SOG as a solution to Hard Water?

So I recently learned that my tap water has about 400 ppm total dissolved solids (and my town reports that it has 62 ppm sodium and 94 ppm calcium carbonate). This I discovered while trying to figure out what's wrong with my plants, which are in their 4th week of flower after 2 months of veg (growing in soil -- FFOF and perlite -- in 7 gallon cloth containers). I'm going to muddle through to harvest as best I can with these, but I'm trying to figure out what to do for my next grow.

I've been considering an RO system, but it seems like a lot of work, so I'm looking for an alternative.

So here's the idea: Since the water didn't give me trouble until the plants were about 3 months old, maybe I could get away with my tap water in an SOG grow, since those get harvested at right about 3 months. Anybody else adopt a similar strategy to deal with hard water? Or anybody care to comment on how they do or do not like the idea?

To harvest before a planned summer vacation, I'm going to have to plant seeds this week, if I do this. So I'm going to have to plant what I've got, which is mostly freebies, none of which were purchased with SOG in mind. I'm thinking 8-10 plants (in my 2x4 tent), and they will have to be chosen from: Skunk #1, Jack Herer, White Widow, Raspberry Cough, and Maui Wowie. Please let me know if you have suggestions.

You need to use nutrients that are designed to be used specifically for hard water.

General Hydroponics Flora series has micro for hard water and Ionics makes hard water nutrients, they both work good

Did you use any fertilizer/nutrients? FFOF won't feed a plant through its whole life cycle, maybe the first 3-4 wks, you should street feeding it when the plant reaches about 4-5 nodes in veg.

Hey I've been scrambling trying to deal with what I believe is the very same issue. I've spent about three weeks now to get to the bottom of this problem. Originally thaught it was nutes but that was wrong. Then I thaught environment damage from hot conditions. It actually wasn't the main problem but contributed to it. I'm on a well and it seems to suck. Still waiting for water quality report from town but tested with pool strips and pH seems good around six but the TDS is looking like a thousand. Not sure how reliable strips are because they r old. I'm in ffof straight up with a teaspoon of desert bat in bottom of c300 plastic pots. I'm in a five by four by four grow box with two four hundred hps and about three hundred in CFL. I have a round floor fan I vent in air. Currently have ventilation on the way. Plants are clones exotic Thai from my summer crop I saved a mother. They are a month veg and they are coming into there third week of flower. I'll throw up some pics of the affected growth when I get home.

heres one I have on me. I have some that r a little different also. I basically had big problems. Because in the end I did have a deficiancy but it wasn't because the nutes weren't there they where just unavailable

Thanks, all.

@blu3bird - Thanks for the tip -- I had no idea they made such things -- will look into it.

@WeedFreak78 - No nutes for the first 8 weeks. Probably I should have started feeding at 6 weeks -- they were small plants in large pots; I think they were good till then. Then I used Botanicare Pure Plend Pro Bloom Soil Formula for a little while (about every other feeding), switched to FF Big Bloom once or twice, and switched back to the Botanicare.

@Grenier5413 - Sorry for your troubles, but nice to know I'm not alone. Mine look quite different though. This picture is about a week old -- they've gotten worse (the girls are sleeping now, so I can't take a fresh one):

I was wondering if anyone knew where I could find a nute lockout chart of some sort.

Grenier5413 said:

I was wondering if anyone knew where I could find a nute lockout chart of some sort.

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I've been having fun figuring out my plants deficiency & the quality of my tap water.
I can't seem to find another growers posts on' water quality and the amounts of calcium & magnesium in the tap water?

I need a numbers guru! To come along and explain the ratios and how to read my nutrients & tap water whilst feeding in coco/perlite?

Calcium=61mg/l
Magnesium=9.8mg/mg

Good luck with that -- I am certainly not the numbers guru. But if you're having a deficiency problem, you might want to post a picture.

looks like the beginnings of a ca deficiency. what is your tap ec?

I have hard water. 250 to 400 ppm depending on time of year.

The only way i have avoided lock out due to salt build up is to flush every 30 days or so.

I veg 4 weeks. Then i "flush" (3.5 gal pot with about 2 to 2.5 gals of RO water). Then after 4 weeks of flower i "flush" again, as above. My strains usually finish in about 8 or 9 weeks so i dont have to flush again.

Also, i feed with nutes twice then the third watering i just use water. So feed-feed-water-feed-feed-water. Works great.

visajoe1 said:

looks like the beginnings of a ca deficiency. what is your tap ec?

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Probably not. He said he has hard water with a ton of calcium. Water might be short on mag...probably not.

I flushed ' the white widow that's in a 2.5gal pot/10litre with 1/4 strength nutes ph to 6.0 until the runoff was good, then I gave a small amount of magnacal+ from plant magic at 1/2ml with a 3/4 strength nutes & 1/8 empsm for a EC of 1.5 phe'd to 6.2 to help with mag uptake.
Plants look better now, I'm a newbie to coCo and I'm just finding my feet. I'm realizimg now that coco/perlite needs a higher level of feeding than what I'm used to with soil?

Why did you flush them in the first place?
If you're just growing in standard soil bought somewhere and supplying mineralic nutrients then there won't be much microlife in the bucks at all and once the time-released pre-nuts are drained a plant in such soil will need the same amount of nutes than coco. To my experience coco bucks have to be watered more often than soil, coco can't hold that much water. But that doesn't mean you'll have to give them more fertilizer.