SOIL Does pH adjusted water need continued adjustment?

[AccidentalGardener]

Have a question for the GWE scientists:
Once a container of plain water has been pH adjusted with pH UP-DOWN, does it maintain the pH it was adjusted to?
Do I have to retest/readjust the water each time I use it?

My water is in a 5-gallon bucket that my kids tote for me. Plenty for watering a couple times, so it sits. Our tap water is in the blue-green realm, so I pH Down every new bucket to greenish-yellow. The cover is loose-fitting on purpose. I let it degas for a while since I can smell the chlorine with my bare nose.

A pH problem appears to have cropped up. Trying to find and fix the start of it instead of trying to stop it at the back end.
I must have cut class the day we covered pH in whatever grade we covered it.

HALP.

[Cali]

I would check the ph any time before watering plus you have to check the run off. Honestly to me it’s a lot of unnecessary work that’s why I just grow in living soil. All I have to do is add water no ph or none of the extras that come with using bottled nutrients. It’s the best way to grow when you have a life and don’t want to waste time chasing your tail trying to figure out a PH issue or something like that.

[AccidentalGardener]

I get all of that. That is why I asked my question the way I did. I gotta do things the way I'm doing them. Do you have an answer to the question I asked?

[D.A.A.S.69]

In soil you want between 6.0-7.0ph.
Letting it sit around like you are doing, an like I do, it might change a tenth of a point, but not much, not enough to cause any problems.
No need to check soil run off, you will catch hell trying to get it back in the right zone,
Coco is different, you definitely want to check your runoff in coco.much easier an a hellava lot less use of water, if you have to flush.
Dude above is right, if you dont ever want problems, try living soil, thats what I use too.
HappyGrowing

[Cali]

AccidentalGardener yes I believe I answered your question first? I said i would check the ph always before watering my plants. Also checking run off is recommended as per GWE tutorials. From my experience the ph will change a bit. Maybe not enough to disturb the plants as nutrients are taken in by plants at different ph levels. That what I remember. About the living soils it’s just a suggestion and my opinion on what is Reilly growing wee easy that’s all. Hope I helped you that was my only intention.

[AccidentalGardener]

Sorry I'm cranky. I can't exactly pull these plants up and change dirt. I adjust the water before I use it. DAAS69 answered the question I had about the pH changing in water once it has already been adjusted to where it needs to be.
I have a tent full of autos and a problem I've not encountered before. Runoff was fine. May have a nutrient situation if it's not a pH issue.
Trying to triage.

[Xena]

Sorry to hear about your problem. I adjust with citric acid and after it sets for a while (over 3-4 days) I recheck it and about half the time it needs taken down a smidge.

[AccidentalGardener]

Thanks hun. I always have to use pH down. The tap here is gross; I won't drink it unfiltered. To be honest, I wouldn't put it on living dirt, lol. I'm safer with dead dirt. Small grow; 5 gallons of water lasts a 3-5 days. Won't be an issue in a month unless I kill these plants :P

[9fingerleafs]

i like that you are trying to understand and not just follow directions, so here is my attempt to explain ph: skipping the actual definition, the way ph is measured is thru a balance between the positive and negative (hydrogen)particles floating around in liquids ready to find an opposite charged particle to interact with. this is important because its not only the negative to positive ratio but the actual amount of particles that come into play when trying to understand the practical implications of how ph behaves.

every single thing you put into the solution: gas solids or liquids will introduce a new range of free charged particles that will alter the ph balance, oxygen brings the ph up, carbon dioxide brings it down, most nutrients are acidic but calcium nitrate (calmag) and other minerals are alkaline.

the key to understanding ph is that ppm is as important as the ph value itself. ro water has a very volatile ph because it has nothing in it so any gas exchange will mess with the ph, hard well water has a very stable ph because its loaded with salts that act as a buffer for the gas exchange. this means the higher the ppm the more stable the ph of the solution

now imagine two different solutions;
one with 10 negative ions and 100 positive, being a 10 to 1 ratio means the ph would be 8
the second one has 100 negative ions and 1000 positive ones, also a 10 to 1 ratio and the ph would also be 8
but what would happen if we add 100 negative ions to each solution;
the first one would have 110 negative and 100 positive changing the ratio to pretty close to 1 to 1 bringing the ph down to 7
the second one would have 200 negative and 1000 positive with a ratio 5 to 1 bringing the ph down to 7.5

this are made up numbers, the real numbers behave just like that with a ton of more ceros, each ph point is then times more (acidic or alkaline) that the previous value: 6 is ten times more acidic than 7 and 5 is ten times more acidic than 6 and 100 times than 7 and so on.

