Phosphite: What companies aren't telling you

[grapeman]

More importantly your water supply is consistent with an EC of 0.02 or even less. Mains water supplies (which have varying ECs from approx 0.3 - the best I've ever seen - to 1.2 or more) are inconsistent and even the same supply changes dramatically over the course of a year (where hardness, alkalinity and macro and micro elements are concerned).

MR

Just so folks understand how water changes throughout a growing season or year, you can check out this site
http://cdec.water.ca.gov/queryQuick.html
Here you can get real time information as to water quality at various check points along several delivery canals as to EC, PH, and about 20 other parameters including some mineral composition.

This allows folks who farm to tweak their fertilizer programs throughout the season.

And even that is not good enough. Aside from this "real time" data, we pay for our own water analysis 3 or 4 times a year to know absolutely the quality at the discharge instead of at the monitoring station 5 miles up the road.

So, as you can see if one is running hydro, RO becomes an important tool as water quality changes during the year due to drawdown on wells during summer months, snow melt or many other factors.

Now that I am playing with soil, my RO machine is by-passed, as my water is good enough for soil and I know what's in it to a large degree.

 

[Shcrews]

i'm a bit confused...

i grow in coco using house&garden a&B, plus AN big bud weeks 2-4 and PURE FLOWERS weeks 5-7

should i replace the PURE FLOWERS with something different? or do i have everything i need with the A&B plus Pure Flowers?

 

[MrFista]

Mullray - when it comes to organic vs chem I'm not looking at plant physiology I'm looking at the environment, screw all the studies from all the scientists who are too well paid to see the deserts in their wake. All of them, fuckwits.

We'll have to agree to disagree that you are being picky. You dropped your original point and picked a new one up. You have an agenda trying to discredit spurr and this is making you look very suspicious in my books, although what your agendas is I'm not sure. Possibly an AN rep or similar.

Your victory then, hydro is different to soil. Oh well done.

"Diplomat", I'm no diplomat.

 

[spurr]

Spurr, I must be missing something. From your post #80 you state "...no one should be using only RO water due to an insufficient level of alkalinity"

Why would I want my water to be alkaline. RO water should be relatively neutral as to pH, no? Is he pH range for cannabis not some what acidic 5.5-6.5 or so?

Thanks for any clarifcation you can provide.

Water alkalinity and alkaline water are not the same thing. The former is in reference to the amount of bicarbonates and carbonates (e.g. Ca and Mg, along with some other less important substances and ions); the latter is in reference to pH of water. The confusion comes from the closeness of the terms (in spelling). High pH water is better termed "basic" than "alkaline" to avoid the confusion between "alkalinity" and "alkaline".

The reason RO water is not a good choice for soil, soilless, and hydro is it has no pH buffering ability (i.e. no ability for acid naturalization). Ideally the level of water alkalinity should be ~40-60 ppm, and for hydro it can be a bit lower, e.g. ~20-60 ppm.

Water with high pH (basic) is not necessary high in alkalinity, but water with high alkalinity (e.g. > 100 ppm) will have basic pH (> 7). Water with sufficient level of alkalinity will have pH ~7. So when we add pH down (if needed after adding ferts) the pH has fewer and less extreme swings downward and upward.

The main reason we want water with sufficient alkalinity in hydro, soil and soilless is to offset the effects acids released by roots; ex., ammoniacal nitrogen (ex. ammonium). When ammonium ions are taken into roots the roots exude (release) H+ protons (acidic ions), thus ammoniacal nitrogen is termed an 'acidic nitrogen'. Also, roots release quite a lot of Co2 into rhizosphere (be in hydro, soil or soilless), and that binds with water (in hydro or the "soil solution") to form carbonic acid (a weak acid). Roots also release citric acid and a few other types of acids into the rhizosphere. Thus, roots tend to lower pH of rhizosphere. In biological organics, bacteria are there to offset the acids and increase pH to keep it in a sufficient range; but in most conventional horticultural systems bacteria do not proliferate.

Nitrate nitrogen, when taken into roots, makes the roots release bicarbonates (basic ions). That is why nitrate nitrogen is termed a 'basic nitrogen'. However, roots exude far more acidic ions than basic ions.

So, when using water with sufficient level of alkalinity we reduce pH swings downward and we do not make pH increase (into basic pH range) because we are not providing too much alkalinity.

