Can I add anything (hydrogen peroxide?) to stagnant rainwater to make it usable?

SU2

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Interesting. I'll admit to never being particularly scientific about it, but I know that the goldfish I've used have definitely been eating something, because they've always been bigger at the end of the season than at the beginning, and I certainly am not feeding them.

It also seemed that the rain barrel had fewer mosquitoes emerging from it in the weeks after we added the fish than in those overly optimistic weeks before. But, right now, the only "working fish" I have is in a pond, and it's not really feasible for me to detect how many mosquitoes in my yard are coming from the pond as opposed to the "wetland" a quarter mile away. Plus I know that there are definitely other squigglies for the pond fish to eat (dragonfly nymphs are terrifying until you google enough to figure out what they are).

Wow! I'd have thought you'd need to modify the setup to make it dual-purpose, didn't think it'd be as easy as just tossing them in! (am only experienced w/ saltwater fish, where the water parameters need to be kept in a real narrow range)

Was originally thinking "this is unfair, will probably kill at least a third of these goldfish" but it doesn't seem that's the case, am overjoyed to hear I may be able to keep fish again, haven't had fish for over a decade (was obsessive w/ my saltwater tanks in college, had a big predator tank w/ a fat purple-mouth moray and a 'nano' mini tank w/ corals, they were then what bonsai is now lol ;D )
 

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I have tried regular goldfish, but not koi. I have a feeling koi, just given their size, might slurp up mosquito larva just in the course of eating anything they can fit in their mouths. My koi will eat juniper branches, for example, if they can reach them.
If you happen to have any pics handy I'd absolutely love seeing your setup!! One day I'll have a koi pond, certainly not setting one up at a rental property rofl but someday I'll be in a spot where I can get back into 'aquatic husbandry', I miss moray eels and corals and I badly want an octopus tank & a mantis shrimp tank....someday!
 

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Peroxide breaks down in H+, H2O, h2 gas, and O2 gas and O3 gas. All of these gasses can stay suspended as do the charged particles.
The time depends on the dose, temperature, light.. 3% peroxide can be kept in an open container for about 4-6 days at room temp until most gasses are gone. Whats left is acidic water high in oxygen. But thats for a few millilitres. I dont know about larger tanks.

How stagnant my water is? It isn't touched until it rains and the barrel flows over. As stagnant as it can be basically.
The algae reside in the water during the summer, the rest of the year its pretty clear stuff.

As for the pH, peroxide doesnt buffer very well, but its just a super weird oxidizer and acid with pretty unique properties.
A while ago I did some calculations, if i remember correctly, you can add up and calculate an average pH based on the ph values.
Plants prefer a pH range fortunately, and rarely one specific value (there is an optimal value, mind me, but the drawback of being tenths of points off is neglible).

If your pH is that low, consider buying some cheap potassium lye (KOH). Make a 4M solution (4.32×4 grams per liter from the top of my head) and add a teaspoon to the barrel. That should bring it up to around 0.2-0.5 point per teaspoon in the average rain barrel. Upping that pH also kills a lot of algae.

Wow I was totally under the impression that, within a short while, peroxide had broken-down fully and was no longer present.....you say they can stay suspended, but would they if the bucket had high-turbulence from a strong pump and there was some air-exchange for it to 'gas off' anything that becomes aerosoled/vapored(sorry, my chemistry chops obviously aren't not very strong!)

"4-6 days at room temp until most gasses are gone. What's left is acidic water high in oxygen"

WHOA! How big an effect on pH are we talking here? Not hard #'s but generally? I ask because I've been on the fence about what chemical pH-Down type product to get but they're all phosphoric acid based and I don't want to add phosphorous, so have been seeking a chemical to acidify my tap-water that's not phosphoric acid and this is the first one that seems it may fit the bill for me!! Do you think it'd be a practical approach for modest pH reduction? I have 8pH tap-water so even bringing it to 7pH is a HUGE increase for me, the change from 7pH to my ideal of 5.75pH isn't remotely as big as going from 8-->7pH! (as you say, tenths of a point are negligible, and there's massively diminished-returns when going downward from a poor 8pH tap!!)

(potassium lye sounds like it'd just be the same issue for me as phosphoric acid ie I'd be putting in a macro I don't want to put in....and you say "upping that pH kills a lot of algae", surely you meant lower it?)


