- Wed Jun 07, 2023 6:42 pm
#436310
From what I have gathered, there is nothing wrong with watering your plants with rainwater from your gutters as long as you filter out debris and dissolved solids and sterilize it. People have contraptions set up that funnel gutter water directly into huge reservoirs. It seems to be a nice arrangement that doesn't involve much effort and apparently results in huge amounts of water.
I can't help but think about all the crap that has landed on the roof of my apartment over the years. For all I know, there could be dead squirrels in the gutters. I'm certainly not going up there to find out. But even in the best case scenario, the rain coming out of my gutters has most likely traveled some distance on the roof, mixing with tar and dirt and bird poop, before being deposited into the rusty metal gutters that funnel all the water down to an easy collection source.
These buckets are sitting under wide open sky. No power lines above, no shade trees or buildings or gutters. Which means that the rain falling into them is pretty much as pure as I could hope for. It's at least a zillion times cleaner than the water coming out of my tap. I checked the local tap water quality for Frankfort, Ky at the utility company website. I'm seriously considering bathing in rain water. I digress.
Would you drink this water after it has been boiled and passed through a ZeroWater pitcher filter? If not, what else would you do to it before you felt safe to drink it? I do plan on cleaning the buckets with bleach before I use them to collect drinking water but I think the regular house plants I have now will be fine with what I catch today. We are paying maybe $7.00? for 5 gallons of drinking water currently. Not bad, but it adds up with 5 people, a cat, and several house plants drinking water all day long.
What else would you do to this water before watering your carnivorous plants with it? My TDS meter will arrive with my ZeroWater pitcher. I believe I am aiming for somewhere south of 70 ppm, except for nepenthes, which can handle up to 150ppm? I'd imagine I probably want to boil it before giving it to the plants but from what I gathered, I don't need to run it through the ZeroWater pitcher unless the ppm is higher than 70ppm? What if it is naturally below 50ppm and I want to grow nepenthes? What should I add to the water to give the plants what they need?
I do plan on setting up a tarp collection system that can be easily folded away when not in use. I live in an apartment so I can't leave stuff like that out. It probably won't be much to look at but I will post pics and discuss any snags I ran into along the way.
I can't help but think about all the crap that has landed on the roof of my apartment over the years. For all I know, there could be dead squirrels in the gutters. I'm certainly not going up there to find out. But even in the best case scenario, the rain coming out of my gutters has most likely traveled some distance on the roof, mixing with tar and dirt and bird poop, before being deposited into the rusty metal gutters that funnel all the water down to an easy collection source.
These buckets are sitting under wide open sky. No power lines above, no shade trees or buildings or gutters. Which means that the rain falling into them is pretty much as pure as I could hope for. It's at least a zillion times cleaner than the water coming out of my tap. I checked the local tap water quality for Frankfort, Ky at the utility company website. I'm seriously considering bathing in rain water. I digress.
Would you drink this water after it has been boiled and passed through a ZeroWater pitcher filter? If not, what else would you do to it before you felt safe to drink it? I do plan on cleaning the buckets with bleach before I use them to collect drinking water but I think the regular house plants I have now will be fine with what I catch today. We are paying maybe $7.00? for 5 gallons of drinking water currently. Not bad, but it adds up with 5 people, a cat, and several house plants drinking water all day long.
What else would you do to this water before watering your carnivorous plants with it? My TDS meter will arrive with my ZeroWater pitcher. I believe I am aiming for somewhere south of 70 ppm, except for nepenthes, which can handle up to 150ppm? I'd imagine I probably want to boil it before giving it to the plants but from what I gathered, I don't need to run it through the ZeroWater pitcher unless the ppm is higher than 70ppm? What if it is naturally below 50ppm and I want to grow nepenthes? What should I add to the water to give the plants what they need?
I do plan on setting up a tarp collection system that can be easily folded away when not in use. I live in an apartment so I can't leave stuff like that out. It probably won't be much to look at but I will post pics and discuss any snags I ran into along the way.
Every time something randomly quits working the way it is supposed to, it makes me miss Star Citizen.
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Fenlena's Grow List