so finally if you want some practical ways to exploit this to your benefit id suggest dissolving some acidic salt that will 1) benefit your plant because its a nutrient, 2) lower ph to the desired value because it going to be acidic 3) provide enough ppms to buffer any environmental factor that could mess with your ph

i love monopotassium phosphate (mkp for short) but may be too much for veg so i would use potassium nitrate for soil grows. minimum quantities just enough to raise the ppm of your water enough to drop ph to 6.5 and provide ph stability, maybe 50 or 100 ppms, youd have to try to figure out exaclty how much. another thing you can do is take a small jar or something to scoop some water from the bucket and pour back from 2 to 3 feet high over and over for a minute or two to aerate and dissolve oxygen back into your water, bringing the ph drift caused by carbon dioxide back in place.

hope this helps you understand why some water needs constant adjustment and others can be pretty stable, its the ppm

[AccidentalGardener]

I guess I will do some experiments to determine stability in my particular water. I do check ph going in, whether its plain water or a batch of nutrients, but this makes my understanding much better. I think, lol. I can certainly aerate the water!

[dilvish]

Test strips can be misleading so it might be wise to invest in a small ph meter instead just to be sure. You can get a decent one for about $10.
Another alternative is to try rainwater or melted snow instead. Definitely let it sit in the open for several hours to dissipate the chlorine, then do the test. Also remember that adding nutrients to the water also changes the PH level so test after they have been added/mixed and then add the PH Up/Down solution if required.
Take some decent pictures of your plants (close up and distanced) for reference and post them. You may be surprised that it is in fact a different issue altogether. Most experienced growers can then see the issue and help diagnose it.

[Cali]

Damn still sounds like to much work for something as simple as PH. Glad I just let the plant figure out what it needs on its own. With so much to do around the house having to worry about chemical imbalances I create my self is the last thing I’d want to be doing. Time is Money.

[AccidentalGardener]

Weed is also money. If I can't grow it, I gotta spend money on it. It isn't usually this much trouble, which is why I am alarmed. Also have a new light which I underestimated. the culprit is the mars hydro tsw2000 turned up all the way :/

[AccidentalGardener]

I believe the issue is resolved. It was the light. Autos were growing faster than I was raising the light. I'm learning. I know you guys are trying to help. I am trying to help myself because newbs who want everyone to do it for them without trying first are annoying AF. I did a little looking at GWE about living/super soil, and it doesn't look like something I am in a position to do with at this time. I have a GH ph kit that I use religiously to test everything that goes in before it goes in. I use pH UP and DOWN. In reality, I wanted to make sure I was doing everything right in the pH department, which I am. Its organic soil that I am trying to keep that way. If I seemed ungrateful, I apologize. I'm triaging a dying fur baby, a dead phone and this is now at the bottom of my pile. I can grow a new plant.
Thank you.

[Xena]

Sounds like you have your plate full right now but when you get some time in the future look up Earth Dust and Nature’s Living Soil, both are dry amendments to make living soil, the NLS looked the easiest, one thing only to use, the ED is two different one to amend for grow and then top dress two times with the bloom when in flower.
I personally will be trying the ED when my current soil is used up, I’m saving the used soil to amend it, I would have went with the NLS except right on their site is a video with a guy talking about how bad it smells and since I grow in my bedroom I didn’t want that.

Hope things get better for you soon.

[Cali]

AccidentalGardener you are right about new growers. Also a new light will catch you off guard I had the same happen to me in my small 2x2 tent but my light is a small HLG 100. I had only used hps before so I wasn’t used to the fact that this light had to be way higher than usual it replaced a 150 watt hps. Now I’m looking to replace my 600watt hps with a big HLG. Glad you dialed in the issue. To be honest living soils are easy when things are going good like everything else, you just have to make sure you have an IPM and stay on top of it weekly because pests are a major issue when using this style of grow thankfully I’ve only had thrips when I first started (knock on wood) but since then it’s been great. Now without me doing anything there are beneficial insects that somehow found their way into my garden which is great cus I’m in flowering so I don’t have to worry about pests.

[AccidentalGardener]

I had an actual spider that made it into the last grow. Magic. I'm new at pot, old at everything else. Usually use The Force, so living soil is probably the way to go. I'm just gonna have to get some help going there. Thanks for putting up with me.