If you happen to know any good 'ELI5'/beginner explanations on buffering I'd love to be guided there, the wiki is too-much for me to translate into IRL knowledge..buffering, buffering-capacity, etc, I go cross-eyed trying to understand it & translate it into practical application here ;P
 

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There is not much to elaborate on. Feeder goldfish are the hardiest of the lot probably. I acclimate the temp of the water before putting them in but after that they survive everything until they finally freeze solid, if I don’t rescue them first. Sorry if I violate anyone’s sensibilities by doing this - I will get into a debate over animal ethics if you would like. By all means rescue them first if you prefer. Sometimes I feed them, sometimes not. Either way the mosquitoes stay gone. The only thing the feeding does is accelerate growth which causes the coons, or cats, to notice them sooner. My tubs are large enough that the cats can’t usually get them. I also am lax about removing leaf litter which forms a nice organic layer as well as shelter and additional food for them on the bottom, plus probably conditions the water and adds organic nutrients. It’s a small pond.

It all works very well for me and it’s simple and cheap. Sometimes fish die (note they are called feeder fish for a reason) If you have a problem with that don’t do it. Hopefully it will work for you.
 

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Wow I was totally under the impression that, within a short while, peroxide had broken-down fully and was no longer present.....you say they can stay suspended, but would they if the bucket had high-turbulence from a strong pump and there was some air-exchange for it to 'gas off' anything that becomes aerosoled/vapored(sorry, my chemistry chops obviously aren't not very strong!)

"4-6 days at room temp until most gasses are gone. What's left is acidic water high in oxygen"

WHOA! How big an effect on pH are we talking here? Not hard #'s but generally? I ask because I've been on the fence about what chemical pH-Down type product to get but they're all phosphoric acid based and I don't want to add phosphorous, so have been seeking a chemical to acidify my tap-water that's not phosphoric acid and this is the first one that seems it may fit the bill for me!! Do you think it'd be a practical approach for modest pH reduction? I have 8pH tap-water so even bringing it to 7pH is a HUGE increase for me, the change from 7pH to my ideal of 5.75pH isn't remotely as big as going from 8-->7pH! (as you say, tenths of a point are negligible, and there's massively diminished-returns when going downward from a poor 8pH tap!!)

(potassium lye sounds like it'd just be the same issue for me as phosphoric acid ie I'd be putting in a macro I don't want to put in....and you say "upping that pH kills a lot of algae", surely you meant lower it?)


If you happen to know any good 'ELI5'/beginner explanations on buffering I'd love to be guided there, the wiki is too-much for me to translate into IRL knowledge..buffering, buffering-capacity, etc, I go cross-eyed trying to understand it & translate it into practical application here ;P

Go with HCl as a pH-downer after your tapwater is left for a few days to evaporate most of the chlorine (place it in sunlight!). Otherwise citric or acetic acids (both buffering, so youll need a lot). Or nitric acid, but then tone down a little on the nitrogen when it comes to fertilizing.

pH effect of the peroxide is present, but I can't say how big it is. It depends on how much you use, how big your container is.. pH is maths, straight up. Add a little of this, or a little more of that.. then the equation changes, and so does the outcome. A few drops doesn't change a thing. A bucket does..

The lye was meant for the rainwater, which I read has a pH of around 4?! Then it should be upped. That kills the algae. Algae thrive at lower pH's and actively acidify solutions.

As for buffers: the simplest thing I can say is think about magnets. Everything is magnets. But everything that gets another magnet added to it, needs to take it from something else.

H2O (neutral) losing a magnet (H+) becomes OH- (see that it changes potential? Suddenly, there's a '-'). Water restores this balance: taking back as much magnets as it can, to get back to 0. So it takes back the H+. Water buffers itself.
NH4 can lose a H+, and it becomes NH3-. But it's in water! Water says: "no way hombre, I'm already as Neutral as Switzerland, take your own magnets back!"
NH3- says: "Man, I'm kind of negative now, would you mind if I take back my magnet?"
Water says: "Sure, here ya go!"
NH3- becomes NH4 again.
But then the water splits again, remember, it buffers itself, so in the fragment of a second, there's OH- and H+. The OH- pulls the magnet away from the NH4.
NH4 loses it's magnet, it becomes NH3-.
OH- takes up that magnet, becomes H2O again. But suddenly, the H+ that has left the water, has no place to go. Luckily there's NH3- willing to take it in.
This happens a few million times a minute in a ammonia solution.
This happens with all 'weak acids' or buffers.

Remember that water is weird. It's one of the hardest to explain parts of chemistry. Simply put: it does things it shouldn't do, but we're all thankful that it does.

