Sphagunum Moss and mold

Vengeance · 01-20-04, 09:00 PM

Anyone have any problems with mold growing on their Sphagunum moss? Is the mold growth directly related to bad air flow. It is for a Black Breasted Leaf Turtle, they need very high hummidity, 75 - 95%. I have to mist twice aday because at current I only have a glass lid with an inch open on each side of the cage. I'm going to be changeing that to a plexi glass lid with holes in it. But I was wondering if anyone else has had any other problems with mold and moss.

Invictus · 01-20-04, 09:04 PM

Sphagnum moss is highly acidic, and thus is very resistant to mold. If you keep it moist (I mist mine once a week or so), you shouldn't have any problems with it. I change it out entirely every 2 weeks, and have never seen any mold.. but then again, it is MOSS, so it can be hard to tell sometimes, hehehe

Vengeance · 01-20-04, 09:57 PM

hmmmmmmmm, could have sworn it was mold, I could defenitly tell on the drift wood that I have now taken out of the cage that there was mold. But it defenitly looked like a white slight mold. I took all the moss out, rinsed it and then thinned it out a bit. I think I may have had too thick a layer of it.

Invictus · 01-20-04, 11:29 PM

If it was white, are you sure it wasn't a urate? What kind of snake do you have in it?

Dani33 · 01-20-04, 11:38 PM

Possibly a powder supplement? I once thought that I had mold in my toads tank. After cleaning it all, i fed dusted crickets. That's when I realised what it was. It really looked like a fine white mold. Just a suggestion.

Linds · 01-20-04, 11:54 PM

If it was on driftwood, it very well could be mold. Untreated wood molds easily in humid environments I find. If you are having problems with mold, switching to the lid you suggested will only compound the problem.

Invictus · 01-21-04, 02:08 AM

Now that you mentioned it Linds, you're right... mold on driftwood does tend to be white... I've seen it before.

Maybe you should varathane the driftwood, vengeance. That would make for an inhospital environment for mold.

Dani33 · 01-21-04, 02:23 AM

True, enough, I had untreated driftwood in my BP's enclosure. After he shed, there was mold all over it, had a slight green tinge though. Alas, Sassafras no longer has drift wood.

Linds · 01-21-04, 02:39 AM

Urethane won't help much. A few years ago I thought it might help, so I took some new hardwood dowels, gave them 3-4 coats of urethane and made them in to perches in three enclosures. Both were well ventilated all around, but high humidity, and it didn't take long before those perches were green and furry

The urethane became sticky under all the moisture as well

Vengeance · 01-21-04, 07:59 AM

Invictus

I'm housing a Black Breastead Leaf Turtle I rescued from my parents. Found out the poor thing was a land turtle and he was living in a water enviornment with only a single rock to sit on. He has a slight case of shell rot, but I took him to the Vet yesterday and he said it looks as if it's starting to clear up since we got him out on that crappy cage. But anyway, I'm almost 100% sure it was mold, I took out the driftwood because t isn't necessary to have it in there, I was useing it as a boundry between the water and the moss. Not a big deal, but it did look like it was growing ontop of the moss as well. When I picked up his hide there was quite a bit of what looked like white mold. It almost liked like a very thin collection of spider webs.

Linds

I'm thinking the plexi glass would be a better choice because I'm going to try and repoduce the same conditions I have in my Ball Python tank (in terms of keeping hummidity not how much hummidity he has). The plexi glass lid with holes drilled all the way around the edges at 45o angles as to slow the rate of hummidity escape. It's worked really well on my Ball cage this far and I'm hopeing since I'm useing a much more damp substrate that it will be able to work really well here in keeping hummidity at 75 - 95%.

Dani

It's not dust, because the little guy is a rescue I'm still working on getting him back to his regular diet. Right now all he has taken is 10 meal worms and about 1/4 of a bannana which is good considering I've only had him a little over a couple weeks. But none of them were dusted with a calcium supplment. I'm trying to get him on nightcrawlers that I'm trying to breed myself. From what I've read they are supposed to be a major staple in his diet.

Thanks for all your suggestions thus far.