Traditional moss garden techniques compared to artificial mat system
Traditional
Artificial Mat System
Soil wicks moisture away from moss
Hand weeding required
pH adjustment to soil
Slow growth
Bird damage and theft of moss
Leaf and litter removal by hand
Restricted to soil growing mosses
Hand weeding required
pH adjustment to soil
Slow growth
Bird damage and theft of moss
Leaf and litter removal by hand
Restricted to soil growing mosses
Retains moisture as needed
No weeding
no pH adjustment needed
Rapid growth
No damage
Leaf blower or small broom as needed
Can grow all kinds of mosses
No weeding
no pH adjustment needed
Rapid growth
No damage
Leaf blower or small broom as needed
Can grow all kinds of mosses
Moss gardening on its' most basic level is essentially an easy task. Locate an appropriate shady site for your moss garden. Plant the moss. If planting moss in summer or late spring then provide some water but do so infrequently. Enjoy your moss garden.
However there are several assumptions in those short sentences that can play havoc with the success of your moss garden. Location should be in the shade or dappled sunlight. Remember though that if you are siting your location in spring or fall that summer sunlight with be from a different angle and may mean full sunlight in the summertime on the moss garden location that had dappled sunlight or shade in fall or spring.
New moss gardens may require supplemental water during the first summer however collected rainwater is the only recommended water source!
If you choose to use water from any other source than collected rainwater or distilled water you will be harming your moss and when the moss is watered repeatedly it will eventually die from the salts, hardness ions and alkaline pH (greater than 7) that are found in all waters except rainwater.
Normal rainwater has a pH of 5.6 which is slightly acidic. The cause of the acidity is normal concentrations of carbon dioxide molecules dissociating and form the weak acid carbonic acid.
In addition rainwater has no dissolved salts or hardness ions. The hardness of rainwater is about 2 ppm CaCO3, incredibly low.
Those three characteristics: acidic pH (less than 7), no dissolved salts and no dissolved hardness ions are unique to rainwater and required by moss.
I have been asked to consult on many occassions for moss garden installations both large and small after the fact when moss was dead and dying. Water from a non rainwater source was almost always the culprit or in combination with incorrect soil pH. Sometimes fungal disease was present but it was not the underlying cause of the problem.
People think because water comes from a river like the Hudson or water from a lake such as any of the Great Lakes that that water source is acceptable for moss. Unfortunately all rivers and lakes are by definition surface runoff waters that accumulate hardness, salts and or become an alkaline pH! Some nice moss gardens from towns that draw water from the Hudson have failed this year because they received Hudson River water and not rainwater as their water source.
Remember once established it is unnecessary to water a moss garden.
These are the three biggest mistakes that people make:
1. Plant moss in too much sunlight. Full summer sunlight can kill most mosses within a few days or weeks.
2. Plant moss on soil that is the wrong pH and expect it to live. It will be dead within a year.
3. Water moss with any water other than rainwater.
When moss covered the earth you can bet the moss mats were thick and deep. Today our moss just as our trees are too often immature. They may seem substantial but not in comparison to past records. The green sidewalk moss, Bryum caespiticium, which appears on the Book Owners Page is generally found today only an inch tall whereas if left undisturbed it grows to three inches in height.
A moss clump or moss mat has a reservoir of moisture, much like a sponge, in the underlying brown stems and old leaves that the green living portions of the moss plant can draw from. (That is why sphagnum moss has been used in hanging baskets and peat moss is used in potting soil).
Small moss clumps don't have much of a moisture reservoir and can quickly dry up and stop growing during dry weather. They can easily die during a long severe dry spell. Once a moss clump reaches a certain size though, its almost like the moss clump has reached critical mass, it will stay hydrated longer through the dry spells and be able to continue to grow for longer periods of time. The artificial moss mat system I developed provides a reservoir of moisture for both thin and thick moss mats, yet keeps the moss from getting too wet and saturated which can also harm or kill moss.
The artificial mat system I explain in the handbook is composed of three layers of completely different types of materials.
An artificial mat system promotes rapid growth and protects the moss.
In some ways moss is its own worst enemy. Seeds readily sprout in a moss bed and if allowed to take root can overwhelm the moss. If the seeds are grasses they can be time consuming to remove.
Birds love to invade a moss garden. They steal big hunks of moss from the moss garden for nest building and then later in summertime and fall they turn over the moss in search of insects. If you have a large moss garden you may not mind the loss or disturbance but most people do mind.
