ok chloramine may not be the devil but it is an archdemon when it comes to ph and soil anyway.
i had 4 jugs of water one straight tap, one filtered and ph adjusted to 6.5, one non filtered but adjusted to 6.5, and one non filtered and adjusted to 10.
i had 4 containers of ffof no plants and 4 ffof with seedlings.
everyday i checked the ph on the water and everytime i watered the plants i checked the runoffs including the pots without plants.
jug of straight tap, ph gradually lowered but never below 8. filtered and ph'd to 6.5 jug climbed the upper 8's. non filtered 6.5 climbed back up but not as fast and not as high. non filtered 10 ph stayed about the same.
run offs for straight tap were around 5.6-5.8 in both pots with a plant and without. the filtered 6.5 runoffs were in the 7' at first and jumped up to mid/upper 8's over time in both. the non filtered 6.5 runoffs were both in the low 4's.
the non filtered 10 runoffs were both 6.5-6.8. the plant in the ph 10 and oddly enough the straight tap(soil turned toxic ec was at 6 or so) plant survived. the plant in the toxic soil is severely stunted and is sorta like bonzai the other is super healthy by comparison. the best i can come up with is when you filter the water it breaks some of the chloramine bonds and leaves the ammonia and chlorine both in the 11's for ph behind. why it behaves the way it does in the soil i can only attribute to some reaction between the chemical content in the soil and the chloramine or the byproduct from filtering. either way its a pain in the sack. i would never have guessed i need to raise the ph when it comes in at 9.3 to begin with. the meter is a good one, i calibrated it over and over thinking i was insane but it is right on the money. the other factor is the seed is from northern mexico, thats the only thing i know for sure. that and the soil in northern mexico can be very alkaline. it sounds crazy i know but the proof is in the plants. the 2 here are the high ph and toxic tap water. on my current grow(since i figured it out) i have been using non filtered ph adjusted to 10 water with a little calmag and ff big bloom(more recently) 2 out of them have recovered pretty much all the way and 2 seems to be taking longer but are getting there. all this adds up to in my case is a good argument for some sort of hydro. the pic of the little plant came out crappy but then it is a crappy little plant
Mal420xl Reviewed by Mal420xl on . chloramine is the devil bobby boucher!!!!! sorry about the waterboy reference but it makes sense kinda. after 30 some odd seedlings and mountains of reading and tearing my hair out i might have actually figured this out.. maybe. every seedling i have started and yeah it is really around 30 or so since early november has developed yellowing and rapid chlorotic/necrotic leaves within 2 - 3 weeks ultimately killing them all. No matter what i try the perk up and then get worse and die off. always showing signs of some kind of Rating: 5