With strong acids, like HCl, there's not that much of attraction going on. Cl- just says: "I never liked that guy H+, water, please keep him away from me".
And so HCl becomes a strong acid. In a solution, H+ and Cl- will never bond again. Hence there is no buffer. They break apart. They filled in the papers, water can keep the kid.
We talk about "H2O with acid" but when a surplus of H+ occurs, H2O becomes H3O+ and starts buffering itself with itself. H2O+H3O <-> H3O+H2O. (notice that one H has skipped places).

Khanacademy.org is the best place to learn about chemistry (and biology) for free. If you can withstand the dorky presenter.

That's the best I could do in this limited time. If you'd like to know more, send me a PM. That's easier for me to read and answer during my daily 4 hour commute.
 
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SU2

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That would be fine, and honest no need to worry about the size of a drop, lol :p

I would avoid pool treatment(s) they vary in total content and in general for that reason not considered good to drink. When chlorine (in any form) is added to water, a weak acid called Hypochlorous acid is produced. It is this acid, not the chlorine, which gives water its ability to oxidize and disinfect. Going back to my general rule of if it is safe for you it is certainly safe for your plants, pool water, not so much as we don't know what else it contains or what other "products" are in it.

Grimmy

Touche, hadn't thought of it like that and you're right there's too much a chance of adulterants...where would you get 'USP-grade' chlorine to use for something like this? Mostly just curious, will probably just skip that entirely, keep it moving/aerated, and use it w/o worry ;D
 

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There is not much to elaborate on. Feeder goldfish are the hardiest of the lot probably. I acclimate the temp of the water before putting them in but after that they survive everything until they finally freeze solid, if I don’t rescue them first. Sorry if I violate anyone’s sensibilities by doing this - I will get into a debate over animal ethics if you would like. By all means rescue them first if you prefer. Sometimes I feed them, sometimes not. Either way the mosquitoes stay gone. The only thing the feeding does is accelerate growth which causes the coons, or cats, to notice them sooner. My tubs are large enough that the cats can’t usually get them. I also am lax about removing leaf litter which forms a nice organic layer as well as shelter and additional food for them on the bottom, plus probably conditions the water and adds organic nutrients. It’s a small pond.

It all works very well for me and it’s simple and cheap. Sometimes fish die (note they are called feeder fish for a reason) If you have a problem with that don’t do it. Hopefully it will work for you.


This is awesome thank you!! So your water must be dark/cloudy when you use it - that's what had me worried initially, just seeing how cloudy it was and wondering whether everything creating the cloudiness was A-OK for my trees!

Will have to hope the cats don't see the goldfish, don't want them dipping their nasty paws into my tubs!!

(and you mention you sometimes save them - an animal ethics debate is probably something nobody likes because it's tedious, I'd always been under the impression that we weren't even sure whether they did feel pain but I recently found that it was resolved and they do feel pain https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/fish-feel-pain-180967764/ , that article is from Jan this year it must be a new study as I've heard it referenced a couple times in podcasts this year! I can't help but wonder how pain is perceived by things that have little, if any, consciousness....am of the mindset that pain doesn't require consciousness, though w/o consciousness the pain may be nothing more than a signal ie it may lack all the unpleasant characteristics that we feel when in pain, to real lower-organisms it could merely be a stimuli like gravity or light that they use to do their thing, but for fish it does seem to be genuine 'unpleasant-type' pain:
linked article said:
In the past 15 years, Braithwaite and other fish biologists around the world have produced substantial evidence that, just like mammals and birds, fish also experience conscious pain. “More and more people are willing to accept the facts,” Braithwaite says. “Fish do feel pain. It’s likely different from what humans feel, but it is still a kind of pain.”

Letting them freeze? You may as well be Michael Vick! (JK!!!) I used to toss larger goldfish into my saltwater tank so my eel could shred them, made quite a spectacle but in retrospect feel kinda shitty for having done so :/ If they're easy to save, may as well save them!
 

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Touche, hadn't thought of it like that and you're right there's too much a chance of adulterants...where would you get 'USP-grade' chlorine to use for something like this? Mostly just curious, will probably just skip that entirely, keep it moving/aerated, and use it w/o worry ;D

USP Grade would probably be around 5%, Clorox 6%, Pool Chlorine 10 - 12%...

