Slime, Mold, Fungus...Prevention & Treatment Questions

[wilnadon]

I seem to have a terrible time keeping a very dark greem 'slime' (i suppose) from growing on the surface of my soils. It appears to be algae but I'm not for sure. Here in Oklahoma the humidity is high so the slime substance actually has been growing on a few of my pots that are kept in an uncovered aquarium terrarium.

The major problem though is with my pots that I've sown seeds in. I usually sow my sundew seeds in small 3" plastic pots and cover the pots with plastic wrap and place them under my lights. With the latest batch of seeds I've sown, this green substance has quickly grown in all of my pots and completely covered the medium to where I cannot even see the original soil. In some cases, the green becomes so dark that it almost looks blackish-green. In other cases, the green slime builds up and becomes a thick mesh.

In pots where the slime hasn't appeared, plants seem to germinate and grow just fine. Not so in the case of my pots that have coated themselves in this crap.

So my questions are:

What is this green slime that grows only on the soil but quickly overgrows it?

What can I spray on the soil to prevent it from growing?

What can I spray on the soil that is already infected with it to try to kill it?

Why do hotdogs come in packages of 10 and hotdog buns come in packages of 8?

Will Clearies 3336 or Banrot prevent this stuff from growing?

Is living sphagnum moss more apt to getting infected with it than, say, sand and peat?

What is a best way and ratio (in plain simple English terms since I'm an uneducated American) to mix Banrot and Clearies 3336? I have both but don't know how to mix them properly so I haven't yet.

Thank's and all of your replies are more than welcome!

WND

[JustLikeAPill]

1- it's a type of algea, however many call it green slime mold.

2- you can try algicide, but i don't know what it'll do to your plants

3- the best bet is to keep any nutriets out of the soil.

4-one of the mysteries of the universe, my friend.

5-those products aren't meant for this.

6- if the slime mold will grow there that means theres enough nutrients to support it, so your spag will probably turn brown at the tips.

the best thing to do is transplant with fresh, rinsed substrate, use ro/distilled water, and if you fertilize, don't get it on the soil, foliar feed only.

[BillP]

The real mystery is why anyone would want to eat those revolting synthetic hotdog sausages or those dreadful congealed hotdog buns.......

[wilnadon]

The slime I am speaking of is growing mostly in my pots with chopped L.F. spagnum moss as the subtrate. I have seen traces of it growing in just about every pot with just about every kind of mixture, even the really sandy soil I use for my D. indica plants have a small trace of it. I only use distilled water, and nothing more. I keep them plants, all of them, in uncovered terrariums so they do get air flow. However the seed pots are completely covered with plastic, and they seem to get consumed by the mold. Sad day indeed.

[Guest Tamlin Dawnstar]

Have you tried pre-rinsing your potting ingredients? I double rinse all my peat (wet, ring out, replace the water and repeat) and then make up pots well in advance of my need, allowing them to weather over the season and using the oldest made up pots first.

[NickG]

Hi,

I've been getting something similar only to me the slime looks reddish (but then I am colour blind).

Strange thing is that on one pot it was growing like mad but on others it was barely present at all. What i did was to remove the top dressing of dried sphagnum moss and replace it with stone chips. I cover the soil of all of my non carnivorous plants with these small stones for decoration but the drosera capensis (four plants in one pot) seems to quite like having the stones. Since then I've had no slime and have covered two others pots that started going yucky with stones and they too are going great.

i'll take a photo this evening and try to attach it to this thread

Nic