moss in tanks from the woods outside

[Angellove78]

My question is can you use moss from trees in the woods? I found some that look exactly like the ones I see for sale. Should I try it or no? Will it hurt my fish at all? I have nice piece in a bucket with only the roots in some of my tank water for now. The moss is above the water. Just wanted to see if it will take without dying. I have seen some use moss from the wild. But, wanted to see what y'all thing? Thanks!

 

[Brookster123]

Good question! Are you going to submerge it fully?

 

[BBradbury]

Hello Ang...

There's nothing on the outdoor moss that will harm your tank. Give it a try. It might grow. My guess is, it likely won't because of the change in the environment. You're putting it under water, so it may not adjust. I would place an airstone under the moss. This will provide a constant source of oxygen and might make the difference in whether or not the moss will live.

B

 

[Angellove78]

Good question! Are you going to submerge it fully?

Yes, eventually. I wanted to start off a few weeks just with the bottom (root system) under shallow water inside a jar. Then add more water in a few weeks to cover the moss if everything is still doing good. The way I see it, is: if moss grows in wet land it could grow in a tank if done right. I just wanted to make sure it wouldn't be toxic to my fish. I was going to test the water from the jar every week to make sure. Only because I have pine trees, pine sap. So, we'll see what happens. I'll update.

 

[Angellove78]

Hello Ang...

There's nothing on the outdoor moss that will harm your tank. Give it a try. It might grow. My guess is, it likely won't because of the change in the environment. You're putting it under water, so it may not adjust. I would place an airstone under the moss. This will provide a constant source of oxygen and might make the difference in whether or not the moss will live.

B

That would be a good idea with the air stone B. But the thing is I don't wanta have to keep an air stone on it all the time. I'll be slowly submerging the moss little by little every few weeks. I am mostly worried about pine sap from the pine trees is all.

 

[goatnad]

i have actually done this with some moss i found growing along the clay walls of a creek. i found 3 different types of moss(no clue what kinds they were). i put them in a 5 gallon bucket after i tied them to rocks. 2 of the 3 grew fine but the third one died off rather quickly. you will need to clean the moss very thoroughly before you put it in any tank. it took probably 30 mins of me rinsing it in the sink and then dunking and shaking it in a bucket before i felt it was clean enough to use and even then i had no intention of putting it directly into a stocked tank. there are some good videos on youtube of people who have done this and how to go about cleaning it and getting converting.

 

[Angellove78]

Yeah. I you tubes a few after I found the moss. Seen a few people put little stones in a water bottle (cut the top off) and the moss was put on top of the stones with a little more stones put on top of the moss to hold in place then filled the bottle and put it in a window. Easy enough.