# bright moss



## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

i have some moss on a wood that is really bright, almost white. any idea whats the reason for the moss getting so bright? 
is this a lack of nutrients? 
the moss seems to grow at a steady pace but i think it should be green and not white 

























i have other moss on the same wood that is a lot greener but its a different moss, however i think all my moss is really thin growing and im not so sure why this is. is this normal in the beginning that the moss is not as fat as it should be? or what could be the issue when moss is growing really thin?


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## FrogTim (Oct 1, 2015)

It looks fine probably more specific to the species of moss. Fertilizers tend to melt moss and be toxic to frogs so I would steer clear from those. Moss takes a while to fill in so be patient. If you are seeing growth then that is a good thing!

If it is growing and your temps and more importantly humidity are good then I wouldn't worry. If it isn't growing I would check the light, either too little or too much.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

FrogTim said:


> It looks fine probably more specific to the species of moss. Fertilizers tend to melt moss and be toxic to frogs so I would steer clear from those. Moss takes a while to fill in so be patient. If you are seeing growth then that is a good thing!
> 
> If it is growing and your temps and more importantly humidity are good then I wouldn't worry. If it isn't growing I would check the light, either too little or too much.


i have no frogs at the moment since i want to get the plant system in good shape first and know what im doing. i did not intend to use fertilizers in the tank since this can be harmful to frogs.

i think there is some of the same moss growing on the cement background next to the wood which looks a lot greener, i will take some pictures when the light is back on, which would rule out the species of the moss as reason for the color. 

the idea was to add a little bit of soil to a spot where the moss grows and see how it reacts (not everywhere of course) you think that is a bad idea?

i just hooked up a raspberry last week to control temp and humidity but at the moment its not optimal since the fan cycles are to long when humidity reaches a certain level, which drops the humidity a bit to much for my taste. i am working on new scripts to improve this, until now it was more in the 95-100% humidity range since i only had passive airflow and 2-3 more misting's a day.









my plan was to get to these ranges as optimal zones, any feedback on those?
humidity:	70-85
temperature:	21.0 - 26.6


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## FrogTim (Oct 1, 2015)

Adding a little soil to help it retain moisture may help. Your temps are fine. Humidity should really stay 80%+ but temporary drops into the 70s are perfectly OK.

Where are you fans blowing? Are they blowing directly onto any of these affected areas? 

Also, have you checked your light? is it shining intensely or not at all on the affected areas?

When adding moss to my tank it usually turns brown or fades before it starts growing and turning green. So far I've only been able to keep sheet moss green from the moment it enters the tank til it starts growing. Any moss slurry or cuttings I've used turn brown or fade before taking off.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

i will see that i can raise the humidity a bit more but until i wrote some new control scripts for the fans i think i can not prevent these huge drops:/
would a range from 80-95% be good or what range would you recommend?

there is currently no fan inside the tank, only one pulling air out when humidity/temp gets to high, but since its a euro-tank it has some passive airflow.
so no there is no direct air blowing on the area where the moss is so white.

the light is shining bright on the area since its pretty high up in the tank. you think it could be to much light that causes color loss?
here a pic where the moss is located









this moss was introduced as some mix and has taken like 2 month till it started to grow, sometimes when there are younger shoots they are more green than the older ones. 

i think i will put a tiny bit soil in one spot to see what happens and see that i get the humidity up a bit more.

and here a pic with the moss next to it which i mentioned, its clearly a lot greener but im not so sure anymore if its really the same species.


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## inka4040 (Oct 14, 2010)

Your bright moss looks like sphagnum that has resumed active growth. The color does look consistent with light stress/bleaching. 



FrogTim said:


> Fertilizers tend to melt moss


This has unequivocally not been my experience. I think that anyone who's ever seen tropical greenhouse benches, or had to scrape trash bags of moss and liverwort off of their benches and mounts would also tend to disagree with that sentiment.


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## Encyclia (Aug 23, 2013)

kromar said:


> i have no frogs at the moment since i want to get the plant system in good shape first and know what im doing. i did not intend to use fertilizers in the tank since this can be harmful to frogs.
> 
> i think there is some of the same moss growing on the cement background next to the wood which looks a lot greener, i will take some pictures when the light is back on, which would rule out the species of the moss as reason for the color.
> 
> ...


Those temps look fine and I like those humidity values just fine. I usually shoot for 60 - 80% humidity for dart frogs. Any higher than 80% and you are removing any chance for the frogs to cool evaporatively if they need to. Probably not as much of an issue this time of year, but it can be an issue in the summer when you might be running hotter temps, possibly without knowing it. 

Mark


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## FrogTim (Oct 1, 2015)

Did you say what light you were using? It does look like light bleaching.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

FrogTim said:


> Did you say what light you were using? It does look like light bleaching.


I have 2 beamslight led about 10cm above the tank. Would light bleaching come frome to many hours or to intense light?