When I have a need for it I just use Clorox :)

Grimmy
 

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Go with HCl as a pH-downer after your tapwater is left for a few days to evaporate most of the chlorine (place it in sunlight!). Otherwise citric or acetic acids (both buffering, so youll need a lot). Or nitric acid, but then tone down a little on the nitrogen when it comes to fertilizing.

pH effect of the peroxide is present, but I can't say how big it is. It depends on how much you use, how big your container is.. pH is maths, straight up. Add a little of this, or a little more of that.. then the equation changes, and so does the outcome. A few drops doesn't change a thing. A bucket does..

The lye was meant for the rainwater, which I read has a pH of around 4?! Then it should be upped. That kills the algae. Algae thrive at lower pH's and actively acidify solutions.

As for buffers: the simplest thing I can say is think about magnets. Everything is magnets. But everything that gets another magnet added to it, needs to take it from something else.

H2O (neutral) losing a magnet (H+) becomes OH- (see that it changes potential? Suddenly, there's a '-'). Water restores this balance: taking back as much magnets as it can, to get back to 0. So it takes back the H+. Water buffers itself.
NH4 can lose a H+, and it becomes NH3-. But it's in water! Water says: "no way hombre, I'm already as Neutral as Switzerland, take your own magnets back!"
NH3- says: "Man, I'm kind of negative now, would you mind if I take back my magnet?"
Water says: "Sure, here ya go!"
NH3- becomes NH4 again.
But then the water splits again, remember, it buffers itself, so in the fragment of a second, there's OH- and H+. The OH- pulls the magnet away from the NH4.
NH4 loses it's magnet, it becomes NH3-.
OH- takes up that magnet, becomes H2O again. But suddenly, the H+ that has left the water, has no place to go. Luckily there's NH3- willing to take it in.
This happens a few million times a minute in a ammonia solution.
This happens with all 'weak acids' or buffers.

Remember that water is weird. It's one of the hardest to explain parts of chemistry. Simply put: it does things it shouldn't do, but we're all thankful that it does.

With strong acids, like HCl, there's not that much of attraction going on. Cl- just says: "I never liked that guy H+, water, please keep him away from me".
And so HCl becomes a strong acid. In a solution, H+ and Cl- will never bond again. Hence there is no buffer. They break apart. They filled in the papers, water can keep the kid.
We talk about "H2O with acid" but when a surplus of H+ occurs, H2O becomes H3O+ and starts buffering itself with itself. H2O+H3O <-> H3O+H2O. (notice that one H has skipped places).

Khanacademy.org is the best place to learn about chemistry (and biology) for free. If you can withstand the dorky presenter.

That's the best I could do in this limited time. If you'd like to know more, send me a PM. That's easier for me to read and answer during my daily 4 hour commute.

Wait just regular hydrochloric acid/HCl? Would it be fine to just get the tins of it from Home Depot and use that? You don't happen to have any rule-of-thumb or link on determining how much I'd use do you? Or is it the type of thing I'd just test w/ pH strips til it was where I wanted? Honestly I was close to just dealing w/ the unwanted extra phosphorous and just buying the pH-Down (phosphoric acid) product, reading your post here has me stoked but want to make sure I'm understanding you, you're saying I can use that just as effectively? Would it leave-behind anything I should be aware of?

(and FWIW I can't gas-off chlorine because my county uses chloramine which won't gas off :/ )

re hydro.perox.&adding pH's- if I add 4pH to 6pH, in equal volumes, I get 5pH? Buffering isn't a third value that has to go in the equation? (btw thanks a ton for the buffering write-up, I've read it several times and it's still not sticking so just copied it to my bonsai folder ('buffering.doc' lol :D ) so I can go over it a bit more, thanks a lot for that :) ) And yeah you're right you'd need a lot of hydro to make a substantial change - if doing that, and hydro perox is such a low pH, I can't help but wonder whether using it to bring down the pH of a 5gal bucket of tap water would be practical (in a pinch, when there's no rainwater) Seems HCl would be the go-to and I shouldn't even consider peroxide further in this context, hopefully HCl is as practical as phosphoric acid for dropping pH but won't leave me with water that's got something extra in it! (phosphorous, in the case of traditional pH-Down, of course! Really don't want to up my P level!)

Re algae, had no idea acidic was better for them - how low on the pH-scale do you need to be before it's bad for them? I know that vinegar kills algae by virtue of its acidity (or at least I'd thought so!), also you say they create more acidity- is this of any practical significance here, like in the context of a container that gets constant perturbation/aeration?