When using RO water in hydro, soil or soilless (in conventional horticultural systems, i.e. with fertilizer salts) we need to adjust the pH much more often to try and keep it in the sweet spot of ~5.5-6.2 (for hydro, soil and soilless). That means we will generally end up adding more 'pH up' overtime (dependent on the fertilizers we use in conventional horticulture) when using RO water vs. water with sufficient level of alkalinity.

For those who have hard water (either due to high alkalinity or lots of other ions like Fe, etc.) filtering water through a thick layer of compressed (plain) sphagnum peat moss is a good choice. The S.peat will reduce the alkalinity and hardness without removing so much alkalinity the water has no pH buffering ability (which is the problem with RO water).

The topic of water alkalinity (e.g. acid neutralizing and pH buffering) and pH of water is very well reported and studied for aquaculture of all kinds. Including hydro for terrestrial plants, aquatic plant tanks, fish tanks, coral tanks, along with soil and soilless for plants.

Carl Carlson and myself have written a lot about alkalinity in the past. For some reason Carl Carlson has deleted his account, which is a real shame, he is a great source of sound info. Here is a thread I participated in a while ago on the topic of managing pH in hydro, in it I wrote a lot about water alkalinity:

"ph keeps climing WTF?"
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=194759&highlight=alkalinity
​

FWIW, many hydro growers, especially cananbis growers, use RO because they do not know any better. The big problem with most cannabis growing info is it's not based upon proven science most of the time. Instead it's based upon very faulty claims by so-called gurus like J.Cervantes, E.Rostenthal, etc., and based upon claims from manufactures who are trying to sell us things...like expensive RO units.

Hope that helps explain things for you. Oh yea, in professional greenhouse horticulture with hydro (not for cannabis), use of RO units is not wholly uncommon, but usually RO water is mixed with non-RO water to keep sufficient level of alkalinity.

 

[spurr]

I think the soil - hydro is a lot of the confusion actually.

RO is crap in soil, crap in aquaponics which I do know a little of, and very useful in hydro should you choose that route. Starting with as little as possible in hydro you can tweak your formulas and know exactly what's in them.

RO is also not a good idea for hydro. In terms of 'knowing' what is in the water, that is where water tests come in; but they cost ~$100. If someone is on municipal water source (at least in the US), the water authority by law has to provide water test reports on a continual basses. In those reports one can find the level of hardness (and what ions comprises it) and level of alkalinity, etc.

Mullray - Spurr is extremely well read, and quite pedantic about getting things correct. I am a feckin slob at pulling out references compared to the man so when you say "makes it up" you are incorrect and out of line.

Thank you, that is very true, but, you are far from "a fecking slob"

 

[spurr]

i'm a bit confused...

i grow in coco using house&garden a&B, plus AN big bud weeks 2-4 and PURE FLOWERS weeks 5-7

should i replace the PURE FLOWERS with something different? or do i have everything i need with the A&B plus Pure Flowers?

Yes, drop Pure Flowers, if you want a P boost you can use something else like PK 13/14 (from CANNA or ATAMI); both of which are not derived from from phosphorus acid [1]. That said, a P boost is not needed in pre-flowering with normal cannabis fertilizers. Cannabis (like most other plants) does not need a lot of P , ~40-60 ppm is sufficient all the time. Most growers over-apply P like crazy. Having a high level of P during pre-flowering will make your plants stretch more than not having high level of P and it will reduce root growth (re: "root:shoot" ratio)...

I just noticed you already use AN Big Bud, if so, there is no reason to use another P booster later in flowering. IMO you shouldn't even bother using a P boost at all, but a K boost does help. See the following thread by my buddy Carl for more info about why P boosts are not needed and can do things we don't want (like increase stretch and internodal length). I am uploading a few more papers to the following thread soon:

"Hemp (Cannabis sativa L) tissue nutrient analysis data"
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=181405
​

IMO you should replace AN Big Bud and Pure Flowers with a potassium silicate product like ProTekt. That will give a K boost, which is helpful as a bloom booster (unlike P), and it will give you Si which is a very good thing to add. Si is greatly overlooked by most growers, it offers lots of benefits to plants, and should be considered an essential nutrient.

