How to grow such beautiful moss?

[mass]

I'm just looking for as many personal accounts as possible.

Oh, mah bad..
In that case, I just got an EXPLOSION of LFS in my pots. All I did was give lower night time temps, and much higher humidity. Since I bagged everyone up a couple weeks ago in anticipation of my upcoming move they are now getting intense humidity levels. The moss is going nuts..
85%-100% humidity
75* daytime
48* nighttime
light levels are full spectrum w/partial sun, but not strong

[TheFury]

Thanks mass! If those conditions worked that well for you then it sounds like i should be able to come very close in terms of light, humidity, and temps if i grow the moss in a box. Once the moss actually sprouts, that is. My concern is what happens if i harvest some of that moss and use it as a top dressing. My humidity in my open rack only touches the 80s overnight; during the day it's around 55. I'll just have to wait and see!

[Zhilin]

Thank you for all your rapid reply. You guys never found any algae or fungus among the moss? These two weeks are all rainy days in my place. And the wind is very strong. However, yesterday I found there were dark green algae appearing among the moss in my nep pots. The air-movement was very good, since I am growing my neps outdoor (put in a big box, but the box top is completely open). I really hate hate such algae and fungus.

[amphirion]

algae is present because a significant amount of nitrates are present that they are able to exploit--could be from not flushing the pot after fertilization. fungus as well. you should try to get live sphagnum as possible since live sphag will absorb those nitrates and keep fungus at bay as well.

[seedjar]

I think amph might be right about the reason for the algae. The open box you're using probably allows for good air circulation so far as the plants are concerned, but it does keep in some humidity, and if it has opaque sides they might increase the ambient light available at the soil level. I don't know much about preventing algae, besides leaving pots out in the rain to wash out all the stuff that the algae wants. I do have a trick for getting rid of it, though - use a spray bottle and just break it apart whenever it shows up. Don't mist the pot - use a harsh setting and hose down the algae like you're washing your driveway. If you break it up enough, it will mostly die, and there will be less when it does come back. Eventually the top of the media won't have the nutrients to support it coming back, or something sturdier like moss will take over as groundcover. Utricularia are pretty handy for wedging out algae and other soil pests.
~Joe

[swords]

I would cover your box with a lid, leaving only a small opening like 1" wide x the length of the tank, you don't need much circulation to keep fungus at bay. However, I have never been able to grow live sphagnum outdoors. Indoors I don't seem to have a problem getting it started and growing it.

I start a tank like this with a bed of 2"+ of dead moist LFS and some chopped bits of live sphagnum



These plants have just been put in here after I setup the moss bed tonight


This tank has been going for some months with plenty of live sphagnum to trim and seed new tanks and pot tops

You're not limited to sphagnum:

This one isn't sphagnum but mostly a kind of fern leaf liverwort that I like to use in my display terrariums so i culture it the same way


This one is another type of moss I like to use in display terrariums


The principle is the same in each, seed the moist bed of dead LFS with your moss, liverwort or whatever, press it down into the bed and I use a heavy duty garden sprayer to soak it down. Give it moderate temps, light and very high humidity and the moss will do it's thing. My tanks all have only a 1" ventilation gap with no molds and fungus.

Distilled water is the best, R/O seems to still allow algae to grow.

[Zhilin]

Thank you, amph and Joe. I generally water the pots once a week, or even once per two weeks, and I think I don't flush the pots heavily (because I want to save some R.O.water). Meanwhile I mist the neps with light fertilizer once a week. Maybe this is the reason that the nutrition accumulates on the top soil and let the algae grow. I will increase the watering strength (heavily flush the pots) and see the results.

---------- Post added at 06:38 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:12 PM ----------

Hi, swords, Thanks for the pics. They are nice terrariums. My setup is similar to yours (except that I have more air-movement than yours), but unfortunately I have the problems As I said above, maybe my fertilizer spray and less watering allow the algae grow.

PS: your N.raff 'red giant' in the second pic is very nice.

[Taliesin-DS]

I wish i had room for terrariums like that :O