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Potting Media Mistake

I bought two beautiful plants from petflytrap 2 months ago....1 was a prepotted green dragon and the other was barefoot green dragon.....the potted plant I placed in a sunny windowsill and is doing very well.....the bareroot did fine for 2 weeks then slowly declined then seemed to go dormant....it also looked burned....

I could not figure it out for the life of me....what have I done to this poor plant.....the light, water, and position were almost identical.....then it hit me...playsand...I had made a 50/50 mix of playsand to peat....and my local water is hard.....so I got some Sanivac(10% phosphoric acid cleaning solution used on lime deposits) and tested a small pinch of sand....it practically exploded....my playsand was contaminated! IT WAS FULL OF NASTY DISSOLVED minerals!
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How could I be so foolish...how could I make a stupid error like that!
mad.gif
AGGGGRRRH!

So stick with nice safe perlite or test a small smaple of your sand before you use it......otherwise you to might see your pride and joy slowly start to wither and die for no apparent reason......
ghostface.gif
 
Whoooaah, not good. If I were you, I'd go to Home Depot and pick up a 50 pound bag of sandblasting sand. I have had no problems so far with that stuff.

SF
 
how much is a fifty pound bag of sandblasting sand? Do you have to rince it out with RO water? or is it good to go right out the bag?
 
I think mine was only a couple of bucks. I don't remember the exact price, as I got mine so long ago. It has lasted FOREVER!! I didn't wash out my sand (I know, I'm lazy) and have had no problems.

SF
 
I`m SO sorry to hear that! <span id='ME'><center>pond boy saddened.</center></span>
 
Hmm, I think I might go for some sand-blasting sand.
 
My Saturday job is at Home Depot. I've seen two play sands - one is throrgh the garden department and the other through building materials. There are several products under the Quikrete label, but I don't recall one called sand-blasting sand. what is the exact name of that particular sand?
 
<span style='font-size:12pt;line-height:100%'>There are different brands/manufacturers, they are all quartz/silica sands and the label will mention the grit size and that they are specifically for sandblasting.</span>
 
don't worry about it. . . my first cp- a sarr died because I repotted it into some construction sand and peat, I read on the internet they liked that mix. Now I always use perlite instead.
 
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