[1] Claims by one person (ahem, the troll) in this thread that PK 13/14 is made from phosphorous acid are false. There are two brands of PK 13/14, which the troll seems to be ignorant about. The first and most well known is from CANNA, and it is derived (made) from mono-potassium-phosphate (verified via calling the US registrant). The other brand of PK 13/14 is from ATAMI, and it is derived from phosphoric acid and potassium hydroxide (cite). Thus, neither PK 13/14 products are derived from phosphorous acid. In terms of P, as I mentioned a few pages ago, most fertilizers use DAP, MAP or MKP for a P source. None of which are from phosphorus acid and all of which would be better than trying to use Phi as a P source from Pure Flowers.

 

[hiker]

Love to see people talking about using Si, now there is a very useful product that should really help cannabis in many ways.

 

[grapeman]

i'm a bit confused...

i grow in coco using house&garden a&B, plus AN big bud weeks 2-4 and PURE FLOWERS weeks 5-7

should i replace the PURE FLOWERS with something different? or do i have everything i need with the A&B plus Pure Flowers?

What this "phosphite hating" thread will never tell you is that NO ONE ever claimed that using Pure Flowers will deliver your P needs.

Phosphites are a good carrier of other nutrients and a lot of smart people use them, especially with Ca and K. People that farm for a living where every dollar is critical.

I do believe the ratio is 0-30-20 so you will get K in the product.

But coming to this thread looking for unbiased informed advice is silly.

 

[spurr]

More about Phi and Pi:

A key excerpt from an article I already cited and posted in full text:

"Phosphates and Phosphites: When Distributors and Growers alike get confused" (from 2007)​

"There has been some confusion lately in Europe and North America, now spreading to other parts of the world, over terms used for fertilizers and chemicals containing phosphorus. Distributors and growers have been using phosphate fertilizers for many long years. They are familiar with formulations like single super phosphate (SSP), triple super phosphate (TSP) diammonium phosphate (DAP) but also MAP and MKP (Monopotassium Phosphate). All of them provide phosphate derived from phosphoric acid (H3PO4). The phosphate that plants use is in the form HPO4 and H2PO4, which is quickly converted in soil from fertilizers.

Recently, new terms are being used including phosphorous acid (not phosphoric acid), phosphite (not phosphate), and phosphonite or phosphonate. Unlike the phosphoric acid that contains four oxygen atoms, phosphorous acid (H3PO3) and the related compounds contain only three oxygen atoms. Is that difference of one oxygen atom very important? In fact a clear distinction exists between Phosphoric acid and phosphorous acid: the former is a plant nutrient and the latter has primarily fungicide applications. It is thus very obvious that claims suggesting that either compound may exactly fulfill the functions of the other are misleading.

Therefore, is the bottom line that on the one side phosphates are what is needed for fertilizer but will have no effect on plant diseases and on the other side that phosphites are useful in managing diseases but will not provide plants with the phosphate they need? Maybe not so simple! New Ag International went to investigate among suppliers and scientists to try sorting out what is really true, untrue and partly true?

Our findings: What is true is that plants can absorb the phosphorous acid compounds through roots and leaves. What is also true is that plants are incapable of using DIRECTLY the phosphorus acid as a nutrient source. What is partly true is that the phosphorous acid compounds can break down in the soil to available forms of P, but this process is very slow and will not provide adequate P nutrition. What is untrue is that they can complement and even replace phosphate fertilizers in all instances. And what is very true above all is that a number of people from various bodies entertain confusion in the market!"

To cite a very current paper, yet again, that I already cited and posted in full text:

"Phosphite (phosphorous acid): Fungicide, fertilizer or bio-stimulator?" (from 2009)​

Abstract:

Phosphite (Phi), a reduced form of phosphate (inline imagePi), is widely marketed as either a fungicide or fertilizer or sometimes as a biostimulant. This is confusing for both distributors and growers.

The present paper explores data from various studies to clarify that Phi does not provide plant P nutrition and thus cannot complement or substitute Pi at any rate. In addition, Phi itself does not have any beneficial effect on the growth of healthy plants, regardless of whether it is applied alone or in combination with Pi at different ratios or different rates.

The effect of Phi on plants is not consistent, but is strongly dependent on the Pi status of the plants. In most cases, the deleterious effect of Phi is evident in Pi-starved, but not Pi-sufficient, plants. Plants fertilized with Pi allowing for approximately 80–90% of its maximum growth might still be at risk of the effect. This negative effect becomes more pronounced under more seriously Pi-deficient conditions.

