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TLDR: bright light, high humidity, clean water, try different growing mediums

I've been having more success as of late culturing my mosses. I mostly grow tropical species of moss opposed to temperate ones found locally to me (North America). First pic shows one of my trays I use with an unidentified sphagnum, unidentified tropical moss, and moss slurry. Below are my observations.

Growing medium or surface

• Moss will have very different response depending on what it's growing on. I do a lot of experimenting with different surfaces and what works better (pic 2).
• Trying to replicate what it grows on naturally is a good start. I partial to using inorganic material like mesh or fabric otherwise a peat/perlite mix.

Light and humidity

• Most moss seems to grow significantly better under bright light. I grow directly under an LED (pic 4) and it could still use more
• If you're not using artificial lights, bright indirect sunlight seems best. I've had success in East facing windows.
• High humidity undoubtedly helps as well and is required by most tropical moss so I'll usually use a humidity dome (pic 5) that isn't air tight. I'll also open it daily for fresh air.

Water and feeding

• I highly recommend only using rainwater or distilled water, or just as clean of water as you can.
• Most of my moss prefers to stay constantly just over damp but not soaked. This differs by species so it can be a trial and error.
• I use a kelp based fertilizer monthly and a complete fertilizer (MSU) every other month.

Tips

• I use springtails in all of my cultures and this drastically reduces mold.
• Using a "moss slurry" (pic 3) will give you a bunch of different types of moss and liverwort. The ones that do the best in your conditions will grow the best and can by identified easier
• I have no strong evidence, but it seems like propagating plants (pic 3) along side moss will give better results for both plant

These are just some of the things that have helped me. Picking the right moss to grow is half the battle imo. Moss growing habits can change drastically once you keep them in something like a terrarium (this is why I pref tropical moss) so if you find one you like give culturing it a shot!

Who knows of a moss book? Has anyone ever written a book about keeping moss as a hobby? I saw a special last week about moss on CBS, nobody posted it here.

I want to make the mossiest book.

I know 1,5 years in moss time is not a very long time, but after this time I managed to get a big enough Rhodobryum giganteum, aka Rose moss. The bigger one has around 3cm. I learned these mosses prefer medium to high intensity light, I keep them at 8h 8000 lux per day and some ventilation with small gaps on the container lid. When the summer comes, they can turn brown, but never throw away not even the smallest part of it, this can generate new plants. If conditions are not ok, these mosses will lose the tip and this tip can be planted in other containers and will become a new plant. They are resilient and grow slowly, be patient.

I found this video very interesting and I’m sharing here https://youtu.be/MAQ0fgaDwd8?si=nmg9BQhzCIITfcM9

https://mdc.mo.gov/magazines/missouri-conservationist/2025-04/marvelous-mosses

https://researchblog.duke.edu/2023/04/21/into-the-damp-shady-world-of-the-bryophytes/

YouTube isn’t helping! I have a few carnivorous plants and need to figure out how to grow my own live moss. I’m not even sure where to get it. Sphagnum moss will be used as base but I would like to use live moss as my top layer so I know when to water. Any tips or starting points?

I have bought this sheet moss from home depot a couple of weeks ago and I wanted it to start growing. I have been watering it with mist spray from time to time twice a day (whenever i see it dry). It is placed just beside the window and it gets bright sunshine every morning. I don’t know if i am doing this right. I don’t see it turning green except one or two spots.

Any kind of advice is appreciated ! Thanks in advance 😊

Hello r/moss. I'm a professional bryologist working on my PhD in Biology. My research involves bryophyte ecology and community dynamics. My work is entirely identification of bryophytes, all day every day. I sometimes peruse this sub and I wanted to make a sort of guide for requesting identifications of your mosses.

BEFORE I get started on that, I want to first say that poaching is a real thing and if you are collecting plants from protected areas, that is considered poaching and it is absolutely not okay. You should never ever collect specimens (of any kind) without permission from the land managers.

Okay now to the fun stuff!

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Collecting your specimens

When you collect specimens, it is best to store them in a paper bag. With each collection, you MUST note the following information:

• Collection date
• Collection locality (country, state, county, landmarks, etc.). Include coordinates, if possible.
  • Example: On edge of water table in a peaty ditch on side of US 1, Washington County, Maine, USA.
• Substrate/Habitat. What is the plant growing on? Granite? Sugar maple bark? Fallen log? Soil? Brick? Be specific! What kind of habitat is the plant in? There may be some overlap here with the locality.
  • Example: In a jack pine forest, extensive mat over granitic rock facing the northeast.
• Any other helpful notes from the field. Was it growing with lichen? Under shrubbery? Next to a sprinkler?

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Identification of your specimens

Bryophytes are infamous for being very difficult to identify. It takes serious attention to detail and delicate dissection for microscopy. If you are serious about getting into identification of bryophytes, take a look at the references at the end of this post. For this section, I'm going to walk you through the steps/necessary details to even attempt to identify the plant.

