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Water quality is a relevant factor for production of forest species, but it is not always taken into account in nurseries in Mexico. One of the parameters of water quality is its acidity. The objective of this work was to study the response in morphology and concentration of ions and cations in leaf tissue of Pinus cembroides Zucc., to different water pH and concentrations of compounds in fertigation solutions. Plants were cultivated in a nursery in 170 cm3 containers with a substrate made of peat moss (40 %), vermiculite (30 %) and agrolite (30 %). The experimental design was completely randomized blocks with two factors and two levels: 1) pH of irrigation water (8 and 5.5); 2) fertilization (ppm): establishment (50-123-73 of N, P, K for both levels), growth (100-22-83 and 150-33-125) and finalization (15- 41-109 and 30-82-218); these levels of fertilization were denominated low and high. The effect of factors and their interaction was determined with an ANOVA (p⩽0.10). The morphological variables and quality indexes evaluated were height, diameter, shoot dry weight, root dry weight, Dickson quality index, shoot/root ratio, lignification index, slenderness index and leaf nutrient concentration. There was no response in terms of morphological variables or indexes. There was, however, a response in leaf nutrient concentration. The highest leaf concentration of K (p⩽0.001) was obtained with high fertilization at both levels of pH, and the highest concentration of Mn with higher fertilization without adjusting pH (8.0). The highest concentrations of Ca (p⩽0.092), Mg (p⩽0.074), and Cu (p⩽0.093) occurred with high fertilization and pH=5.5, and that of Zn (p⩽0.001) was with low fertilization and adjusted pH. There were interactions between fertilization and water pH for K (p⩽0.005), Ca (p⩽0.1) and Zn (p⩽0.039). The highest nutrient concentrations were obtained with water pH=5.5 and high fertilization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]