Mixed up my ferts, need your help to ID them

[Kilgore]

Hi All,

Well, I was in a hurry before I went out of town and mixed up the lids to my canisters of dry ferts. Oops! I have only been dosing them for a couple of weeks now and I can't remember which is which, but I know some lids got mixed up because the Plantex lid (the only one I know for sure) ended up on one of the other canisters. I just need help telling the difference between the potassium nitrate, potassium sulfate, and mono-potassium phosphate.

The way I would describe the 3 "unkowns" are as follows:

1) Very fine
2) Fine
3) Fairly coarse

They are all white substances. The first one is more like a powder, and the last two are more like salt and sugar. Hope someone can help me. Thanks!

 

[Lonewolfblue]

Hope this helps.

The Potassium sulfate is the finest (like a powder), and the Mono-Potassium Phosphate is the coarsest. The Potassium nitrate is kind of in between.

 

[Purrbox]

I would try mixing a small solution of each. Using your test kits you should be able to tell them apart by determining which ones has a reading for PO4 and which one has a reading for NO3.

 

[src]

Good idea, Purrbox. And for the future, label the containers as well as the lids.

 

[Kilgore]

Thanks guys, I can fertilize my tanks with confidence tomorrow. I was going to try the test kit thing but I had no idea how much to add of each to such a small quantity of water in order to get a valid test (i.e. too much and it can just precipitate out, giving a false negative result).

And I will label the containers now that I know, lol!