It's just on the moss

This is a Japanese maple which I purchased in June at our club's auction. I'd began cleaning away moss today around it's roots but never saw anything like these hundreds of tiny black balls . My son thinks they look like fish eggs but the nearest a fish has come to this bonsai was when I applied fish emulsion to fertilize last week.

Any ideas ? Insect eggs? Spores?

Also is there a product I can use to remove the moss other than brushing with a toothbrush?

Norma

Hi Norma. This is algae. Ihad it on a group planting of English Elm, during a very wet spell. Its gone now of its own accord. Maybe the soil stays too wet? Lovely rootbase by the way!

Hi Will,

I did a web search but all I could find was algae in the aquarium. I've heard of people spraying tree trunks that have algae with a diluted alcohol spray but would this be harmful to a root system?

I've never seen any algae on my bonsai but since the past owner told me he had repotted in the spring perhaps the density of the soil is the problem. I will water it less and clear away the moss for now.

Thanks for the help , Will !

Norma

Just wondering..... on his blog Walter Pall talks about a product he sprays on his bonsai with algae but doesn't give any specifics about the ingredients. Kaizen bonsai in the U.K. advertises a safe product to rid your bonsai of algae and moss.

Does anyone know of such a product in the United States or Canada?

Norma

Try Physan 20 for algae http://www.physan.com/

Frank

Personally, before I sprayed yet another chemical on a bonsai, I'd keep at it with a tooth brush -- or a hand-held brass bristle brush applied lightly.

The algae is likely forming on the moss. Moss tuns to a bubbly green-black jelly around here toward the end of summer. I scrape it off with a wooden tongue depressor.

I believe that what you are describing is a slime mould. They are fascinating and do no harm in my pots when they occur, though they look pretty disgusting.

Slime molds, also called myxomycetes (Gk: myxo = mucus, mycetes = fungus) are organisms that are neither plants, nor animals, nor fungi, nor truly “mold,” which is fungus. They are protists.

This is from http://lichencolony.wordpress.com/2006/05/04/slime-molds/ Lots of images and info can be Googled.

Hi Norma.

I've sprayed full-strength vinegar on moss clinging to fragile bonsai trunks while avoiding run-off into the soil; it works for me. I remove moss from soil by hand.

Looking to inhibit moss in my partially shaded & over-watered back yard, I ran across the following using Google:

A flame thrower could be used to burn off the moss and the application of limestone would eliminate the slipperiness while raising the pH, which would discourage the moss from growing back.

I imagine a flame thrower would discourage algae & perhaps even Kevin's "protists"...

As Will noted, you've a very nice root spread.

OMG .... slime mold

After this possible diagnosis I consulted a local expert on molds/algae and she strongly feels these are eggs, from, perhaps the little toads that are all over my garden this year. We have had a drought that hasn't been seen in Minnesota for decades. I wonder???

Thanks for the tip, Chris, about vinegar and moss. The maple does have a very nice nebari , the gentleman who grew this tree planted it in his yard every spring and moved it to a pot in the winter for cold frame protection. The arthritis in his hands forced him to sell his beloved bonsai.

Norma

A club member who has a greenhouse for her bonsai also recommended PHYSAN 20 for cleaning up mold and mildew. I thought I would use this product for cleaning my cold room for winter dormant bonsai and called several hydroponics/orchid dealers in my area. The product can no longer be sold in Minnesota because it is toxic to fish. This "10,000 Lakes" state is a prime destination for fisherman so I can understand why physan 20 is banned here. Are we the only place this chemical is banned? It's still sold on the internet with a warning!

Norma

I'm almost certain that that is a slime mould Norma. I would bet anything that it's not toad or frog spawn. There's a great timelapse sequence of slime moulds and fungi here. This one is yellow but you get the idea!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GScyw3ammmk

I couldn't embed it here. Must ask Jeremy how he did it!

I also use Physan 20 to clean my greenhouse, but haven't had to buy any recently...

While they do look a lot like toad eggs, they are laid in water and have a slimy clear protective mass around them.

Toadspawn is laid in strings, has clear jelly around the black centre and are all a regular size. These are not.

Hi Norma
I've never seen that before, and it can get pretty wet here, but in my experience things that like wet just need drier conditions to get rid of them. You may have already tried that. I really like the idea of a bonsai flamethrower though, do you think Dai-Ichi or Kaizen might source one?? As for moss, the blackbirds in my garden make it practically impossible to keep any moss on pots, although they aren't so good at clearing it from nebari or trunk, more training required ;-))

I occasionally get this as well, growing out of the moss on trees that have been kept too wet/shady. Tends to be associated with the same kind of conditions as liverwort growth, and I *think* it occurs more around solid organic fertiliser lumps. It's a 'slimy thing that grows', rather than being any kind of eggs or whatever. Never seems to do any harm, other than being a bit ugly and a sign that the growing conditions need a bit of attention

This is the only good image of slime mould that I've encountered in a pot. I have seen it in other pots looking more black and like yours. This is a macro shot about 4x lifesize.

Attractive eh?