And 4hr commute? Damn! Am guessing it's something very worthwhile, you're obviously smart as hell you've been there w/ technical info on a variety of my threads like the concrete pots and other unrelated things, you seem quite the know-it-all (in a good way!), hope you're making good use of it ;D God 4hrs....would be listening to a lot of podcasts lol!!
 

SU2

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USP Grade would probably be around 5%, Clorox 6%, Pool Chlorine 10 - 12%...

When I have a need for it I just use Clorox :)

Grimmy
Wait are you using sodium hypochlorite/ide (bleach) interchangeably with chlorine? I'd always thought they were similar but distinct...my curiosity is piqued!!
 

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Wait are you using sodium hypochlorite/ide (bleach) interchangeably with chlorine? I'd always thought they were similar but distinct...my curiosity is piqued!!

Yes, it is plants not potable water for drinking. The Bleach in small doses will simply clear your water and air off. I don't do anything complicated if I don't have to :p

Grimmy
 
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Velodog2

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Oh boy animal ethics! I also kept salt water fish and corals for decades and was very good at it. I don’t any more. The fish I observed in an aquarium and later snorkeling on the reefs, particularly the larger fish and among these particularly angels and triggers very clearly had a high level of intelligence and probably consciousness. I decided it was cruel to keep them in an aquarium at all, and stopped and just raised captive bred coral after. Goldfish I observe nothing like that kind of consciousness in. It’s where I choose to draw my line. You can be different. You feed them to morays. That’s how the world works. I suffer everyday with pain also.

There that was fun.
 
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M. Frary

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I use water from the hose.
I don't worry about P.H. at all.
 

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I use water from the hose.
I don't worry about P.H. at all.
I have to let my hose water sit for a day or so, it tests higher than the pool water for chlorine. This whole discussion seems to be a lot or worry over nothing. Surprised there isn't bottled bonsai water for the worry warts.
 

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Wait just regular hydrochloric acid/HCl? Would it be fine to just get the tins of it from Home Depot and use that? You don't happen to have any rule-of-thumb or link on determining how much I'd use do you? Or is it the type of thing I'd just test w/ pH strips til it was where I wanted? Honestly I was close to just dealing w/ the unwanted extra phosphorous and just buying the pH-Down (phosphoric acid) product, reading your post here has me stoked but want to make sure I'm understanding you, you're saying I can use that just as effectively? Would it leave-behind anything I should be aware of?

In the lab we use HCl to lower the pH. I figured that if we used it for million dollar plant breeding material, I'd guess it would be safe to use for material that has other value. General store hydrochloric acid is usually around 10% so just a few drops will bring a bucket of water down a few total pH points. Always test it! Always! A drop too much could have significant effects. Even better is to buy a gradual pipette for a few cents. That way you can just use a marker stripe at the amount you need for your tap water. Test this around 10 times, just to be sure.
Phosphoric acid, nitric acid and sulfuric acids can also be used. If I had to choose from those three, I'd go with sulfuric acid (sold as drain cleaner sometimes, but very high concentrations, that shit should be illegal if you ask me.. Nobody needs 96% H2SO4 for anything other than doing great damage to something).. Because the sulphur doesn't do much harm either.


re hydro.perox.&adding pH's- if I add 4pH to 6pH, in equal volumes, I get 5pH? Buffering isn't a third value that has to go in the equation? (btw thanks a ton for the buffering write-up, I've read it several times and it's still not sticking so just copied it to my bonsai folder ('buffering.doc' lol :D ) so I can go over it a bit more, thanks a lot for that :) ) And yeah you're right you'd need a lot of hydro to make a substantial change - if doing that, and hydro perox is such a low pH, I can't help but wonder whether using it to bring down the pH of a 5gal bucket of tap water would be practical (in a pinch, when there's no rainwater) Seems HCl would be the go-to and I shouldn't even consider peroxide further in this context, hopefully HCl is as practical as phosphoric acid for dropping pH but won't leave me with water that's got something extra in it! (phosphorous, in the case of traditional pH-Down, of course! Really don't want to up my P level!)
If you add ph4 to pH6 in equal volumes, you should get pH 5. We could calculate this in an equation, but as you can read below, I have done that for days on end as homework assignments, and I really don't want to dive into it unless I have to.
Buffering happens only, and only, with weak acids or weak bases. But, after a while, most buffers even out. There's as much buffering as there is free hydrogen/acid (or hydroxide). However, there are equations that allow you to exactly calculate everything, even with buffers. For that you'll need a chart, and the actual equation. Buffer calculations have been a while for me, 4 years to be precise.. And I promised I would never touch them again until it was absolutely necessary. Frankly, I think it isn't necessary right now (please, please, don't force me!).
If you're wanting to deal with HCl or other strong acids, forget about the buffering. Those chemicals just don't buffer.
Peroxide for lowering the pH is basically useless. You either need a giant amount, which is pretty expensive, or a high concentration, which is both dangerous and expensive.

