buckets full of my nute mix for that week and just leave them covered, then use when i need? Or would they need an air stone to keep some air and circulation?

Just to try and save me some time.

Click to expand...

Throw an air stone in.

i'd use a pump on a timer or airstone to keep it circulated but no real issue.

sandman83 said:

i'd use a pump on a timer or airstone to keep it circulated but no real issue.

Click to expand...

Sounds good can do

The other factor to consider here is temp, if you cant keep the stored solutions below 70 then even with aeration they wont be immune to bacteria growth for long, have you considered just keeping your reservoir next to/near your water source and using an oversized pump to pump it upstairs? alternatively have you considered adding a water source upstairs? When you say no water source upstairs are you talking like at all? you dont have a shower/sink/toilet upstairs?

Have you considered doing this? Run a 1/4" poly tube line up through the floor to get some H2O upstairs, like the type line we use off an RO filter. Set a small say 14 gallon drum up with a float valve so it will stop when full. Now you have water up there whenever you need it. You can either pump the water out of the barrel as needed or you can set it up on some cinder blocks and install a 3/4" barbed fitting through a grommet on the bottom side of the drum and connect a shutoff valve as a tap. Then you can slide a 5 gallon bucket under the tap and grab what you need that way. I do that a lot myself with 30 and 55 gallon drums and I use 5 gallon bucket dolllies.

Pool shock will keep anything from growing if you are concerned.