buying a reverse osmosis filter for my crazy hard water. help

i posted somethin a few days ago asking about reverse osmosis filter and which one to buy. now i haven a new question. what should i do about remineralizing? i get i need calmag ( people have said itss ok witt thrue livivng organics, is this true?) but what about iron? i used to worry about iron toxicity but now im worrying about not having enough my soil is oceans forrest , homemade wormcasting fed seaweed and rtockdust (obvi more just talkin about mineral here and whatever the filters gonna take away from me) homemade thermal compost, kelmp meal, alfalfa meal, fish guano, rockphostphate, kelp meal azomite and gai green glacial rock dust. however the rockdust i doubt is absorbed or inoculated cause this is my first run of this mix so will i have low iron levels? and is calmag ok? all advice welcomed, thank u!

When I switched to RO water I immediately had issues with rust spots and dying leaves. I started adding Cal/mag (by Dynagrow) and it helped right away. I can't say about all the other stuff you have in there just that when I switched to RO my grow went south until I figured it out.

mschanandlerbong said:

i posted somethin a few days ago asking about reverse osmosis filter and which one to buy. now i haven a new question. what should i do about remineralizing? i get i need calmag ( people have said itss ok witt thrue livivng organics, is this true?) but what about iron? i used to worry about iron toxicity but now im worrying about not having enough my soil is oceans forrest , homemade wormcasting fed seaweed and rtockdust (obvi more just talkin about mineral here and whatever the filters gonna take away from me) homemade thermal compost, kelmp meal, alfalfa meal, fish guano, rockphostphate, kelp meal azomite and gai green glacial rock dust. however the rockdust i doubt is absorbed or inoculated cause this is my first run of this mix so will i have low iron levels? and is calmag ok? all advice welcomed, thank u!

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I also have to add liquid organic cal-mag when I'm using RO or distilled water from my dehumidifier. I use general organics brand: it is safe for no till soil. Also when you recycle your soil add back in some dolomite lime, Garden gypsum, and oyster shell flour to increase mineral content but you will likely still need to give them a liquid cal mag that is readily available to them when they really need it in mid to late flower. Adding soft rock phosphate & blood meal seems to avoid iron deficiency- probly not gonna be an issue.

Your 'crazy hard water' has tons of minerals. Do a 50/50 or 75/25 with the RO water and forget messing with a cal/mag supplement.

Wet

mschanandlerbong said:

i posted somethin a few days ago asking about reverse osmosis filter and which one to buy. now i haven a new question. what should i do about remineralizing? i get i need calmag ( people have said itss ok witt thrue livivng organics, is this true?) but what about iron? i used to worry about iron toxicity but now im worrying about not having enough my soil is oceans forrest , homemade wormcasting fed seaweed and rtockdust (obvi more just talkin about mineral here and whatever the filters gonna take away from me) homemade thermal compost, kelmp meal, alfalfa meal, fish guano, rockphostphate, kelp meal azomite and gai green glacial rock dust. however the rockdust i doubt is absorbed or inoculated cause this is my first run of this mix so will i have low iron levels? and is calmag ok? all advice welcomed, thank u!

Click to expand...

Do you have a worm bin if so egg shells oyster shell flour are 2 ex of excellent calcium. For iron and etc kelp has alot.of trace minerals micros etc like iron boron mag cap etc ( from what I remember) and read kelp has literally everything in it to rid of defs

Wetdog said:

Your 'crazy hard water' has tons of minerals. Do a 50/50 or 75/25 with the RO water and forget messing with a cal/mag supplement.

Wet

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took the words outta my mouth.
Personally I don't like using dolomite lime to get calcium.
Egg shells, gypsum, oyster flour.. those are better sources of it, in my opinion anyways.

anzohaze said:

Do you have a worm bin if so egg shells oyster shell flour are 2 ex of excellent calcium. For iron and etc kelp has alot.of trace minerals micros etc like iron boron mag cap etc ( from what I remember) and read kelp has literally everything in it to rid of defs

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Took the words out of mine too!

Dr. Who said:

Took the words out of mine too!

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I like getting likes from you it makes me feel like I am comprehending what I am reading

Dolomite lime provides mag as well as calcium, so unless youre using some epsom salt, your gonna need some mg.... but lime buffers PH towards 7... above and beyond what it adds in calcium and magnesium so lime isnt a bad thing... I use pelletized/prilled and powdered lime as well as crushed oyster shell (chunky-ish), and oyster shell flour (powdered), and gypsum in my soils with RO water... But my RO filter has a permeation pump which adds back about 30ppm of ca/mg to the filtered water... AND..... I still use GO ca/mg on top of all that...

Oyster shell is just calcium, it has no mg; and I do not believe it buffers PH... or at least it isnt gonna buffer PH like lime does/is intended to.... I suggest using all of the above but I would personally buy an RO unit without the permeation pump if/when I buy a new one because I would really like to know I'm giving my plants 0ppm water the last couple weeks... 30ppm is really nothing but I feel that little bit of ca/mg shouldnt be there in the last week or 2.... Not that I believe in flushing but I do believe the ca/mg aids in the uptake of other nutrition in the soil and causes the plants to not finish as quick as they normally would.

The main thing I dislike about the RO units is that they are very wasteful unless you buy a $$$... most run a 2 to 1 or 3 to 1 ratio meaning for every 1 gallon of filtered water you discard 2 or 3.... But they're getting better and I'd suggest spending some $ on some kind of a halfway decent sediment filter and install it before the RO unit as it'll aid in making your RO filters last a bit longer.......(in theory)...

My one and only pro RO argument is that it makes it possible to eliminate water immediately as a problem if and when problems do arise....

Lime does not buffer ph. It adjust ph. Oyster shell flour does buffer though and it does have cal and mag.

Dole lime also takes about year to break down til it's readily available for the plant to uptake


Get the hydro logic 200 Gpd one. Add flow reducer and uv-c light and it's $375 total from growers house. They don't have a smaller one without the add ons. Which are a must.


You can't buffer towards a ph range either. Buffer ph means it doesn't change. Ph remains the same.