Liquid pH corrector pH+

pH+ raises this value. It is built around potassium carbonate, an alkaline salt that also provides a small amount of potassium, a nutrient beneficial at every stage. Its second feature is less expected: it is also a source of silica. Silica accumulates in cell walls, thickening them, and makes stems more rigid and leaves less vulnerable to heat stress as well as insect attack.

Silica is not counted among the essential elements: a plant completes its cycle without it. It is, however, one of the most useful elements for something that is never measured, mechanical strength. Absorbed as silicic acid, it is deposited in cell walls, particularly in the epidermis and around the vascular tissue, where it stiffens and forms a mineral framework.

In practice, this means stems that carry their load without flopping over, petioles that are less brittle to handle, and foliage that copes better with hot days because the thickened walls reduce moisture loss. That same barrier also makes the leaf harder to penetrate for piercing insects and surface fungi. The effect is most noticeable where the plant is working under load, on heavy-fruiting crops grown with TriPart Bloom and on fast-growing upright stems with TriPart Grow.

One important caveat: the silica content of this product is not published. No figures exist in the official documentation, so no dose per hectolitre can be given here, and pH+ should not be regarded as a dedicated silica supplement. It is a secondary benefit of a pH correction, nothing more. On an inert grow medium, which itself contributes no silica either, this detail matters more: see our grow medium guide.

All three circulate as quick fixes, and all three present a different problem. Baking soda raises pH effectively, but does so by introducing sodium, an element that plants have no nutritional use for. Sodium is not taken up by the roots at anything like the rate it's added: it stays in the reservoir, accumulates with every correction and every top-up, drives conductivity up without providing any nutrition, and then competes with potassium at the point of uptake. Over a solution changed every two or three weeks this goes unnoticed; over a passive grow run to completion with the same water, it eventually becomes apparent.

Lime and wood ash have the opposite flaw, a complete lack of precision: they deliver calcium and potassium in quantities that are impossible to control, dissolve slowly and only partially, cloud the water with a haze that takes days to settle, and leave a residue that continues to act after the reading has stabilised. You end up correcting a value that is still moving. Wood ash varies entirely from one batch to the next. A formulated corrector does the opposite: a known, immediate effect, and nothing else added to the water. The pH- meets the same requirement in the other direction, and our article on common mistakes revisits these quick fixes that end up costing more than they save.