Growing Willow Moss in tubberware.

1472 Views 6 Replies 2 Participants Last post by Little Soprano, Mar 30, 2014

Little Soprano

Discussion Starter · Mar 30, 2014 (Edited)

The 40 Gallon Long has a few bunches of Willow moss in the tank, and it is just growing like MAD. Wrapping itself around lava rocks, gravel, etc. When I went to pull out the Wysteria to trim it better, I had to move the moss to get to it's roots, and I couldn't even get some of the gravel out. It's a VERY lush green as well.

In my Shrimp tank I'm planning on using quite a bit of the willow moss, as it's one of my favorites. Is it possible to cut off a few trimmings, and put them in a Tupperware container filled with water and in indirect sunlight? If so it would end up being way cheaper then buying all of it, not saying the stuff is expensive, but still... It's going to be until at least May when I can get out to the Dunes to get driftwood for the tank, but would the willow moss clippings actually grow quite a bit in a setting like that?

Should I put dirt in of any sort? Or could I attempt to grow it on matts to make it easy to replant in the tank?

Thank you in advance

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creekbottom

· #2 · Mar 30, 2014

Put it in the container, and try just high humidity instead of submerged in water. I've done this with some moss and it is growing like crazy. I mist it daily with old tank water.

This gets rid of the algae problems from growing moss in containers and it grows faster out of water. It will take some time to adjust to emmersed conditions though. I think mine took about a week or so.

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Little Soprano

Discussion Starter · #3 · Mar 30, 2014

creekbottom said:
Put it in the container, and try just high humidity instead of submerged in water. I've done this with some moss and it is growing like crazy. I mist it daily with old tank water.

This gets rid of the algae problems from growing moss in containers and it grows faster out of water. It will take some time to adjust to emmersed conditions though. I think mine took about a week or so.

Will it transfer fairly easy to being submerged again at a later point? I don't mind some browning as I know it should recover, but how well did it fair on the switch back?

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creekbottom

· #4 · Mar 30, 2014

I haven't switched mine back yet. I would think that going from emmersed to submersed would be less likely to cause any browning because the 'humidity' is getting even higher.

The only tips that I've lost have been the ones that I miss when I'm misting. Not very many.

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Little Soprano

Discussion Starter · #5 · Mar 30, 2014

So will that be satisfactory? It isn't necessarily bright enough out right now for it to be sitting in the window, but I put it behind my tank and it's getting light off of one of the T5s jerry rigged to the hood. The piece I snipped off isn't in direct light, so I assume it will be okay?

I just put a little bit of tank water in the bottom, misted the saran wrap, and threw a few little clippings in. Anything I'm missing? Or is it really that simple...

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