# Hydrogen Peroxide



## gego (Nov 28, 2016)

I read about some uses of this stuff in a diluted form in potted plants, anyone tried/used this on orchids in general? Any benefits?

Thanks


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## Chicago Chad (Nov 28, 2016)

Yes and it will also kill beneficial bacteria so I follow up with an innocculent.
I use it on plant bases that look sketchy. I see no reason to water it through the mix.


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## orcoholic (Nov 28, 2016)

I don't think you have to dilute it, but will be looking to see what others have to say.


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## gego (Nov 28, 2016)

Chicago Chad said:


> Yes and it will also kill beneficial bacteria so I follow up with an innocculent.
> I use it on plant bases that look sketchy. I see no reason to water it through the mix.



So this is just as effective as any fungicide/bactericide? But you don't water/drench it to media. Are you just applying it to the infected part with a 3% solution?

This write up says watering the whole media with 5% solution.


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## gego (Nov 28, 2016)

orcoholic said:


> I don't think you have to dilute it, but will be looking to see what others have to say.



You have used it at 3% on the media? Did you see any benefits? Like the plant liked the extra oxygen?


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## Chicago Chad (Nov 28, 2016)

3% undiluted, small sprits at sites of concern


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## tomkalina (Nov 28, 2016)

We use it on open wounds, never as a drench.


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## AdamD (Nov 28, 2016)

I've read it does well against fungus gnats. But I'm too chicken to try it...


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## gego (Nov 28, 2016)

Thanks to all. I guess I can try drenching some guinea plants. 

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## Mark Karayannis (Nov 29, 2016)

I have used the 3% solution by it self as a spray with good results


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## cnycharles (Nov 29, 2016)

A while back I'd read about using it diluted against bugs and disease but don't remember rates or cautions


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## JAB (Nov 29, 2016)

Alan Koch is a big advocate of using HP. Good enough for him, good enough for me.


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## gego (Nov 29, 2016)

cnycharles said:


> A while back I'd read about using it diluted against bugs and disease but don't remember rates or cautions
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk



There are infos in the net, some say 3% for treatment some say 5% but for daily watering, suggestion is half a cup of 3% to a gal of water.


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## Happypaphy7 (Nov 29, 2016)

What they sell at a drug store, I think 3% is what I see, you use it as is.
If you mix half a cup of this to a gallon of water, it is basically water. There is no point of using it. 

I am not sure what negative effects it might have on the roots, I doubt there will be any, just as it is meant to be used on humans, it would be best for disinfecting open wounds. 

Someone mentioned benefit of oxygen. There is none.
When you see it fizzles, that is when it is separating into water and oxygen. 
Oxygen will just dissipate into the atmosphere.


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## cnycharles (Nov 30, 2016)

A quick google search found research with nasturtiums in pots where one teaspoon h2o2 in a gallon of distilled water was used to water, improved whole plant root and flower mass, so there is some benefit in certain conditions


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## myxodex (Nov 30, 2016)

Happypaphy7 said:


> What they sell at a drug store, I think 3% is what I see, you use it as is.
> If you mix half a cup of this to a gallon of water, it is basically water. There is no point of using it.
> 
> I am not sure what negative effects it might have on the roots, I doubt there will be any, just as it is meant to be used on humans, it would be best for disinfecting open wounds.
> ...



I get 35% HP from a general chemical vendor online. Some hydroponics vendors sell 17.5% for oxygenating irrigation solutions but the 35% works out cheaper. I don't know whether you can get either of these in the US but if so be aware it will burn your skin so use gloves when handling and be careful ... read the hazard labelling. I use it to pretreat stagnant rain water when I run out of the fresh rain water and need to resort to the manky rain butt at back of the garden with a few rotting leaves and the odd drowned slug in it. The final concentration of HP is 0.02 - 0.03 %, but I leave it for 24h before use in a 25 L container with the cap tightly closed. When I do this I see tiny bubbles forming from the oxygen released, so by the time I use it the concentration of HP will already be extremely low, but my water is oxygen super-saturated and the facultative anaerobic and anaerobic bacterial count should be reduced (or that is my wishful thinking anyway). When I open the cap the water releases tiny bubbles because I have released the pressure and the solubility of oxygen in water at sea level at 20C is about 7.6 mg/L and I'm adding more than 10X this with the HP (0.02% or 200mg/L HP will produce a bit over 90mg O2 / L of water if completely decomposed and so the pressure in a sealed container does increase a bit depending on the extent of HP decomposition). This treatment is also sufficient to bleach out the pale brown colour of this water.

