Effectiveness of Glyphosate mixed with hard water

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I will be using glyphosate later today and learned something this morning.
Hard water, like in parts of the south east and Staffordshire with Ca ²+ or Mg ²+ levels above 400ppm reduces the effectiveness of Glyphosate. The glyphosate bonds to the minerals in a cation reaction and what gets sprayed on the leaves is less biologically active.
If you must use this evil stuff and live in a hard water area you will get more bang for your buck if you mix with demineralised water.
It's been a long time but I think the pertinent information on what's in your water can be found on your utility companies website.
 

HMS_Dave

Grand Old Lady
I'm interested. My toilet bowl constantly builds up with mineralisation here in staffs...
 
Evil stuff just arrived as I was processing water through a resin ion exchange filter.
GLS driver asked me what the funny looking tubes are for, magic I said.
Time to attack nature.
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Yes demin or RO water would be much better in this case. The phosphate (Po4) in the glyphosate is attracted to the calcium and mag (more the calcium) and it then will not do it's job, or less effectively at least.

I use the same principal to strip Po4 from water here (here i use Lanthanum chloride)
 

Profpointy

Legendary Member
I didn't know that, and whilst it's been pretty effective, I'm having difficulty killiing ivy growing on our back wall despite several sprayings. We've a 30' wall at the end of the garden so I'm keen the ivy doesn't damage it and cause the garden, and more importantly the house to march down the hill into the gardens below
 

PK99

Legendary Member
Location
SW19
I didn't know that, and whilst it's been pretty effective, I'm having difficulty killiing ivy growing on our back wall despite several sprayings. We've a 30' wall at the end of the garden so I'm keen the ivy doesn't damage it and cause the garden, and more importantly the house to march down the hill into the gardens below

Cut the stem low down.

Top growth will die.

Spray regrowth from the stump as often as needed
 

HMS_Dave

Grand Old Lady
I don't do gardens. Back to the drawing board for me then...
 
Yes demin or RO water would be much better in this case. The phosphate (Po4) in the glyphosate is attracted to the calcium and mag (more the calcium) and it then will not do it's job, or less effectively at least.

I use the same principal to strip Po4 from water here (here i use Lanthanum chloride)
I use this, reef aquarium types use them. It will strip minerals from +400ppm water to 2ppm but it needs to be regenerated after only 100L throughput. Hydrochloric at 15% for the cationic and anything caustic at 20% for the anionic.
I normally use it to finish water for a water jet cutting machine or water for the clothes iron.
It's been a long time since I was able to deploy glyphosate due to the ban on retail sales here.
I am going to enjoy this. :biggrin:
I would prefer 120M3 of chipped wood mulch to suppress the weeds but I need a lottery win for that.
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I use this, reef aquarium types use them. It will strip minerals from +400ppm water to 2ppm but it needs to be regenerated after only 100L throughput. Hydrochloric at 15% for the cationic and anything caustic at 20% for the anionic.
I normally use it to finish water for a water jet cutting machine or water for the clothes iron.
It's been a long time since I was able to deploy glyphosate due to the ban on retail sales here.
I am going to enjoy this. :biggrin:
I would prefer 120M3 of chipped wood mulch to suppress the weeds but I need a lottery win for that.
View attachment 582888

Yes that's my application: reef aquarium. I produce around 15,000 ltrs of zero TDS water before i change the resin though:okay:
 
I didn't know that, and whilst it's been pretty effective, I'm having difficulty killiing ivy growing on our back wall despite several sprayings. We've a 30' wall at the end of the garden so I'm keen the ivy doesn't damage it and cause the garden, and more importantly the house to march down the hill into the gardens below
This is Boston Ivy which is not a true Ivy. It attaches itself with tiny sucker hands unlike the true Ivy's.
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This is the base of my Ivy, it's on a gable wall.
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Ivy gets a bad rap, only in unsound mortar and copings would it cause problems.
 
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