Then there is the periodic windblown leaf and litter accumulation that must be dealt with. Dead wet leaves eventually will smother a moss garden and kill it.
Traditional moss garden methods of hand weeding and debris removal it can be said are comparable to the time involved with lawn care but I try to avoid working on my hands and knees.
An artificial moss mat system eliminates bird damage. Dead tree leaves and other debris do accumulate but a fine leaf rake or a leaf blower makes quick work of removing them without disturbing the moss.
Continued on Handbook 3
However there are several assumptions in those short sentences that can play havoc with the success of your moss garden. Location should be in the shade or dappled sunlight. Remember though that if you are siting your location in spring or fall that summer sunlight with be from a different angle and may mean full sunlight in the summertime on the moss garden location that had dappled sunlight or shade in fall or spring.
New moss gardens may require supplemental water during the first summer however collected rainwater is the only recommended water source!
If you choose to use water from any other source than collected rainwater or distilled water you will be harming your moss and when the moss is watered repeatedly it will eventually die from the salts, hardness ions and alkaline pH (greater than 7) that are found in all waters except rainwater.
Normal rainwater has a pH of 5.6 which is slightly acidic. The cause of the acidity is normal concentrations of carbon dioxide molecules dissociating and form the weak acid carbonic acid.
In addition rainwater has no dissolved salts or hardness ions. The hardness of rainwater is about 2 ppm CaCO3, incredibly low.
Those three characteristics: acidic pH (less than 7), no dissolved salts and no dissolved hardness ions are unique to rainwater and required by moss.
I have been asked to consult on many occassions for moss garden installations both large and small after the fact when moss was dead and dying. Water from a non rainwater source was almost always the culprit or in combination with incorrect soil pH. Sometimes fungal disease was present but it was not the underlying cause of the problem.
People think because water comes from a river like the Hudson or water from a lake such as any of the Great Lakes that that water source is acceptable for moss. Unfortunately all rivers and lakes are by definition surface runoff waters that accumulate hardness, salts and or become an alkaline pH! Some nice moss gardens from towns that draw water from the Hudson have failed this year because they received Hudson River water and not rainwater as their water source.
Remember once established it is unnecessary to water a moss garden.
These are the three biggest mistakes that people make:
1. Plant moss in too much sunlight. Full summer sunlight can kill most mosses within a few days or weeks.
2. Plant moss on soil that is the wrong pH and expect it to live. It will be dead within a year.
3. Water moss with any water other than rainwater.
When moss covered the earth you can bet the moss mats were thick and deep. Today our moss just as our trees are too often immature. They may seem substantial but not in comparison to past records. The green sidewalk moss, Bryum caespiticium, which appears on the Book Owners Page is generally found today only an inch tall whereas if left undisturbed it grows to three inches in height.
A moss clump or moss mat has a reservoir of moisture, much like a sponge, in the underlying brown stems and old leaves that the green living portions of the moss plant can draw from. (That is why sphagnum moss has been used in hanging baskets and peat moss is used in potting soil).
Small moss clumps don't have much of a moisture reservoir and can quickly dry up and stop growing during dry weather. They can easily die during a long severe dry spell. Once a moss clump reaches a certain size though, its almost like the moss clump has reached critical mass, it will stay hydrated longer through the dry spells and be able to continue to grow for longer periods of time. The artificial moss mat system I developed provides a reservoir of moisture for both thin and thick moss mats, yet keeps the moss from getting too wet and saturated which can also harm or kill moss.
The artificial mat system I explain in the handbook is composed of three layers of completely different types of materials.
An artificial mat system promotes rapid growth and protects the moss.
In some ways moss is its own worst enemy. Seeds readily sprout in a moss bed and if allowed to take root can overwhelm the moss. If the seeds are grasses they can be time consuming to remove.
Birds love to invade a moss garden. They steal big hunks of moss from the moss garden for nest building and then later in summertime and fall they turn over the moss in search of insects. If you have a large moss garden you may not mind the loss or disturbance but most people do mind.
Then there is the periodic windblown leaf and litter accumulation that must be dealt with. Dead wet leaves eventually will smother a moss garden and kill it.
Traditional moss garden methods of hand weeding and debris removal it can be said are comparable to the time involved with lawn care but I try to avoid working on my hands and knees.
An artificial moss mat system eliminates bird damage. Dead tree leaves and other debris do accumulate but a fine leaf rake or a leaf blower makes quick work of removing them without disturbing the moss.
Continued on Handbook 3
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Handbook excerpts Page 2
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