I think the point of drenching the medium with dilute HP is to reduce or inhibit any pockets of medium that might have become oxygen limited. If roots are fighting infection they have a higher respiratory demand and increasing oxygen supply might help and furthermore some of the rotting bacteria might be sensitive to HP and higher oxygen levels. But I think you are right in the sense that if parts of the medium have become oxygen deprived then it's time to repot into a more open mix and HP treatment is a temporary fix at best. 

HP is really unstable stuff and decomposes quickly in the presence of transition metal ions (such as micronutrients in fertiliser) and even more rapidly when there is catalase present. Many bacteria excrete catalase; both pathogenic species such as Pseudomonas syringae and also many beneficial root associated bacteria. This will give them some protection from HP oxidation. Plant tissues also contain catalase. In response to infection plants actually make their own HP at the infected site. So plants should be fairly resistant to HP, and applying 3% HP at an infection site could help, but because it is unstable it would probably be better to apply repeatedly a few times a day. I suspect with some infections a smaller amount at a higher concentration would be necessary, even at the risk "burning" the plant tissue around the infection site, local damage might be preferable to losing the plant. HP's disinfection activity depends on it's oxidizing power and this is greatest in slightly acidic solutions (bizarrely it can even become a reducing agent in alkaline solutions). So if using the strong stuff for disinfection then dilute it in deionised or distilled water rather than tap water (especially if this is > pH7).


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## Happypaphy7 (Nov 30, 2016)

cnycharles said:


> A quick google search found research with nasturtiums in pots where one teaspoon h2o2 in a gallon of distilled water was used to water, improved whole plant root and flower mass, so there is some benefit in certain conditions
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk



Charles, did it say what was responsible for the help?
Was there a control group?
I'm just curious what benefit there possibly could be because hydrogen peroxide will separate out as water and gas.


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## SFLguy (Nov 30, 2016)

Someone was telling me about a study done by UF a while back where they grew some orchids in water that wasn't changed often, water changed regularly and HP changed regularly and found the ones in hp grew the best and had far stronger growth
I'll have to look into it some other time


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## cnycharles (Nov 30, 2016)

Happypaphy7 said:


> Charles, did it say what was responsible for the help?
> 
> Was there a control group?
> 
> I'm just curious what benefit there possibly could be because hydrogen peroxide will separate out as water and gas.





The study didn't say whether or not if the benefit was from a chemical response to the constituents before and after breakdown of h2o2, the benefit of having some oxygen in the soil, or from a reduction of soil disease (or a mix of each). 

They admitted openly not knowing why there was a benefit. They did say that different rates benefitted different responses, like more overall plants mass, just root mass, just flower mass, green leaf mass etc. 

They used an equal amount of water for each example, and the control was watering with distilled water with no peroxide

A benefit seen with farm treatment of waste cesspools is a removal of anaerobic bacteria. In poor soil a continual use of peroxide may limit the bacteria that will go to town where there isn't enough oxygen. The radicals created when peroxide breaks down can kill things that normally could invade roots. Putting a bit of oxygen in periodically and killing the anaerobic disease causing agents could allow roots to stay healthy and let a plant build up more. 

