Growing food with high nitrate water? Help!
Growing food/livestock with high nitrate water? Help!
We recently bought a home and made a lot of mistakes. Please don’t remind me. I can’t stop thinking about it.
I will attach a screenshot of our water results from our well. As mentioned, we did not do enough research and now I’m afraid of the quality of our water will produce unhealthy food. Is there any data on this? It seems hard to find for me.
Water is very hard and seems to be high in a few key areas. When we were first purchasing nitrate was all I was concerned about as we have four young babies. We have an RO system for the sink.
But a big part of buying these 2.5 acres was growing vegetables and fruit, as well as raising chickens for eggs and goats for milk.
I’m having a hard time understanding if watering garden food with this water will produce unhealthy food. I understand it may help the food grow, but that’s not my concern.
I am a complete novice so any help is appreciated. Don’t need to sugarcoat it.
I am in Colorado slightly northeast in Morgan County. Surrounded by several dairy farms, as well as some crops I have not identified yet.
by UserAldo_
3 Comments
My spring has high nitrate water. The only thing we were careful about was the kids not drinking too much of it, particularly when very young. So bottled water for them (although I’m not sure I trust the plastic bottle leachates much more).
But as far as your garden goes, it’s fine for growing anything. If you’ve ever fertilized anything in your garden before then you’ve hit it with stuff way stronger than that water. Ditto for your body, if you eat bacon.
*Edit. Have you checked that your filter system on your kitchen supply specifically extracts nitrates? I know ours didn’t, hence the bottled water for kiddos.
Watering your gardens is fine as is bathing. Babies and pregnant women shouldn’t drink it. Don’t use the untreated water to boil, as boiling will concentrate the nitrate concentrations. Maintain your RO system per manufacturer instructions. Ask your vet if there are any livestock concerns; the only thing I’ve heard of is young and small animals can be affected similar to children under 6 mos, but check with the vet!
Plants love nitrates.