These are the ones I have found:

I've found this one for $36 available several places, it makes no claim as to how much chlorine it removes, but does say it's a 5micron filter good for 7,500 to 10,000 gallons.

This one says it removes 85% of chlorine and cost upwards of $50. Good for 20,000 to 40,000 gallons.

This one is good for 30,000 gallons and removes 85%-90%
of chlorine and also chloramine. But it does say not for use w/ ponds.

Bruce Deuley speaks of using hose end sprayers and compost tea as being compatible, even without a chlorine filter, because of the sheer number of BIM that will make it to the soil in spite of cholorinated water.

He also talks about using an Evenflo fertilizing system with a hose and sprinkler with wheels. (This is also mentioned in the Teaming with Microbes book.)

http://www.dripdepot.com/fertigation-fertilizer-injectors.html?id=L4DKVJMS

I know that some of the drip depot things come with chlorine filters but yours look more substantial. Again, thanks for posting these.

Have you seen the thread on Bug Juice? Lots of links to do with compost teas, beneficial Bug Juice, and the videos.

You're right...we've all been doing it for years.

However, my BIL and I noticed an interesting thing last year when we planted tomatoes around the same time. When we watered with the hose, we both got yellowing leaves from the bottom up. He got some AquaSafe to try with handwatering another tomato plant and the plant was much happier. Plus the growth of the plants was just slower when we both just used hose water. After a good rain, everything perked up and took off.

Neither of us was paying much attention to BIM at the time, I had done a lasagna bed which was doing SOME composting of the materials but not a ton. He was planting in containers with sterile potting soil and adding tomato fertilizer. Neither of us had "grown" our own compost at the time, either.

We are both playing with adjusting our growing conditions, bIM, compost teas, etc. this year so adding a chlorine filter might be of added benefit.

I know this sounds like I'm contradicting what I said above but am more into the "experimenting" in the garden this year so I want to do several kinds of tests.

I haven't seen any of these in the box stores but haven't looked other than the kitchen tap filter I got at wally world a few weeks ago.

Before I spent money on a filter I would find out what type of disinfection my public water supply is using. Chlorine dissipates rapidly and doesn't need to be filtered out. Chloramine on the other hand doesn't dissipate a squickly and you might want a filter if your PWS is disinfecting with it...

What makes them work, well, the Zeolite catches the chlorine, but the water has to be moving slowly across the Zeolite. That is why the filter is so large. When the water flows in from the hose, it hits the large diameter of the filter and slows way down. Of course the Zeolite inside takes up most of that extra volume so the water does not slow down as much as you might calculate it does. It slows down enough.

If you live in South Texas you can get Zeolite kitty litter at H-E-B grocery store. It comes in under the brand, Hill Country Faire, their house brand. Its in a blue bag and looks fairly generic. It's the cheapest kitty litter they have.

The unfortunate thing with these devices is you never know if they are working unless you test the water going in and again coming out. I don't know if mine worked.

I think Bruce Deuley is going off the experiments done by some of his friends who tested the San Antonio water. They found that delivering compost tea with chlorinated water killed about 50% of the microbes. That still leaves you with 50% which is more than you started with. That was announced on an organic gardening radio show in 2005.

I can't really help about the filter as I'm now using well water.

Perhaps an option if you find the filters restrict water flow to much for hose spraying to work, you might be able to get a small pump that could give you enough pressure from say a rain barrel to do some quick spraying?

Do chloramines affect fish?

Yes, just like chlorine, chloramines must be removed from the water. See your local pet supplier.

Can I let water sit for a few days like I do with chlorinated water before adding to my fish tank or pond?

No. Unlike chlorine, which dissipates when water sits for a few days, chloramines may take weeks to disappear. If you don’t want to use a dechloraminating chemical, the next best solution is to install a granular activated carbon filter and allow sufficient contact time. Please talk with your pet supply representative.

That really makes me wonder, we have a beta living w/ a peace lily. I have always changed the water and poured it into my compost pile and rinsed and refilled w/ a gallon that I leave sitting for at least a day usually more but not always and it's been fine. While I was gone for a month the wife did it w/ straight tap water and it died the next day, she replaced it while the kids were at school.

I am going to integrate this Filter into my AWS system this year to see if filtering out all this stuff (or much of it) can improve plant health and tomato taste:

This was on the Santa Clara Water District site:

""Chlorinous
During the treatment process, chlorine is added to water as a disinfectant. Before the water leaves the treatment plant, ammonia is added to form chloramines to keep the water disinfected while it is distributed to homes and businesses. Chloramines may impart a chlorinous, or medicinal, taste or odor to your drinking water. Chloramines, rather than chlorine, are used to maintain a disinfectant residual because they are more stable, form fewer disinfection by-products, and tend to produce less offensive tastes and odors.""

