Share The Seeds
Gardening Area => Growing questions and answers => Topic started by: New Wisdom on May 27, 2015, 12:15:11 AM
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WARNING!!!!!
If I told any of you to put 2 tablespoons of distilled vinegar per gallon in your water then STOP DOING IT!!!! My plants have been on decline for a while. It took a while after I started using the vinegar to take effect. Anyways I had no clue why it was happening. My pereskiopsis were loosing leaves and had a slow growth rate. I had skinnier branches and the color was off.
I got discouraged because I couldn't figure it out and started to get lazy. I stopped using vinegar in the water about a month ago. Well after about a month all my plants are doing 50 times better since I stopped the vinegar. I think it was somehow building up in the plants and really screwing with things. Anyways. I think it can be helpful if you use 1 teaspoon per gallon once or twice a month, but 2tbls/gallon every watering is too much.
Sorry if I told you to do this, but I reccomend you stop now if I did!!
Sorry!
New Wisdom
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Try apple cider vinegar instead. Distilled vinegar has been used as an herbicide
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What happens is you are lowering the pH of the soil and when lowered too much the plants cant absorb nutrients unless it's a plant that like low pH which most plants dont.
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Yeah. I have heard from lots of people that when using tap water putting vinegar in it helps stop salts from building up in the soil. Which actually is a good thing, but using too much will hurt your plants more than help I have learned. I think once a month with a small amount would be good for it. Or even just flushing pots with distilled or rain water.
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I think you can use dish soap too. Top watering usually prevents build up of salts
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New wisdom
Did you check pH of your water before and after adding vinegar ? Cause, if you drop too much the pH it, of course, lead to problem.
I'm concerned cause i have to lower a lot my water pH (8,8 where i live).
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I did not. I definitely should have. My plants really love the rain water which is supposedly a bit more acidic than tap water. I'll have to check the PH of the tap and rain water and figure something out.
And idk about dish soap. That seems a bit sketchy. Would raise the PH quite a bit and leave behind residue wouldn't it?
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Rain water is the best ! But as you i guess, here rains are quite rare.
As a cacti lover, i think you could be interested by this document (http://ralph.cs.cf.ac.uk/cacti/Cactus%20and%20Alkalinity.pdf) if you don't know it yet.
It made me understand lots of thing about water pH
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Yep. It only rains like 2-4 times here during the summer. Rains a lot in spring though. I haven't seen that document before. I'll have to read it when I get home from work.