Anyone wana take the 'Evian Challange' with me?

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
Water falls as rain, it is a vacum in this pure state, on the way down to earth it absorbs carbon from the atmosphere due to its vacumous state. This carbon in the water forms carbonic acid and lowers the pH of rain water to about 6.5 or mildly acidic. When it reaches the ground it flows over various rock and mineral deposits and being an acid dissolves some of them into solution, calcium and magnesium are the main ones although sodium and potassium are also present normally. These calcium and magnesium deposits are generally calcium carbonate or sodium bicarbonate hence why you get bicarbonates and carbonates in the mineral water. As we all know calcium and magnesium are alkaline ions and hence the buffering effect against the acidic hydrogen ions in the soil. As far as i understand it anyway. Peace
 

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
How about determining you have a cal/mag problem when your plant shows you it has a cal/mag problem?

Refer to this chart, never fails to diagnose -

View attachment 1733560

Calcium on the left and mag right. Calcium is passive which means it is directly related to the amount of water a plant drinks, not all cal/mag deficiences call for call mag, it may simply need more ferts or not be drinking much water due to too hot or cold conditions or too high humidity. Generally a cal/mag supplement will work for healthy plants.

Determin the ppm of your water, you want it to be inbetween 100 to 200 ppm for the sweet spot adding more cal/mag if the plant shows deficiency like at the onset of flowering.

House and garden nutrients for soil say they will work with pure or RO water as they have a very high cal/mag percentage. There are a lot of variables with calcium and magnesium, fulvic acid helps calcium be absorbed actively through the xylem not phloem so may help a lot as well. Unfortunatly i do not know everything but what i do know seems to help a great deal. Peace
 
im in but how would u bring down the ph in it ??...asking this because ive only grown 2 times so im a noobie lol..................OR do u even need to bring it down O_O?
 

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
im in but how would u bring down the ph in it ??...asking this because ive only grown 2 times so im a noobie lol..................OR do u even need to bring it down O_O?
Yo dude, i finished my Evian days now and getting 'Sensi Cal Mg', gona try run the bloom cal/mag for the veg too and see how that goes. The thread was directly aimed at calcium and magnesium in water, my water being too soft and 40ppm is closer to reverse osmosis water than what plants like. Water is an essential carrier of calcium and magnesium for plants.

Now if your plants are cal mag deficient you need cal/mag in either supplements/fertilizer or the tap water to begin with. Mineral water has ingredients printed on the back and will show the parts per million of the calcium and magnesium as well as whatever else is in it. Evian just seemed the best although i did dillute it down to 200ppm from the original 309ppm which is what it is straight out of the bottle.

From what i can see the more bicarbonates in the water the higher the pH, evian sits at pH7.2 and i never adjusted pH although it is not a problem i have, Ph, and a lot of myth and bad information surrounding it. Ph down acid will neutralise the bicarbonates (bicarbonates generally being alkaline as they are joined with the calcium and magnesium in the water.

If your having problems with your tap water (a lot dont just mine is soft water!) then mineral water could be your saviour till you get a dedicated cal/mag supplement. Evian being the best i have found.

I could write an essay on the subject, not small and very very complicated, so i cant try to tell you everything i know or think i know and urge you to take it upon yourself to check your water, if you dont have a digital ppm reader just knowing wether it is soft water or hard water will suffice. Theres too much to explain but read the thread and you'll pick up some and also there is a wicked thread on water called 'Water the most essential element' in the general forum as a sticky, check this out to start learning, a great water scientist wrote it and tells the truth about water for beginners.

Now the point of the thread was to determin if Evian stops cal/mag deficiencies from happening. Check it out yourself by running one plant of your grow for two weeks and see if there is a change for the better, if so cal/mag is probably part of the problem/

Ask me more questions here, i will try to help, but new growers seem to have more problems than just cal/mag so bear this in mind if you do use Evian, dont be getting back to me saying Evian killed my plants cause it simply dosent. Could be you already have enough cal/mag in your ferts or water or soil already, how would i know what variables your grow runs with so on your own head be it but certainly at the very least research your and water in general, know that it contains most of the calcium and magnesium your plants need, bicarbonates buffer the soil pH, too many built up in the soil and it will turn from acid to alkaline, the right amount and your soil keeps its pH for a very long time balancing the acidic effects of peat and ferts etc etc. Most chemical ferts or in-organic ferts list calcium and magnesium so check the label of your ferts. Even more complicated than this is the ratio that plants like cal/mag generally anywhere from 5:1 to 3:1 calcium to magnesium and i see levels such as 25 magnesium to 75 calcium to be about the average for a lot of strains. You may need to top up the mag yourself now and again as plants consume more as they start to flower and at the end of flower as they start to ripen.