So, I am concluding that chlorine never makes it to my house, but the chloramines do. Then the question becomes: Will any of these filters trap the chloramines - - or are they ineffective for this.

Ray

So it's the addition of ammonia to the already chlorinated water.

When I lived in UT we had Weber water for watering yards and gardens etc. You had a seperate spigot on the house for washing the car. I thought it was great when I was a kid, my dad had a blast pipe next to the sprinkler main to flush the system before turning the sprinklers on(keep them from clogging). Every once in a while a gold fish would come flying out and land halfway across the yard.

The "active ingredients" in this filter are not listed on the Watts website. Here is the description they give for the filter:

5 Year / 20,000 Gal Ice Maker Filter
Clean, Clear, Great Tasting Water. This NSF certified product is the perfect filter for residential and commercial ice makers.This filter will reduce chlorine taste and odors, as well as lime scale build-up. Filter contains a "bacteriostatic" media that inhibits bacteria growth. Longest lasting certified bacteriostatic filter on the market.

In addition, there is an instruction on the filter that reads: "Run water through for 15 minutes before first use to flush loose carbon particles". I take this to imply that the filter does indeed contain charcoal as a filtering agent, in addition to the fiberous filter materials.

I have emailed the Company requesting both the composition of this particular filter, as well as effectiveness of it filtering out chloramine.

Raybo

He said "roses will survive and grow if you water them with tap water [that is chlorinated] but they won't thrive". I'm interpreting "thrive" here to have a connotation of "optimum" that "survive" and "grow" don't have. I thought to myself, what about humans?

Thanks for posting about the filters. I'm gonna look into that as well. Keep us posted if you decide one is a lot better than another.

Could you list what parts you used?

I was at lowes today and was looking in the pvc parts for something I could put together. A 4'' canister and caps w/ hose threads. I didn't find any thing at all like it.

Interesting thread. I was debating what I could contribute that hasn't already been said. I will give it a go. Treated water is expensive. To use it more than what is absolutely needed is wasteful. The filter in your refrigerator cost $50 bucks a pop to replace every 6 months if your lucky, then the water doesn't flow as well if you don't. Almost all filtered water will be similar (except osmosis systems). The cartridges are a combination of filtering particle size and activated charcoal to absorb smells by chemically absorbing the the ions from the offensive additives. Activated charcoal sand filters are used by large unchlorinated water treatment plants to remove pesticides or other harmful chemical found in the water traveling through the soil and ending up in the ground water and reservoirs. These system are extremely expensive but the cost is spread over a large population using the water. The cost per day of the house sized system will be approximately $1.50. It would be easier to let your water stand in the sun for a day and eliminate the harmful free chlorine. The chlorimines are at a too low of a concentration (PPM) to spend that kind of money. Check with your local water agency what the concentration is. Where do those filter cartridges go after use? What price to just have the perfect compost tea. Think again. Aloha

Since the water has to travel through 2 x 100ft hoses, it smells and tastes terrible without the filter, even after it's been running a long while, even on a cloudy day. Also, most brass hose fittings, which I have, contain some lead to make them malleable.

It said it was good for several thousand gallons (again my memory isn't specific on the numbe) -- I'll find the ad and post it. I plan to definitely get another one this year.

I was at lowes today and was looking in the pvc parts for something I could put together. A 4'' canister and caps w/ hose threads. I didn't find any thing at all like it.

Lucky (or unlucky) you! I found a picture. It looks like it was taken with an old Barbie camera, so apologies for the quality. You can barely see the gray colored thread adaptor at the right side. You can see the kitty litter I used, charcoal, and Scotch brite pad I cut down to keep the filter innerds from flowing out into the hose.

If you have trouble finding the thread adaptors to go from hose threads to the pipe thread, ask a clerk. I had to ask everywhere I went looking for them.

It looks like I did not use any PVC pipe at all but only used pipe fittings. This experiment was from June of 2003 so I've forgotten a lot since then.

If you want to get an idea of a ratio of charcoal to kitty litter (zeolite), crack open a filter from one of those water filters you put into the container in your fridge (like a Pur). I was surprised to find only a few specks of black charcoal inside. Most of it is zeolite.

Still luckier YOU! I just went out and searched the archives of my garage and found the filter. Here's a modern picture.

As you can see I did use 2-inch PVC pipe in the middle. This picture shows the threaded parts much better. It has to come apart somewhere to fill, or refill, with the filter medium. The gray nipple on the left side is straight pipe threads, not hose threads. The female hose fits on the male pipe threads okay (not great), but at the other end I wanted a better solution. It is a real pipe to hose connector.

If I had it to do over again I would use 3-inch pipe for more filter volume and less water speed through the filter medium.

I am not trying to hawk these as I am not involved with them in any other way than as a consumer.

Good luck
timo