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## JPP (Mar 25, 2015)

kromar said:


> I have 2 beamslight led about 10cm above the tank. Would light bleaching come frome to many hours or to intense light?


Beamsworks LED fixtures? Which ones? They make many different units with different optics and LED strengths. 

And how tall is that tank?


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## FrogTim (Oct 1, 2015)

kromar said:


> I have 2 beamslight led about 10cm above the tank. Would light bleaching come frome to many hours or to intense light?


It could come from too intense light or too long of a photoperiod.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

JPP said:


> Beamsworks LED fixtures? Which ones? They make many different units with different optics and LED strengths.
> 
> And how tall is that tank?


both are 6500k with i think 0.5w leds, so no lense 3w leds. i think one has 48 leds and the other one 80.

the tank is 50cm (~20") in height, 40cm (~15") depth and 60cm (~24") width.
one is 50% wider than the other one, the one i lift up in the 2nd picture.

and i have 12h lights on per day.


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## FrogTim (Oct 1, 2015)

kromar said:


> both are 6500k with i think 0.5w leds, so no lense 3w leds. i think one has 48 leds and the other one 80.
> 
> the tank is 50cm (~20") in height, 40cm (~15") depth and 60cm (~24") width.
> one is 50% wider than the other one, the one i lift up in the 2nd picture.
> ...


So both are 0.5watt fixtures? I am not familiar with any 3watt BW fixtures without lenses.

It could be light burn. Is there any other moss at the same height/area in the tank that is doing well? Those 0.5watt fixtures are pretty powerful up close especially directly under the fixture.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

Yes they are both 0.5w without any lenses. 
There is other moss growing up ther which looks a lot greener, one of the pictures i posted shows some moss between the other plants and that has a nice green so far. One other is a bit bright.
I think i will keep things the way they are for now since it seems to grow fine and see how it develops. And only do really little changes to see if the changes make a difference.
If its to much light i can always turn one lamp off and see how that works out.


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## FrogTim (Oct 1, 2015)

I wouldn't worry about it either. The rest of your tank looks great. Why bother turning off a light just so one branch will grow moss on it?

Clean looking set up by the way. I really like how you have your lights set up.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

FrogTim said:


> I wouldn't worry about it either. The rest of your tank looks great. Why bother turning off a light just so one branch will grow moss on it?
> 
> Clean looking set up by the way. I really like how you have your lights set up.


thanks for the feedback on the topic and the tank
also the moss is still growing, just white. so maybe i will have a white moss carpet on the wood which would be really cool

however since i plan to do some experimenting how the plants react to environmental changes i will still change some parameters when i have everything set up. i will of course start a thread with the experiments when i get there (of course no frogs involved in the tests)


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## Panther (Feb 23, 2014)

I'd suspect it's either nascent, is a more marginal/hydrophilic species that realizes it doesn't like to be up high, or does not have enough nitrogen.

I'd let it play out and see what happens. Many species of moss either darken or lighten, depending on moisture content.


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

i did some googling because the leaves of my orchid are turning violet and i wanted to know when this happens. apparently they start to change color when they had enough light.
that might be a good indicator that the moss is getting a bit too much as well. 
i have now set one lamp to low light mode to reduce the overall light intensity and will see how that will influence the orchid and the moss.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

I've grown mosses pretty close to VHO's without a loss of coloration (except in growing tips) of mosses. 

Is the tips of the moss drying out? If it is drying out it can also cause a whitening of the tips in my experience. 

If you can get the picture large enough, there is naturally growing sphagum that dries out quickly and as a result the tips are white but it is still growing albeit not quickly since when the reservoir for the misting system runs low I let the tanks dry out for several days to a couple of weeks. 

Some comments 

Ed


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

Ed said:


> I've grown mosses pretty close to VHO's without a loss of coloration (except in growing tips) of mosses.
> 
> Is the tips of the moss drying out? If it is drying out it can also cause a whitening of the tips in my experience.
> 
> ...


thanks for the information, seems strange that it would turn white for me when your light is also really strong, maybe its something with bright led's?

i dont think its dried tips since its not looking dry, i made a close up shot and i think it can clearly been seen that its not dry. however it seems it got some more green so not sure if thats already the reduced light that causes this.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

It could be that the tips are growing faster than the chlorophyll can become established in the cells. This would lead to a white color that then darkens to green with age. 

Some comments 

Ed


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## kromar (Jun 6, 2015)

Ed said:


> It could be that the tips are growing faster than the chlorophyll can become established in the cells. This would lead to a white color that then darkens to green with age.
> 
> Some comments
> 
> Ed


maybe so, and since its young the whole thing is almost white. well i will keep the light a bit dimmer since it looks like the moss is getting a bit more color since ive done so, and if it grows in a bit more i will see what happens if i blast it with the full light again. if it turns white again i know for sure it was the light 
but lets first wait if it really gets green


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