HELP! Q pls! Final pH for foliar-spray application of AllPerPlus Organic Leaf Wash Powder?

[KeyLimePie]

Hi all

I have a question, please - one which is driving me bat-shit-crazy trying to research and figure out!

What should the final pH for a mixture of AllPerPlus Organic Leaf Wash Powder be? (I mainly want to know for when using as a foliar-spray application)

For those not familiar with this particular product but might know the principles in question in general, it is a mixture of some essential oils (clove oil, geraniol, and rosemary oil, along with quillaja saponin) and its indended purpose is as an insecticide and fungicide.

The pH of everyone's water will be different to start with, so once the AllPerPlus (or these type of ingredients) has been added and mixed into the water, what should it be pH'd to for optimum performance, for both a foliar spray and for a soil drench, please? Or, put another way, should I pH my water to a certain pH before adding the AllPerPlus powder and then use it like that, at whatever it might change the pH to, without any further adjusting? And if so, then what should my starting water be pH'd to?

I can't seem to find this anywhere online or on the manufacturer's site (and I have written to them to ask them personally but have not heard anything back as yet) so was hoping you guys would be able to advise me.

Thanks very much and looking forward to hearing!

My kind regards and best wishes to you all,

KeyLimePie xxx

[Gingerbeard]

Y'know, the wheel was not the great invention. The axle was the great invention. Without an axel, a wheel ain't nothing but a circle.

[Rwise]

Can one call those plastic pieces they put on the front and back of today's autos, a bumper, or is it just trim.

[Ckbrew]

They are just dressing trim. Remember when bumpers were required to withstand a 5 mph impact with no damage? Those were real bumpers, gas shocks behind them and structure you could tow a trailer with.

[Rwise]

At 5mph they fall off when hit, and cost way more to replace.

[Gingerbeard]

Y'know, Little Boy did not end WWII. The Japs in charge were still willing to sacrifice everyone to defend the island. Bunch of 'em thought, 'Meh. They have one. Probably not two." It wasn't until Fat Man blew up that the emperor told his people to cool it.
Nor was Little Boy the first atomic bomb. It was the second. LB was merely the first atomic bomb to be dropped in war. The Trinity Bomb was the first.

[Gingerbeard]

AI is not emerging technology. Humans are emerging apes who are being led to oblivion.
AI has been around since cave people. It has only just given us the tools to allow us to give rise to the machines.

[Gingerbeard]

Click me, please!

[Gingerbeard]

Click me, please!

[Gingerbeard]

Does this look like a bug bite or zit?

[KeyLimePie]

That's kind of like playing "I Spy" over the internet or on the phone! Depends on what you're looking at. Can you send a photo? Actually, that was a rhetorical question - without being a proper rhetorical question because I can't think of the proper word or term for it right now - coz I definitely don't want to see a photo.. Or, well, actually, maybe. Up to you. But my best first guess (considering the vagaries of what I have to work with): It looks like a praying mantis to me. Either that or the dominant species of that red dwarf planet up there, being two clicks to the left of that, just like yours is here, but up there.

[Bluey]

Depends.

Front of leaf or back of leaf foliar spray?

[KeyLimePie]

Greetings, Bluey
At the risk of offending you - which, please, sir or madam, I truly wish not to do - I don't know if you're taking the piss or actually being serious here.
So far, everyone has responded along the vein of the former, so I shall take yours as the first glimmer of a turning point and treat your answer in a serious light.
Both the tops and the undersides of the leaves, dude I am in particular trying to fight a battle with powdery mildew, so will be spraying the tops and undersides of the leaves, the stems, all the little crevices, just everywhere everywhere - and I'm in flower, so the buds as well.
But seriously? Would it make a difference? (tongue-in-cheek emoji)

[Rwise]

But it is not a foliar spray its bug killer, not on my plants!

[Rootsruler]

All foliar sprays should pH at 5.7

[Rwise]

But it is not a foliar spray its bug killer,

[Gingerbeard]

Geez! I'm going to have to try harder. This is an advertisement, folks.
Sigh... I was having fun. Especially that wheel/axel bit.
Throwing the flag. I have to stop others from falling into the trap.

[Gingerbeard]

My bad. I didn't see how stupid you were being.