Although a number of studies have shown positive crop responses to Phi, these responses are likely to be attributable to the suppression of plant diseases by Phi and/or to Pi formed from oxidation of Phi by microbes. In addition, indirectly providing P by Phi-to-Pi oxidation is not an effective means of supplying P to plants compared with Pi fertilizer. An understanding of these issues will aid the right selection of fertilizer as well as minimize the harmful effects of Phi use on crops.

Steps for making Phi from phosphorous acid via neutralizing phosphorus acid with a base to make Phi:

H3PO3 (phosphorous acid) > [add base salt KOH makes] KH2PO3 (potassium dihydrogen phosphite) > [add base salt KOH makes] K2PO4 (di potassium monohydrate phosphite)​

Something I just found out I find interesting:

According to the Merek Index, potassium phosphite can slowly be oxidized into phosphate. My only issue is the accuracy of the claim my Merck because no studies I am aware of have cited this info as true:

Windholz, M. (ed.). 1983. The Merck Index (10th edition). Merck and Co., Inc. Rahway, NJ, p. 1103.​

 

[spurr]

@ grapeman and anyone who uses either Phi (e.g. Pure Flowers) or a P fertilizer (e.g. phosphoric acid) derived from phosphorus acid (e.g. Bloombastic)

Warning about human heath issues:

Phi and phosphorous acid (both considered fungicides/fungistats) found on edibles (like grapes, apples, etc.) has been found to be harmful to human (and rats) when ingested at levels commonly found on those edibles. This topic is also relevant for those who spray cannabis in flowering stage with Phi (e.g. Pure Flowers) or P fertilizer (e.g. phosphoric acid) derived from phosphorus acid (e.g. Bloombastic).

Both Phi and phosphorous acid are not safe for humans to ingest at levels commonly found on plant fruits/flowers/etc. after application of products I listed above. For anyone who is concerned about their health, and the myriad of poisons found on our food (and buds from many conventional growers), I would suggest staying away from products I listed above. This is yet another reason to grow following the paradigm of biological organics.

To grapeman: I told you about this already, but you ignored me. I told you how people who eat your grapes are being slowly poisoned, but you didn't care.


"PHOSPHATE FOLIAR FERTILISATION AS A SOURCE OF PHOSPHITE RESIDUES"
L. Tosi and M. Malusà
(full text thanks to Avenger) https://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=4096561&postcount=61

In particular environments foliar fertilisation with phosphate is a common practice to overcome transient deficiency status. Phosphate liquid fertilisers are also used as acidifiers when hard water is available for pesticide treatments. Phosphites, a common by-product present in phosphate fertilisers, are among the metabolites of pesticides whose residues in foods are regulated by the law.

Therefore, experiments were designed to evaluate the chances of finding phosphite residues in fruits and buds of apple trees treated with phosphate fertilisers. The study was carry out on two year-old apple (cultivar ‘Golden Delicious’/M9) trees grown in pots and in an open field trial on 8 year-old apples trees (cultivar ‘Mongerduft’/M26). Trees were treated either with a single phosphate fertilisation (SP) provided to soil at the beginning of the trials or with a foliar phosphate fertiliser (FP) (five treatments, from May 11 every 7 days). Control plants were not treated with any phosphate fertiliser. Phosphorous acid concentration in foliar fertilisers was 172 ppm. Bark and bud samples were collected only from the field trial in March and in December. Fruits were collected starting from May 18 till harvest, on a monthly base. Phosphite concentration was determined by GC. At the end of the season we found a two-fold increase in phosphorous acid content in FP treated trees as compared to untreated and SP treated trees.

Phosphorous acid was detectable only in fruits treated with FP. It is concluded that phosphorous acid traces present in foliar phosphate fertilisers can enter the plant and be found in different organs (fruit and bark). The amount found in fruits at harvest was in both trials over the legal limit for this compound suggesting a possible interference of normal foliar fertilisation practices with pesticide treatments.

