Paintable Moss Art

[RustyDHart]

I love this idea....I'm going to try this on some old Urn type pots that I have. Thanks for the recipe and info.....

 

[journey11]

I am with Lesa everything is better covered in moss. I have tryed the buttermilk a few times and was disapointed.I found the best way to grow moss on cement object was to put it in a goldfish pond i have. Not sure how good it is for the fsh but moss grows in a couple of days.

As you mention that, I was wondering if adding a little fish emulsion to the mix would help? I saw something...vaguely remembering details...about painting urns with fish emulsion to age them quickly. Must be that it helps grow moss. Your goldfish experiment probably explains why river rocks are so mossy.

I also saw another recipe using beer and a little bit of sugar...

 

[Jared77]

I bet its the concentration of available nutrients.

Fact Fish waste products (aka fish manure) is broken down by bacteria in the water into NH4, NO2 and NO3 (ammonia, nitrite and nitrate) with nitrate being the easiest form for plants to make use of the available nitrogen.

Theory Using fish emulsion would definately give the moss a kick start since its not a complex organism like say a tree or a bush is so you would see rapid growth very quickly because moss I don't think needs a lot of nutrients to grow. I wonder about using molasses since thats supposed to be packed with nutrients too. Might be worth mixing into the buttermilk to help give it a quick shot of nutrients.

Either way thats great stuff Journey thank you for sharing. I'm a big fan of mosses. I like how they soften edges and make things look "aged" or "undistrubed" I guess would be another good choice of words.

 

[NwMtGardener]

I'm wondering if you might end up with ant/bug problems using the molasses...if that wouldn't be an issue for you, might as well try.

 

[Jared77]

I don't know, I haven't heard of anybody having issues with it before and they are putting it IN the ground. That's why I clarified it however I don't know. I may try a couple pots one with the standard recipe, one with fish emulsion added, and one with molasses added. One more project to add to my list of things to do.

Those would just be an experimental pots see if I couldn't improve on the recipe. It will have something simple in it that if the pot gets covered in ants I could easily transplant it. Then Ill soak it so the sugar is removed. No big deal. Failures are only failures if you don't learn from them.

 

[Nyboy]

At my city house I have a small 200 gallon pond with cheap goldfish. I bought a new cement fountain and placed it on a shelf, half was under water. A few days later I was playing with the fountain and couldn't believe how much moss was growing on part underwater. I have put several new cement planters in the pond and all quicky grew moss. I don't know about trying this if you have exspenive koi, might change water ph.