[Rwise]

yep its an add for bug spray.

[KeyLimePie]

Greetings again, Gingerbeard What if I was actually trying to advertise my homemade key lime pie? But sadly everyone just fixated on the All Per Plus and thought I was trying to sell that? You say you feel the need to stop others from falling into the trap. Well, that's actually very noble and cool of you. But are you not yourself sitting with your foot stuck in the trap of presumption? How does one prove that one's question is a sincere one and not an advert for the product in question? Should I have just outright said, "Key lime pie, anyone? Tastes so nice. Very good price."
So yes, it was neither. But I COULD make it into an "advert". I'd actually rather like to. Because it's a very good product for so many amazing reasons. And I would love to share those reasons with fellow growers who don't know about it for them to consider and maybe try it, as I am so happy and grateful myself to have come across it - after much trial and error with other products beforehand, I must add. But I fear that if I do expound on its many glorious and wonderful virtues then that might make someone such as yourself say, see, she really was actually trying to advertise the product. So I find myself in a bit of a "welcome to You Can't Win" situation now, sadly. And I still don't know what to make my friggen pH to! Sigh. (winky smiley face emoji wiith heart and rainbow eyes)

[Rootsruler]

ANYTHING you spray topically on your plant is a foliar spray. Anything topically applied should be pHed at 5.7

[Rwise]

Doesn't change the fact that this is an add. And you are the first I have seen say that sprays should be PHed, nor have I ever done it.

[Rwise]

Also OP has not been back

[Bluey]

Rootsruler what is your source for that information? Why does the pH at the leaf have to be 5.7? Shouldn't it be closer to neutral which is 7?

I've read info from only two foliar spray manufacturers and they have both stated "should be neutral."

[KeyLimePie]

But it is not a foliar spray its bug killer, not on my plants!

Hi Rwise So if you get bugs on your plants you just leave them? Or do you use friendly bugs to eat the bad bugs? That makes the friendly bugs also bug killers, dunnit? We all gotta use summin if we get summin, right? Coz we love our green babies so much and need them to thrive, no matter what it takes. I am of the ilk that wants to use something to kill (or prevent) the something but for that something to not harm anything or anyone else in the process. You keep calling this a bug killer! Maybe you should actually look it up online. It's made out of essential oils from other plants, dude! That's all it's got in it, plus some soap-type substance which also comes from a plant. Yes, one of the things it does its it kills or deters bugs, and mildews and fungis etc. But that's why I love this product in question so much, am so delighted-happy to have come across it, because, A, it doesn't harm beneficial microbes in the soil, B, it's biodegradable, C, it's pet and human friendly, bees, etc, the whole bang shoot (earthworms too as far as I've been experimenting, whoop hallelujah and major blessings), and you can use it from seedling right through to harvest, so you can practically smoke it, in other words. Golly, this is going to get me into trouble. But anyway, I've said it. It ticks all my boxes.; Excepting for: no mention of what to make the damn pH!

[Rwise]

Me Myself and I find cutting WPM out works the best

[Bluey]

I'm with you Rwise re the scissors but as you know it often catches back up if you can't get the RH down.

[Rwise]

In that case air flow through the plant is critical Bluey I grow in Mother natures room and she determines the RH, and temp etc..

[KeyLimePie]