Re algae, had no idea acidic was better for them - how low on the pH-scale do you need to be before it's bad for them? I know that vinegar kills algae by virtue of its acidity (or at least I'd thought so!), also you say they create more acidity- is this of any practical significance here, like in the context of a container that gets constant perturbation/aeration?
In water, algae love acids. In air, not so much. We treat algae on our trunks with acids, to kill them. We treat algae in our ponds with a rising pH to kill them. They're different algae with different demands, coming from different origins. Land algae, versus water algae. They all need water to grow, but some can handle oxygen, others have a hard time dealing with it.
A container with constant aeration will thrive when it comes to algae. They will grow so much that they will clog every part they can lay their cells on. That's why hydroponic growers use non-transparent containers. The roots are in the dark, not because the roots need it, but because the algae need light to photosynthesize. If there's no light, there's no algae.
That's also why algae never grow in caves, only on the edges, where sunlight can enter.

And 4hr commute? Damn! Am guessing it's something very worthwhile, you're obviously smart as hell you've been there w/ technical info on a variety of my threads like the concrete pots and other unrelated things, you seem quite the know-it-all (in a good way!), hope you're making good use of it ;D God 4hrs....would be listening to a lot of podcasts lol!!
I used to be a slacking student with so many hobbies that I didn't know what to do with myself.. From art & social studies, to psychology, to life science and bio-engineering. Last year I got the opportunity to do a trainee-ship in molecular genetics, and after that a trainee-ship in the cell biology division at a vegetable breeding company. They're the number 2 in the world, so resume-wise that was a very good decision. That's where I'm at right now. I am in need of a few good podcasts! If you or anyone else has any suggestions, I'm all ears!
 

Velodog2

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There is something to being a worry wart about water actually. I’ve shared this before but after killing many trees over many years using my tap water from a well I found out the alkalinity was extremely high. This is about carbonate ions and is different than high ph, and toxic to plants. I lost half my collection one year when it didn’t rain for six weeks and I had to rely on the hose that whole time. It was the folks at Meehan’s nursery who educated me as they are in the same area as I and had similar problems when they started the nursery. They inject acid into their well water now. I use only rainwater, and rarely lose a tree.
 

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There is something to being a worry wart about water actually. I’ve shared this before but after killing many trees over many years using my tap water from a well I found out the alkalinity was extremely high. This is about carbonate ions and is different than high ph, and toxic to plants. I lost half my collection one year when it didn’t rain for six weeks and I had to rely on the hose that whole time. It was the folks at Meehan’s nursery who educated me as they are in the same area as I and had similar problems when they started the nursery. They inject acid into their well water now. I use only rainwater, and rarely lose a tree.
that's all I use is rainwater too, or tap that has sat a day or so for the chlorine to dissipate. The chlorine levels here test at pool recommendations, so I can't use it straight from the hose. The OP was talking about rain water so I don't see all the freaking out over using it.
 
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ERIKA

Yamadori
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I can't find the thread where @M. Frary mentions adding it to a well to increase oxygen but anyways I'm in a situation where I've got a really bad rain-water setup consisting of a couple ~30gal rubbermaids and a ~50gal wheelbarrow. They fill-up entirely from a normal rain-storm (not even gutter-directed, just large roof surface-area and I have them under the drip-line/eave)

Problem is that, after a day like today, I'll have 100gal+ of good, 4.7pH (tap is 8pH here!) that I like to mix with my tap-water to bring the pH down, but I can't use it that quickly so all I can think to do is, every time I go outside, I just stir them up (trying to keep it from going stagnant / anoxic)

My understanding is that hydrogen peroxide would be useful here, doing the things I want and then breaking-down / becoming inert, hoping for confirmation and/or other tips/suggestions! Will be getting a proper acid to mix w/ my tap-water soon enough, am just stuck at the point where it seems phosphoric-acid based products are all that people use, and I reallly don't want to add phosphorous to my containers.....have heard things like lemon juice but never heard confirmation (from someone trustworthy!) for any acid besides phosphoric :/

You might want to read this article ... https://www.hunker.com/13425289/hydrogen-peroxide-and-pond-algae
 
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