Seriously dude read up about cal/mag and water, work out what yours is and go from there, i got into deep and now its all a little scientific, aint no easy answer for me to give you any more except if it aint broke dont fix it!lol!

Seriously best of luck and get back to me, im always open to discuss this subject, cant grow your plants for you but i could talk about water and cal/mag if you wanted. Peace
 

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
sounds like someone has stock in evian!
I did but ive just cashed them in and bought shares in 'Sensi Cal Mg' for the flowering period, they also run a dedicated cal/mag supplement for the veg period too, i am not buying two cal/mag supplement if i can just use the one, seriously these guys are good but i think they want a lot of money in return for my plants being happy.

I would never shamelessly plug Evian, the water that nature intended you to drink and cheap as chips!lol! but it was the best out of about 50 i have available to me so it got the advertising time!lol!

So i see most chemical ferts seem to contain enough cal/mag for your plants. 'House and Garden Nutrients' have so much in they require you to start with reverse osmosis water and not tap water!!!!!

Anyway its a crazy world out there far from the confines of my little safe grow room, cal/mag is a big variable for a lot of grows and i bet a lot of growers never realised that some gardeners in the field of excellence disagree with the NPK way of depicting the three most important ferts, they argue that Calcium is more important than Potassium and use instead of the NPK ratios an NPCAK ratio and frown on us NPK people.

Peace
 

beginner.legal.growop

Well-Known Member
Seeing all the different things I have, I personally believe you can never know exactly whats wrong with a plant... unless you ask the plant directly. I believe this because most of the deficiencies look so much a like it might be hard to always tell. This is just my opinion. Im not doubting what you are saying either.
 

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
Seeing all the different things I have, I personally believe you can never know exactly whats wrong with a plant... unless you ask the plant directly. I believe this because most of the deficiencies look so much a like it might be hard to always tell. This is just my opinion. Im not doubting what you are saying either.
Doubt away dude thats the way to learn.

Yer it can be hard to spot a deficiency dude, i hear you, if more than one deficiency presents itself then it can be even harder and sometimes impossible to know. My cal/mag chart is good though and spot on for calmag, look again at the chart and your plants...... The best way to understand what your plant is trying to tell you is by looking at all the variables first, are you suppling all the major and minor nutes, remember that calcium on its own is as important as notrogen phosphorous and potassium and magnesium is directly linked to calcium.

Anyway if your having problems post some pics and give some details. Peace
 

ireeman

Member
Sorry for the late reply, i am still using Volvic and compared to the plant that i have not used it on there is a considerable size difference! i only water once a week with volvic (sometimes two) and am very happy with the results so its still all going well and i`m glad i used it now. I am currently using biobizz- bio grow, bio bloom, top max as well as fish blood and bone. Well i guess next time maybe i can use Evian and you use Volvic... unless the bank manager refuses us a loan again :P lol

ps.. i agree with the NPK and Calcium being just as important as one another :)
 

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
Glad to hear that Volvic also gives great results. Water quality and dissolved solids can be a bit up and down in the UK, my water is too soft whereas some might be too hard. On top of this Biobizz seems to have very little in the way of calcium for quick release to the plants i grow, mineral water dose make one hell of a difference to me too so much so that i now run the Sensi cal/mag supplements with my tap water.

If i had not had a second quality of water to base against my tap water i would probably still be stuck wondering what is wrong with my tap water, now i know it lacks cal/mag so i supplement and all is sweet.

Am i the only one who finds mineral water quite cheap in my local store? I can buy 18litres of Evian for under 4 pounds and dont find this exspensive for 15 plants in small pots. As i said the mineral water was just a quick fix till i got some cal/mag and now i just use supplemented water out of the tap. Peace
 

AussieAstronaut

New Member
I only wanted to use Evian because it has Silica. This is like steroids to cannabis. I came here to see what negative side effects the plant has to Evian. Seems there’s a few other posts on burns. But that could be the fact that new growers are adding NPK nutrients to Evian which already has nitrates and in a high number which could toxify and burn a plant
 

PJ Diaz

Well-Known Member
I only wanted to use Evian because it has Silica. This is like steroids to cannabis. I came here to see what negative side effects the plant has to Evian. Seems there’s a few other posts on burns. But that could be the fact that new growers are adding NPK nutrients to Evian which already has nitrates and in a high number which could toxify and burn a plant
It would be a better value to buy quality silica than to buy Evian.
 
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