All foliar sprays should pH at 5.7

Ahoi, Rootsruler! Ah! Finally! THANK YOU! A serious answer! (Even though the rest has been fun and interesting.)
Yes, what is your source for that info, that ALL foliar sprays should pH at 5.7? And that's a serious question, please. This was my genuine original question, and I am REALLY wanting to learn and know.
I am a first-time grower - started near the end of April this year (April being the second month of Autumn in my part of the world - we're almost through the worst of winter now - officialy 11 days into Spring, even though it's still cold). So pretty much everything has been a case of research, trial and error, trial and error, and slowly making progress in the right direction.
And my first main big problem has been powdery mildew (PM). And what doesn't help in my country is that we have something called Load Shedding, where we have times during the day and night, never the same times each 24-hour cycle, where our power is off for 2 (and sometimes 4) hours at a time, two or three times per day. Yes, fun and games. And I'm a small-scale home-grower on a small budget - no big power-backup systems for me. So when the power goes off, my inline fans, ciculation fans, heaters and lights all go off.
I bought LED rechargable lanterns to stand in for my lights, butt my first errir was neglecting to consider or realise that I desperately also needed some kind of backup circulation fans for my tents during these power-out times. So when my HPS and MH lights and inline fans are off my humidty shoots right up, temperatures drop, and there's no extraction. I eventually clicked and made a plan with USB fans to run off the rechargeable lantern ports, so thatt has helped (and have rechargeable oscillating fans coming soon) but I am still fighting the PM.
I tried two other products before this current one. The first one wasn't strong enough, the second didn't do a really good job, even though it gets such good reviews and is one most commonly used by so many gardeners and growers, and then I stumbled upon this latest product, that I am so happy with, and my ladies seem to love it, and it does a really good job with the PM, but would just like to make sure I'm using it right to get optimum performance from it and so it doesn't possibly hurt or damage my plants by using it incorreclty.
Which is why I am so surprised that the label (or website) doesn't mention what to pH it at. So one can, I suppose, only presume to pH one's water to what one would maybe pH one's irrigation water to , add the product and then use as it comes out? Or what? I could go in circles with what one's supposed to presume one should do.
For example, when I was trying potassium bicarbonate and an emulsifying, surfacant agent, it shot the pH of my water up to +-8.3. I was most alarmed, immediately got on the line with my grow-shop dude, who told me, no, it needs to be at that high of a pH for it to work, it needs to change the pH on the surface of the leaves to kill the PM, and to leave it like that and use! And hey, my plants were okay with it! So that was interesting.
Then, with another product, my pH came out at 3.8, so I tried it on just one plant, and hey, my plants were okay with that. So. Interesting.
When I used the All Per Plus last, the recent batch I made of it, I pH'd it to 6.5, just to use a sort of common-ground number, and the plants were happy. So, well, ya. I'd just like to know what it works its best at, you know.
I have read that the leaves absorb and assimilate different nutrients better at certain pH's and for a pesticide or fungicide at an even different pH. (And every site or article or forum answer by a grower says something slightly different - or vastly different. Which confuses matters immensely.)
So wondered what it should be for a product that contains essential oils. That's all.
I wonder why the manufacturer of this particular product doesn't state what it should be? We all know the effects of wrong pH on our plants, which is why we go to so much trouble to pH our irrigation or nutrient waters.
The guy at my grow shop didn't know regarding the All Per Plus, and also said he'd write to the supplier to ask, but in the meantime he said he would suppose that the essential oils would do their work regardless of the pH, so at the most just to pH it to neutral, 7 (which is what Bluey ending up also saying in one of his last comments in this thread) and before adding the product, which brings it down by about 1.0, which would make it about 6. So. Hmm. I don't know. I'd love to know! Feel desperate to know!
Oh well, hey ho, I gotta go.
Love and light, peace out
Best wishes and kind regards to all
Key Lime Pie

[Rootsruler]

Marijuana Foliar Spray Insider Tips & Tactics (bigbudsmag.com)

Use the Proper pH, PPM, and Temperature: For maximum efficiency and for deterring leaf problems, your marijuana foliar spray should be pH 5.7. Don’t go higher than 220 parts per million.

Ensure the marijuana foliar spray water is between 70-75 degrees Fahrenheit.

4 Reasons PH Levels Matter in Spray Solutions- Taurus Ag

Tips for managing pH levels in your spray solutions.


As you can see, pH plays an important role in the performance of your spray solutions. To summarize:

• As a general practice, spray solutions work best in an acidic solution (pH 4.0 – 6.0).
• Pesticides are most effective at a pH of 6.0 or below.
• Phosphate is absorbed best at a pH slightly below 4.0.
• Most spray products become more soluble as pH decreases.
• Extremely high or low pH levels can cause leaf burn.
• Spray solutions should not be acidified if they contain lime, lime sulfur, or fixed copper products, carbonate, hydride.
• Acid spray solutions help control certain fungi and may be a factor in maintaining populations of some beneficial insects.

A quick google of "foliar spray pH for marijuana" should yield you all the confirmation you need......

[KeyLimePie]

Awesome! Thank you SO much!