 

[ambertrich]

Spurr, you are right in that I read that line to quickly. I do know that alkaline refers to basicity and alkalinity refers to the ability of a solution to neutralize acids to the equivalence point of carbonate and bicarbonate, with alkalinity being equal to the stoichiometic sum of bases in solution (including borate, hydroxide, phosphate, nitrate, ammonia, as well as conjugate basis of organic acids and sulfide) normally expressed as mEg/L or ppm.
I also understand how this is involved in the buffering capacity of a solution. (as carbonate, bicarbonate, phospate, nitrate, etc. ions ability to accept H+ ions, neutralizing the base, thus the ability to resisting change in pH).
Chem 101 was more years ago that I care to think about.

 

[spurr]

i'm a bit confused...

i grow in coco using house&garden a&B, plus AN big bud weeks 2-4 and PURE FLOWERS weeks 5-7

should i replace the PURE FLOWERS with something different? or do i have everything i need with the A&B plus Pure Flowers?

What the "pretend" scientist phosphite hating poster will never tell you is that NO ONE ever claimed that using Pure Flowers will deliver your P needs.

LOL, I'm "pretend", OK, thanks for letting me know! I was worried there for a minute that I was "real"...phew! <sarcasm>

Your claim that "NO ONE ever claimed that using Pure Flowers will deliver your P needs" is flatly false. The reason most cannabis growers use Pure Flower is for a direct P and K boost. You know this, stop being so damn disingenuous. Just read this thread and the other thread about phosphites to see the vast amount of growers who DO try to use Pure Flowers (i.e. Phi) as a direct P source...

IIRC you were first claiming Phi does provide direct P, but then when I showed you it does not, you changed your claim to something along the lines of "Phi allows me to use less Pi". For info on why your second (amended claim) is most probably wrong, see the bottom of this post. And you still have yet to cite a single reference to your claims, this is a science sub-forum if you are unaware

Phosphites are a good carrier of other nutrients and a lot of smart people use them, especially with Ca and K. People that farm for a living, not troll on the internet for a living.

No they are not, I already told you why, but again, you're being disingenuous. Please, cite at least one legit reference backing up your claim; I would honestly like to learn if I am wrong, and so far you have proven nothing.

In the last Phi thread you asked me to comment on your hypothesis that Phi is a good carrier of other ions into leafs, and I told you why it is not. I am planning on writing a thread on the topic of increasing absorption of ions into leafs. Once I do you can learn what has been proven true by science, and stop pretending your hypothesis has been proven true by science.

Ca, K and nitrate (to name a few ions) are great for increasing absorption of other ions into leaf (through cuticle layer and cell membrane); but phosphates/phosphites are not. Ca, K, etc., accomplish what I described, in part, by swelling the cuticle layer and aqueous pores. This has to do with "point of deliquesce" of calcium nitrate, etc.



See some of these references until I post my thread (not all are in full text at this time):

1. "FOLIAR NUTRITION USING INORGANIC SALTS: LAWS OF CUTICULAR PENETRATION"
Jörg Schönherr
(full text thanks to Avenger) https://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=4096561&postcount=61


2. "Cuticular penetration of calcium salts: effects of humidity, anions, and adjuvants"
Jörg Schönherr
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/1522-2624(200104)164:2%3C225::AID-JPLN225%3E3.0.CO;2-N/abstract


3. "Polar Paths of Diffusion across Plant Cuticles: New Evidence for an Old Hypothesis"
LUKAS SCHREIBER
Ann Bot (June 2005) 95 (7): 1069-1073
(full PDF) http://aob.oxfordjournals.org/content/95/7/1069.full.pdf+html


4. "Characterization of aqueous pores in plant cuticles and permeation of ionic solutes"
Jörg Schönherr
J. Exp. Bot. (2006) 57 (11): 2471-2491
(full PDF) http://jxb.oxfordjournals.org/content/57/11/2471.full.pdf+html


5. "Surfactant effects on cuticular penetration of neutral polar compounds: dependence on humidity and temperature"
Baur P
J Agric Food Chem. 1999 Feb;47(2):753-61.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10563965


6. "Deposit characteristics, penetration and biological efficacy of selected agrochemicals as affected by surfactants and plant micromorphology"
Thorsten Krämer

• link to google books, search for terms like calcium, etc: http://books.google.com/books?id=Shg...page&q&f=false
• here is a section of calcium cations from that book: http://books.google.com/books?id=Shg...alcium&f=false

Here are papers that have to do with ions in Dutch Master Penetrator and Saturator; e.g. phosphates, potassium and ammonium. The papers about phosphates are relevant to phosphites:

