contaminated water buts

[Ken the Chef]

Last year I found that a lot of my tender plants were dying back and was told that my water but may be contaminated.
Is there any thing I can do to prevent this happening again this year.
I have three containers with approx 1000ltrs storeage capacity

[sweetiepea]

If you even suspect that your butts are contaminated, empty completely and wash thoroughly. Keep them covered and ensure there is no debris at the bottom. If there is make sure you remove it all, or the problem may reoccur. Check that your gutters and drain pipes (or whatever collection method you use) are clean too. Also, make sure the water is used / replenished regularly to avoid stagnation.

[PAULW]

Avoid watering seedlings/young plants from water butts, older plant will not be harmed

[Jeanied]

Ken what could they have been contaminated with? If it is just stagnant rainwater then PaulW is spot on - older plants will be fine. The only time I got problems with seedlings damping off was when they were watered with rainwater from the butt. But if you have had some dreadful environmental incident with the rain getting contaminated - then I dunno!

[Snadger]

Funny you should mention this.............

One of my water butts appears to be contaminated with something and it is right next to a public pathway? I have a feeling that someone has chucked something undesirable into it and will clean it out and reposition it when I get time.
The plastic is not porous so if tipped out and rinsed well all traces should be removed.
Will put a lid on mine when I repositon it!

[Ken the Chef]

I had been told to use only tap water on new sowing and seedlings but no explanation offered. Tha water can't be that bad or the fish I had in it previosly would have been killed. That water came from the same roof too.
The water in my butts apears to be very clean, no discolouring etc etc
I will make a point of only watering new stuff from the tap.
Thanks everybody

[snohare]

If possible, leave the tap water for a few hours to let the chlorine residue and other byproducts of the water filtration processes to evaporate off. The biocidal qualities of these are the reason why some growers swear that they get better results from rainwater than tapwater. (As usual, it is a trade off of chemical versus bacterial and fungal contamination.)
Personally I have never seen tapwater actually kill anything, but I have seen excellent wee seedlings thriving on sunwarmed rainwater when my ones from the same batch languished with tapwater.
Have you tried buying any of the waterbutt cleaning products ? Although I would say if your water looks clear and smells okay, if anything it is chemicals that are your problem, and you might want to use detergents for removing that.
Oh, and whatever you water with, to prevent damping off soak a chamomile tea bag in the water until it is amber coloured. I know a commercial grower who swears by this.