rain water vs. tap water

I have five rain barrels around my house catching the rain water from off the roof. Is the rain water best for plants vs. tape water or does it make any difference? Naturally our city water has chemicals in it that rain water does not.Is that good or bad?

I prefer rain water for a lot of my plants, but I have well water as the alternative, so that's not as bad as city water. I know for my bromeliad garden, the chemicals in tap water can cause mineral deposits that are generally unattractive. I also use the water from my rain barrel for my indoor house plants (African violets mostly) for the same reason. Other than that, I don't think there's a huge difference. I know here in Tampa a lot of people use reclaimed water for their lawn watering, and it's not treated nearly as much as the water we drink from the tap, but I haven't heard of anyone having problems with it.

In a pond with fish you do not want to use rain water! For most ponds the hardness in the water is all the buffer it has to retain PH and prevent a PH crash which could be catastrophic to your fish. I've heard so many times of people losing a whole pond of fish after tons and tons of rain.

I use reclaimed water for gardening here in St. Pete but have never used it in my little pond because I'm not sure of the chemicals used to treat it. I have no problems with the plants though. I use city water with the chloramine treatment for the pond. I also have a well but had it disconnected when the reclaimed water went it but I'm considering hooking it back up. It's capped off but really needs a new pump. My well is over 100 ft deep. One of the deepest in my area and you can drink directly from it with no problem.

I use a Reverse Osmoess lol bad spelling and the run off from it is great for plants

Rainwater by a mile especially after a thunderstorm . "You are what you eat" I recon this goes for drink too ! LOL

Used to have about 1/2 acre vege garden and town and bore water compared to a decent downpour No contest . There is a lot of reading on " ionised rainwater" as well.

Have fun ,
Holty......

Anything water without chlorine is good. The Ph, alkalinity and hardness of treated tap water all vary from one municipal water treatment system to another. It just depends on what is in your particular water. Here our water is softend and has a high Ph. Very unusual. The Kh (carbonate hardness) is 1 and the Ph when it comes out of the tap is 9, so the water lacks carbonate hardness but is still highly buffered. The Ph backs off in 24 hours to 7.6. Water plants all like carbonate hardness. It is hard to raise carbonate hardness without raising Ph. Here rain water is not a problem as the fish are already adjusted to a low carbonate hardness. One thing all treated tap water does not contain is potassium. In the NPK of fertilizer K is potash or potassium. Neither plants nor fish appreciate chlorine.

I configured a filter to put on the end of my hose, but the water quaility from Rain water is great, and clears up my water. You can get a compression fitting at Lowe's that has a end for water hoses, a filter for RV water, and a flex hose with compression fitting you would use to connect your kitchen faucet.

I would not use water that comes of the roof. The chemicals from th shingles cannot be good for them.

Azreno, not sure who you heard that from. Lakes and ponds are naturally filled with rain water. Most likely the ones who lost fish after hard rains most likely did not take precautions from run off, and got chemicals from the lawn into the pond such as herbicides.

Jason

Natural lakes and ponds are much larger bodies of water that have soil as a natural ph buffer, ornamental ponds do not. If you take a small ornamental pond and basically replace all the water with rain water you just lost your pH buffer leaving you wide open for a PH crash which will kill fish. Fish that are adjusted to a certain PH obviously won't have a problem, but if your fish are currently living in a high PH pond and that suddenly drops that will kill them. My comment had nothing to do with runoff and lawn chemicals, but rather the PH of rain water and it's effect on a ponds PH.

Glad you are not my wife cause I have to say you are right. Rainwater can test around 6 where natural bodies can test around 8 just from what I looked up last night. So far heavy rains has not effected my pH, but I do have a 3000 gal pond with rocks and other substrate in it.

Jason

LOL