7. "Cuticular penetration of potassium salts: Effects of humidity, anions, and temperature"
Jörg Schönherr and Milana Luber
(full text) http://www.springerlink.com/content/m046gh75pj27835n/


8. "A mechanistic analysis of penetration of glyphosate salts [ex. ammonium nitrogen, potassium, etc.] across astomatous cuticular membranes"
Jörg Schönherr
(abstract only for now) http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...s.462/abstract


9. "Foliar phosphorus fertilization of dryland crops: Potential for foliar phosphorus fertilization of dryland cereal crops: A review"
S.R. Noack, T.M. McBeath and M.J. McLaughlin
(full PDF, in draft form only) http://digital.library.adelaide.edu.au/dspace/bitstream/2440/60960/1/hdl_60960.pdf
​

I do believe the ratio is 0-30-20 so you will get K in the product.

Yes, but he/she will not get P, and it's quite clear he/she is interested in P and K. That is why I wrote what I did about using potassium silicate or mono-potassium-phosphate.

But coming to this thread looking for unbiased informed advice is silly.

If one seeks info from you, and your unreferenced claims, then your statement is quite true. My referenced claims, and those of many others in this thread are unbiased. I cite actual science, you do not, you only cite your opinion. Just because I/we proved you wrong and cite the fact Phi is very poor source of P, a rather poor SAR inducer, and a good fungicide/fungistat doesn't make us biased; it just makes us correct

You have yet to cite a single academic reference. And your one citation of NutriPhite company was proven to not agree with your claims about it. That is, after I called them and asked them about your claims and their claims. I have proven what you claim to be false time and time again. Except for your claim that you think Phi allows you to use less Pi, which I do not agree with but I can not disprove because you have not done proper testing with controls, etc.

Your claim:

The only fact I stated was that since using phosphites in the form of nutri-phite K (all foliar) in my vineyards (for almost 20 years), my P levels have consistently remained where I want to maintain them and I have been able to reduce the use of heavy phos acid applications to the soil. Major reductions. Saving money reductions. And I have validated these P levels with petiole analysis.

My rebuttal (once again):

To your claim that by using a Phi foliar spray (i.e. NutriPhite-K) and reducing Pi fertigation (if by "phos acid" you mean phosphoric acid), your grape's P levels did not decrease; please remember when I wrote you were not doing proper leaf tissue analysis. What I meant was you were looking at P2O5 (most likely), and current P content tests of petiole sap do not different between Pi and Phi. Current tests treat Phi an Pi in plant sap, as equal in terms of P nutrition, and that is not sound testing or sound science. Also I pointed out that when you noticed no decline in yield and health of your grapes, that most likely meant you were OVER-APPLYING phosphates (via fertigation) in the first place, thus when you reduced Pi (via fertigation) your plants did not suffer.



Rebuttal from the article: "Phosphates and Phosphites: When Distributors and Growers alike get confused"

"...“The detection of different phosphite concentrations in phosphite fertilized maize plants indicates that this P compound is well absorbed by plant roots. After phosphite foliar application, this compound was also detectable in all parts of maize plants, which proves its phloem and xylem mobility. The phosphite accumulation was notably high in developing corncobs.

Phosphite is obviously stable within the plant metabolism process as only small amounts appeared to be oxidized to phosphate. The reduced growth observed in phosphite treated plants was especially evident under conditions of P deficiency. This could result from a suppression of the natural mechanisms of plants to respond to P deficiency.

These results should be considered as an aspect of the German fertilizer law: in the future, the P content of marketable mineral fertilizers is to disclose specifically in terms of soluble phosphate or phosphite instead of generalized “P2O5”, as hitherto”."

The last sentence from the conclusions from German researchers is a key point indeed! Phosphite may go undetected by most agricultural testing laboratories that are set up to test for orthophosphate. So far, approved techniques for fertilizer testing only measures orthophosphates. However, some non-regulatory laboratories are switching to inductively coupled argon plasma technology for rapid analysis of several elements simultaneously. This technology has the capability of measuring total P whether orthohosphate, phosphite, or solubilized organic P.

If this technique were used to measure total P, it could create the impression that plant-available P is higher than it really is if some of this P was phosphite. Testing for the phosphite anion alone is tedious and expensive but it may be the price to pay for a better transparency in the market..."

