Using well water

[Gustave]

Hi fellow members,

Future grower from Quebec, Canada, here.

I am planning to build a grow room using 16 hydro tubs of 5 gallons each. My source of water is a well. It is hard water that I have to send through a filter system with a UV lamp or something and a special membrane to get rid of bacteria and other bad stuff . I am not familiar with this system since I moved from the city to the contryside recently.

After being filtered the water is softened in a reservoir with salt pellets. I have a faucet between the pump and the filter system so I can use unfiltered water.

Can I use unfiltered water ? Or should I find a way to put an other faucet between the filter system and the salt reservoir giving me the possibility to use filtered but not softened water ?

[Farmall]

More importantly will be the pH of the well. Mine is around 8.3 so it is alkaline and I too use a softener for iron taste and a UV sterilizer for bacteria. I have raised plants both indoors and out, saltwater fish and weed. Neither seems to be affected by the treated softened water. I have a faucet at the pressure tank and comparatively the water tastes a little rusty some days and can have a slightly orange tint from iron. I think the softener is 48,000 grains? If I were to have trouble, I’d only suspect ph though

[SoOrbudgal]

Our household is on well and have similar as Farmall. Same here with the faucet at the pressure tank we have old iron pipes.

[Gustave]

Thanks Farmall,

So the ph is the key here. I have read somewhere that softened water was bad for cannabis because of the sodium used, but it is good to know that You don't have problem with that.

[Rwise]

Most water has some salt in it,,,, the wells here first thing would be to test the water. I have 4 wells that are not used, 1 has bacterial sulfur (this well has an 8 inch casing, was poked some 5000 feet deep, plugged (cedar) at 450 feet produces more water than can be pumped), 1 was good water but produced little (shallow well, during wet periods water flows out the top), 1 the water is orange most of the year (shallow, water flows out during wet periods, the last well is a deep well, was good water did not produce a lot (I am restoring this one.
There are many wells near me with a vast mix of water quality, one was told do not use it, fill it with concrete. One behind me cleans aluminum to a shin just spraying it on, in a fish tank the fish were almost double size, but not healthy. Another had so much salt if you washed a black car it would be white. There's many more here within 2000 feet of me, all I am saying is test often, you dont know whats been injected in the ground that can harm your water and mine!

[Farmall]

True.... I test my water for the list of carcinogenic compounds every 5 years. It runs about $270 us Has a touch of manganese but nothing outside of potable acceptance. Also check your total dissolved solids. A TDS meter is cheap and fairly accurate and can be used regularly if your mixing nutrients. My baseline TDS is about 65. When I was mixing nutrient solutions for a hydro grow it would be up to 1100 at times with the fertilizers mixed in. If your plain water is high tds, you can add a sediment filter. I use two. One is 50 micron and washable called a spin down and the other is a 4.5”x10 10 micron with carbon. When the water has a stronger yellow orange tint, these filter would never let it show..crystal clear.

the filters are placed between the pressure tank and the water softener. You could also look into a chlorine injector. It squirts a very tiny bit of bleach into the water to kill bacteria and the carbon block removes the bleach after it does its job. Of course your UV does this also.

[Rwise]

With all the high pressure injection wells here in OK, I would have to test more often, I dont trust them!
A chlorine injector is the answer to the sulfur well as it changes the bacterial sulfur to (IIRC) biological sulfur, anyway it can be settled or filter out. (the sulfur can then be used in the garden)
A home test for this is to run it through copper tubing, if it has bacterial sulfur the water will look like piss! (thats how we found it in the 60's)

[SoOrbudgal]

We also take samples to local co-op for testing

[Gustave]

Thank You all for your input. I will have my well tested. That way I will know with type off water I have to deal