Hydroton raised my ph

Just thought i'd share this. PH'd my water prior to hydroton and after and noticed it had raised my ph. i thought they advertised hydroton as ph balanced?

Did you wash or at least give a thorough cleansing before hand?

Did you wash the Hydroton thoroughly prior to using it?
Did you just run water or were there nutrients in it?
Have you started growing plants in the Hydroton?

Hydroton is made from 100% clay and it is PH inert, meaning it is neither acidic or alkaline. The only preparation needed for use is rinsing off the dust, if you are using it new from a bag. PH will raise naturally for many reasons. I'd begin to look at other causes. Good nutrients will have PH buffering agents included. Also, a plant that is on the proper amount of nutrients, will rarely need any adjustment to the PH. I have a one gallon bottle of GH PH Down that I have had for more than 6 months. The bottle is still full enough that I can use a small dropper to withdraw some.

simply boil your hydroton for about half an hour, then leave it in a vinegar solution (1 part vinegar 2 parts water) for at least 2 days.
Rinse with water until all the vinegar is gone and use.
While your hydroton was stored for an extended period, its basic surface sites were activated and it is now self-buffering your nutrient solution through cation exchange....

i have absolutely no idea what i am talking about either

RINSE ALL MEDIUMS THAT ARENT SOIL! Always have always will...

Just in case anyone thought he was serious...... He was not.... He was using sarcasm, due to the number of myths and tips that seem to keep popping up on here regarding hydroton. Half of the ones spreading rumors or myths never used hydroton for any period of time, or they would know better. lol

ChubbySoap said:

simply boil your hydroton for about half an hour, then leave it in a vinegar solution (1 part vinegar 2 parts water) for at least 2 days.
Rinse with water until all the vinegar is gone and use.
While your hydroton was stored for an extended period, its basic surface sites were activated and it is now self-buffering your nutrient solution through cation exchange....

i have absolutely no idea what i am talking about either

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I have always rinsed my soil extremely well....

DrtyBngWtr said:

RINSE ALL MEDIUMS THAT ARENT SOIL! Always have always will...

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Just got done rinsing some myself....and hated every moment of it! I found it to be the most unenjoyable part of growing...so far.

Beagle said:

Just got done rinsing some myself....and hated every moment of it! I found it to be the most unenjoyable part of growing...so far.

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I agree... There is some new product on the market called Sure To Grow and they make a synthetic medium to replace hydroton. I was going to buy some, but after reading, it doesn't like EBB and flow or wick systems, because the medium doesn't wick or retain moisture well. That turned me off. It may be fine for DWC or drip though if anyone else wants to check it out. It is called STG Hail.

lol hydroton does't lower or raise the ph. its inert.
just wash it off real well before first time use. i just bought a bag today and it was filthy. its just clay dust. also inert. but rinse it off

Beagle said:

Did you wash the Hydroton thoroughly prior to using it?
Did you just run water or were there nutrients in it?
Have you started growing plants in the Hydroton?

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yeah i rinsed it first and then put the basket in just plain water in my bubble bucket. not that big of deal, next time though i'll just adjust my ph after the hydroton sits in the water awhile.

i would suspect your water temp in the rez are causing the troubles before anything else...but as i said. I'm ignorant.

i've met lots of people that have mistakenly believed they gave a good solid washing though...all they did was rinse them off a bit

What was the PH of the water that you rinsed the hydroton with? If the hydroton retained water with a higher ph, maybe it could have offset the ph of the water your running in it now. Just a thought.

Beagle said:

What was the PH of the water that you rinsed the hydroton with? If the hydroton retained water with a higher ph, maybe it could have offset the ph of the water your running in it now. Just a thought.

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Bingo! I bet thats what it was. Guess my brain didn't think of that, been thinking of gettin a new one.

Sorry to bump an old thread. My googling lead me here. The hydroton I have been using is definitely raising my ph. The LECA I am using has needed to be treated for days with acid. I just thought I would update this for future googlers.

Phaetonau said:

Sorry to bump an old thread. My googling lead me here. The hydroton I have been using is definitely raising my ph. The LECA I am using has needed to be treated for days with acid. I just thought I would update this for future googlers.

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When you say raising your ph, by how much and how fast? Your ph will naturally drift upwards over a few days its normal

The clay dust will cause the pH to rise. If you rinsed the hydroton well then it should only be rising a couple points and will stop rising in a few days.

klx said:

When you say raising your ph, by how much and how fast? Your ph will naturally drift upwards over a few days its normal

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it would rise up a from 5’s to 6’s over about 24 hours of sitting in phd water.
My ph’d Tap water wasn’t rising.

Same is happening to me and i have a separate res to prove it. Mixed up 10 gallons of nutes for my young plants 2 days ago. Ph'd it, let it settle for a couple hours, dead on 5.8. Used about 8 gallons of it to start 4 new 3.5gal dwc buckets, left the remaining 2gal in my mixing barrel to use as top up if needed, but will most likely dump it and mix new. 12 hours after filling buckets it had climbed to 6.5. 2gal in res still at 5.8. I adjusted it down, 12 hours later 6.5 again, corrected it, 12 hours later AGAIN 6.5. The original 2 gal in the res has not been touched since mixing and is still dead on 5.8.

The hydroton i used is new, but when i say i rinsed it thoroughly, i mean it. It was enough to fill a 5 gal bucket about half way. I did start by rinsing with my well water which measures 7.5 and 200ppm. Used 6 large airstones at bottom of 5 gal bucket full of water with hydroton to really mix things around, basically like an aggressive boil, replaced water maybe 10 times with a half hour between. Last few times water drained clean. After that i did 3 more cycles with ro water to wash out well water. Apparently not enough? Only other difference between the buckets and the 2gal in the res is that the buckets have dissolved oxygen from air stones but that wouldnt affect ph right?

Anyway, ill continue to ph down, hopefully it settles eventually. Maybe the issue is that it takes many hours for the hytroton to absorb water to the core and release whatever its releasing. Next time ill give a few 12 hour periods of soaking and rinsing. Just wanted to chime in since i have an apples to apples comparison that proves it actually is happening. If i didnt have a separate 2 gal of same mix to test that didnt touch hydroton, i too probably would have assumed it was just a regular ph creep, although now its getting kind of ridiculous after adjusting down 3 times.