 

[spurr]

Spurr, you are right in that I read that line to quickly. I do know that alkaline refers to basicity and alkalinity refers to the ability of a solution to neutralize acids to the equivalence point of carbonate and bicarbonate, with alkalinity being equal to the stoichiometic sum of bases in solution (including borate, hydroxide, phosphate, nitrate, ammonia, as well as conjugate basis of organic acids and sulfide) normally expressed as mEg/L or ppm.
I also understand how this is involved in the buffering capacity of a solution. (as carbonate, bicarbonate, phospate, nitrate, etc. ions ability to accept H+ ions, neutralizing the base, thus the ability to resisting change in pH).
Chem 101 was more years ago that I care to think about.

You have a great understanding of the issues, especially considering you learned about it years ago! Thanks for that very well written post, it should help some folks who do not believe anything I write.

 

[Mr.Meds]

Thanks Spurr...

 

[spurr]

Thanks Spurr...

 

[spurr]

@ all:

Avenger was nice enough to get two of the most important papers for me that I posted above:

1. "PHOSPHATE FOLIAR FERTILISATION AS A SOURCE OF PHOSPHITE RESIDUES"
L. Tosi and M. Malusà
(about the harms and laws about said residues to human health)


2. "FOLIAR NUTRITION USING INORGANIC SALTS: LAWS OF CUTICULAR PENETRATION"
Jörg Schönherr


See Avenger's post below for the full text studies, thanks again Avenger!
https://www.icmag.com/ic/showpost.php?p=4096561&postcount=61

 

[grapeman]

@ grapeman and anyone who uses either Phi (e.g. Pure Flowers) or a P fertilizer (e.g. phosphoric acid) derived from phosphorus acid (e.g. Bloombastic)

LOL.

5 foliar treatments!! If he would've asked a farmer, he would've been told that 2 to 3 treatments per season would suffice.

But that kind of knowledge only comes from actual farming where the farmer needs to justify the expense of each and every action vs. the benefit obtained.

This goes back to one of my original comments that the actual farmers do the beneficial science.

And I don't put much credence in being over the EU legal limit of P. They banned Alar also didn't they?

More later

 

[VerdantGreen]

Spurr, again, post your papers on Reverse Osmosis water use in hydroponics.......

mulray, that is off topic in a thread that is already long, bitter and rambling, feel free to start a thread about the subject if you wish.

and again, try and debate properly rather than resorting to name-calling tactics.

thanks

VG

 

[MrFista]

Well mullray, I gave you an out ("perhaps it's the soil-hydro confusion") and you jumped on it to shift your position, and now you have shifted your focus to another issue entirely, a comment made about RO water. Your language has not improved, you keep asking spurr to prove things why don't you contribute something other than this abuse you are out of control the 3 edited posts in a row show you are losing it. Why lose it if you are so right? Just lay out the facts, not what you got to say or your qualifications imagined or otherwise as that is getting very tiring, show us your documentation that discredits spurr so horrendously we too should see him as some conspirational anti chem industry evil spin machine.

Of course farmers know more about growing than scientists. In vitro testing has a boatload of limitations I don't like it at all in comparison to field trials it is outright bullshit at times. But consider this. Farmers are mainly doing exactly what industry representatives tell them to do. Add this, spray that. Stupidity encouraging ignorance, that's how I see the farmer-farm rep relationship in my country. The status quo is a load of crap maintaining it just shows ignorance imo.

What is needed is decent discourse started between farmers-ecologists-conservationists-botanists-microbiologists-chemists-physicists and more. Where we desist in blame and name calling and sit down and discuss solutions. Where corporations and governments are banned from the table. Oh, the enlightenment that will descend upon us all when finally we learn to address problems together instead of in a competitive manner.

The world of business and science is full of pettiness and rudeness like this thread has descended into. A one-upmanship type thing starts to form, competitiveness instead of community. We need an edge in business and academia we need to try and show why our brand is something special... but, it is not called for here. Perhaps here we can do better.

 

[grapeman]

Your claim that "NO ONE ever claimed that using Pure Flowers will deliver your P needs" is flatly false. The reason most cannabis growers use Pure Flower is for a direct P and K boost.

I don't even know where to start spurr. The first sentence above is your position and your second sentence makes my point.

Sigh.