It's interesting that some studies show different benefits from different rates, like there might be something other than a little more oxygen and little less disease, but I haven't seen or personally heard of any research showing induced response like aspirin raising disease and insect resistance




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## naoki (Nov 30, 2016)

This is the one, right, Charles?
https://www.dirtdoctor.com/garden/Hydrogen-Peroxide-as-Soil-Amendment-Research_vq4078.htm

There are some hydroponic people talking about O2 for roots from hydrogen peroxide. I didn't find any evidence (published data) to support this claim. But what Charles found is kind of interesting. Even though they don't have any way to tell the mechanism, it seems likely that the slight difference in plant is likely to be due to the modified microbe composition (similar to what Chales said, and what the authors speculated). It would be interesting if they see the similar response in more aseptic condition (i.e. autoclaved soil).

As myxodex mentioned, H2O2 is likely to be involved in plant immune response. I don't know the details, but some papers suggested it could be a response down stream of SA signaling (of systemic acquired resistance, SAR). Also, in some plants, seed germination is influenced by H2O2.

It's unlikely that there is effect in epiphytic orchids (with regard to oxygen supply), but someone should try. But be careful if the area is enclosed. Increased O2/CO2 ratio is counter productive. Plants lose carbon due to photo-respiration since RUBISCO (enzyme important to CO2 assimilation) can bind to both.


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## gego (Dec 1, 2016)

My original intention was to treat my rain water that has been stagnant for a while. Collected from our clay roofing, I can see some other stuff collected along the way. I refrain using chemicals so I search for some organic solution.
I stumbled this notion about extra oxygen than can be supplied deep down below the potting. This is basically what we need so we don't over water the roots (no oxygen). In nature, rain could pick up a few oxygen before it reaches the ground. This extra oxygen could be the reason why these plants are not over watered even though they get soaked for days in their habitat. And probably control bad fungus/bacteria too. Not impossible.


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## Happypaphy7 (Dec 1, 2016)

Well, you should have stated it in the beginning. 
Now I'm interested reading about what others would say about treating rain water.


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## gego (Dec 1, 2016)

Now that got your attention.
I was just curious if somebody have already tried and have some results.
So far, nothing from the internet say it's a bad idea but just to be careful handling the stuff.
But I have already used some diluted water and so far the plants are fine.
I like to experiment, now I have another reason to buy another plant:wink:


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## naoki (Dec 1, 2016)

Myxodex has mentioned that he uses it for treating rain water (message #16). If you are using 3% HP, it will be quite expensive to get the concentration he is using.

When I started to use rain water, I worried about the water born opportunistic pathogen. But in practice, I haven't had any problems. Healthy, unstressed plants don't get sick easily from those opportunistic attack. We don't have lots of precipitation, so I have about 250 gallon rain barrels. So the water is stored there for a long time. In the winter, I have to move them indoor, and get stored for 4-5 months. There are some organic matters (fragmented leaves, pollen etc) even though large things are filtered out. So it does smell a bit like methane after a while. The only time I treat it by boiling is for deflasked seedlings (first 1-2 weeks), and for carnivorous plant seed germination (to reduce cyanobacteria bloom).

I think Bjorn uses pond water, and I don't think he treats it, neither.


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## gego (Dec 1, 2016)

35% HP is available in quartz or gallons. For drenching, 100 ppm is not expensive. If it actually works, that's the question.


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## cnycharles (Dec 2, 2016)

For the very concentrated hp, getting some on leather gloves will cause them to combust (yes, really). But that's super concentrated. 

For standing water in barrels, you could always turn on an air stone once in a while to get some air moving into it. Also periodic running through a UV filter can cancel out microbes (like for aquariums, or for big ebb/flood/ hydro systems)


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## Brabantia (Dec 2, 2016)

cnycharles said:


> A while back I'd read about using it diluted against bugs and disease but don't remember rates or cautions
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk



Look Here. At the bottom page 8. Many informations about the use of hydrogen peroxide.


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## SlipperFan (Dec 2, 2016)

Brabantia said:


> Look Here. At the bottom page 8. Many informations about the use of hydrogen peroxide.



Thanks -- very interesting.


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## troy (Dec 2, 2016)

Sweet!!! thanks brabantia!! Gego, alan was right


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## gego (Dec 2, 2016)

Yup, I saw the same article and more if you google it with plants and orchids and hydrophonics. It really got my interest. My 35% hp is on the way. 

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