watering with hard water

 

Here we are in London and the ground is getting drier, actually the pots
are getting really dry.  We have a mains water irrigation system, some
drippers, some sprayers, and use it if there has been no rain for a few
days.  But I do notice that the leaves afterwards show how hard the
water is - the lime is left as a whitish bloom where the droplets
evaporated.  Is this generally OK or should we try and counterbalance
the lime with an acid drench now and then?  We don't irrigate the
camellias which are in a relatively shady area, but a potted azalea
would suffer without the drips when we were away.  Otherwise we have all
sorts of stuff - roses, lilies, delphiniums blue and geraniums red -
I'll put up some photos soon on Flickr.

As a rule, though, is a lot of hard water bad or indifferent for most
plants?

--
Kate B

PS 'elvira' is spamtrapped - please reply to 'elviraspam' at cockaigne dot org
dot uk if you
want to reply personally

 



Here in East Anglia if you use mains water, it's very, very hard water, so
the plants have to deal with it. So far, mine are thriving.

 



Hi Kate,

I would be inclined to give the potted azalea an acid feed; without it,
other nutrients in the compost will not be available to it.  I give my roses
one acid feed a year to help with blackspot, but you don't have to if your
roses are happy without.  Some lilies like an acid soil, but by no means all
of them.  You may need to look up the requirements of your variety(ies).
Delphiniums and geraniums are happy with alkaline soil, as are pelargoniums,
in case that's what you meant :~).

Personally, I would find the hard water staining on the leaves undesirable.
However, whilst you might be able to adjust the drippers so that they only
wet the soil, I don't see how you can avoid wetting the leaves with the
sprayers.  Still, it is just a niggle compared with watching your plants
wilt during a drought.

Spider

 


I would agree with that, I had that probem in the UK.

Judith

 

On Fri, 29 May 2009 16:13:07 +0100, Kate Brown


I wouldn't use hard water for camellias, azaleas, rhododendrons or
summer flowering heathers (collectively known as ericaceous plants) if
they are in pots. Use rain water if you've got a water butt, and
consider getting one if you haven't. Failing that, dose the pot with
Sequestrine (available as a powder in sachets from garden centres),
say twice a year in the growing season, otherwise the plants will
start to show yellowing of the leaves (chlorosis) and won't thrive.

The ericaceous plants in the soil will cope with a few waterings using
hard water without too much problem, but frequent watering may build
up alkalinity in the soil and result in chlorosis in the plants; it
rather depends on the degree of acidity in the soil and its capacity
to cope with hard water.

Most other plants won't mind a bit of hard water.

--
 
Chris

Gardening in West Cornwall overlooking the sea.
Mild, but very exposed to salt gales

E-mail: christopher[dot]hogg[at]virgin[dot]net