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Location

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Date Posted

On top of Brush Mountain, Pa.

Anyone have any experience with measuring soil conductivity? Has it been of value to those using it? Should more of us be paying attention to this measure of soil nutrition?

2/9/2019 11:26:40 AM

On top of Brush Mountain, Pa.

Getting hard to stimulate discussion here. Where has everyone gone?

2/10/2019 10:26:57 AM

Buffalo, MN (Billsbigpumpkins@hotmail.com)

Marv you maybe onto something to check. You can do a online search of conductivity and growing plants there plenty of articles there.

2/10/2019 11:17:08 AM

Norfolk, UK

Never measured it myself. But i’ve toyed with a garden RO device which dechlorinates and lowers EC of tap water as I’m in such a hard water area http://growmaxwater.com/content/20-products. The chlorine may be counter balancing my compost tea, and the minerals in the water countering my soil.

2/10/2019 12:52:18 PM

Lebanon, Oregon

This is a good topic. I need to do more reading on this. Looks like getting a good understanding of EC is yet another important tool for learning about water and nutrient uptake. High salts in the soil affect this.

2/10/2019 1:46:28 PM

Wixom MI.

Soils and products are my weak areas !!! I leave these subjects to the people that understand these subjects better than me !!!

2/10/2019 3:51:46 PM

Morgantown, WV

We learned a little bit in school about it. Typically, growing in-ground, salt buildups aren't a big problem because the rain will drive it deeper into the soil profile. Where it becomes an issue, is in container growing where the plants are minimally watered.

Even when watering with a higher concentration of nutrients, salt will not build up past the level of those nutrients if proper leaching occurs (watering to the point of about 20% runoff). It will however start to build up if it is not run out of the bottom of the pots as it has nothing pulling it through, and it is left behind as the water and nutrients are absorbed.

The way we tested (for simplicity sake) was to take 100 ml of whatever soil you want to test, saturate with 100 ml of water, let rest for a few minutes, then drain and test water.

Be careful with RO, as I've used it in the past and it had a learning curve to it. It will be very clean water, so more important to pay attention to your additions and make sure everything is in there. I found I always needed to boost calcium a bit more than normal.

2/10/2019 6:59:41 PM

Vernal, Ut

Here is a little interesting reading on the topic you are discussing. https://www.tomatogrowing.co.uk/nutrient-strength-tomatoes

2/11/2019 2:28:54 PM