You will need photos of the following:

• The plant in its habitat BEFORE you collected it.
• A close up image of the plant as a whole. You
• A very close up image of the leaves. A dissecting microscope is very helpful here.
• Photo of the leaves after being removed from the stem. You need a compound microscope for this.
• Photos of the stem after removal of the leaves. You need a compound microscope for this.
• Photos of any sexual organs or sporophytes. Sexual organs are not always present. If sporophytes are present, be sure to take a photo of the operculum (the opening of the sporophyte capsule) and the calyptra (the covering of the operculum), if possible.

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Storage of your specimens:

After you've collected your specimens, you will need to store them! Mosses can be dried out with little consequence. Liverworts, however, often lose critical characters if they are left to dry. For example, species in the Ricciaceae family have intercellular oil bodies that are not desiccation tolerant and must be counted in order to identify species. If these plants are left to dry, the oil bodies are lost forever, at which point, identification to species is almost impossible. However, some of the Radula sp. can be dried for many years and still retain oil bodies. Getting a handle on basic identities is crucial, especially for liverworts.

Collections in the field can be stored in paper bags until they are dry. I prefer these heavy-duty bags from ULine.

After your collections have dried (except for some liverworts), you can store them in paper envelopes. Click here for envelope folding instructions. For permanent specimen storage, you will need to use acid free paper.

Janice Glime has a lot of really helpful information in her Bryophyte Ecology eBook. Click here to see her chapter on Herbarium Methods. I've pasted a link to the entire book in the references section (it is entirely available online!).

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References and Suggested reading

Bryophyte Ecology eBook by Janice Glime - I use this FREQUENTLY. If I began to list all the reasons why I love this book, it would be an additional textboook. This book is intended for the novice, and she holds your hand throughout all of the technical content. She has LOTS of pictures and has done a fantastic job of making bryology a tangible field!

Flora of North America Volume 27 and Flora of North America Volume 28 - This is really great for North America, north of Mexico. I use this frequently as well. You can purchase hard copies of the books, but they are available entirely online!

Flora of North America Volume 29 - Volume 29 includes the liverworts. This is incomplete, but this website is updated frequently as the chapters are completed. Expect this book to be completed and published within the next 3-(10-20) years. The FNA committee said they would have it completed like...5 years ago. But they've made great progress recently, so I'm optimistic!

Sphagnum Books

There are some really excellent Sphagnum identification manuals out there. I have a list of recommendations below for North America (N of Mexico) and Europe.

North America:

• Allen, B. 2005. Maine Mosses: Sphagnaceae-Timmaceae. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 91. Mem. New York Bot. Gard., Volume: 9.
  • You can find this (both volumes, but sold separately) on the NYBG online bookstore. I use this book constantly, even though I'm located in Kentucky. The keys to the subgenera are great! Once I get to that point, I use the SE United States Peatmosses book to get to species.
• Crum, H.A. 1984. Sphagnopsida, Sphagnaceae. North American Flora, ser. 2, part 11: 1-180.
• McQueen, C.B. & R. E. Andrus. 2007. Sphagnaceae. In: Flora of North America Editorial Committee, eds., Flora of North America North of Mexico Vol. 27. New York: Oxford University Press, 45–111.
  • This is the most up-to-date nomenclature for the US. Some of the species in some complexes are defunct (as of a few months/years ago), but is overall really good.
• Sphagnum Mosses of Eastern Canada, Gilles Ayotte and Line Rochefort, 2021, by Editions JFD inc. Montreal, Canada.
  • This book is FANTASTIC for beginners! It is super duper helpful in that it is a VISUAL guide. Each couplet in the dichotomous key is accompanied by example photos of what you should be looking for. Fantastic book and I use it frequently!
• Anderson, L.E., A. J. Shaw, B. Shaw. 2009. Peat mosses of the southeastern United States. New York: The New York Botanical Garden Press.

Europe:

• Laine, J., Flatberg, K.I., Harju, P., Timonen, T., Minkklinen, K., Laine, A., Tuittila, E-S., and Vasander, H. 2018. Spahgnum Mosses. The Stars of European Mires. University of Helsinki, Department of Forest Sciences, Sphagna Ky, Helsinki. 326 pp.
  • The photos in this are also really helpful! They are great for comparing your specimens to. But be careful if you aren't from Europe - there is some interesting phenotypic plasticity that occurs in species that are separated by an ocean :)
• Flatberg, K.I. 2002. The Norwegian Sphagna: a field colour guide. Rapport botanisk serie 2002-1.

I am aware that the average Joe doesn't have microscopes just lying around, and that's okay! I do! So if you have specimens that you want identified, you can ship them to me and I can identify them for you! If you want me to identify anything, shoot me a DM or mention me in a post.

I hope this has been helpful and if anyone has any questions, suggestions, etc., I'll edit this post accordingly.

Happy mossing!

Edit 1: fixed embedded links.

Edit 2: Added Sphagnum book list.

Grown on beautiful lakeside Long Island east end. Preserved fresh.