The bamboo I had grew mold/moss?

[Herpluver]

So last night we were spot cleaning and feeding our collection, when my wife noticed that two of the pieces of bamboo in my Cresteds cage had what looked like green mold or maybe some weird moss or something.

We threw it away, but I was wondering if you guys knew of a way to avoid that in the future? I bought the Bamboo from home depot in packages of 6 pieces of 6' long bamboo. I cut it to fit into the cages, but it wasn't painted, glossed or any of that. Looks to be all natural.

Last week during full clean day they were sprayed with a 10% diluted solution of Chlorhexidine Gluconate and rinsed very very well under running water.

Any ideas?

 

[FBody355]

You can try baking it before putting it in an enclosure to help. I think it was something like 350 degrees for forty minutes.

 

[Mclaughlin]

Where there is moisture there will be mold. It will always be a battle with it. Cork is highly mold resistant FYI.

 

[DrCarrotTail]

If it is organic and can absorb water it can grow mold. You just have to keep an eye on it. I don't think there's any way to 100% prevent it except to keep the enclosure 100% dry and you can't since you have a bitty beastie that needs humidity in there. Cleaning and baking can kill the existing mold, reduce the chance of it popping up again soon or make it less frequent but can't eliminate it.

 

[Herpluver]

Thanks much for the quick responses. This is the first time i had ever used bamboo in a cage. We actually removed all of the it last night, from every cage. Out of 3 cages with it, only 1 had the mold, but for safety sake i removed it all. So 40 minutes at 350 degrees is safe to kill spores? I'll do that now then. I bought 2 packages and have barely gone through half of the first one. So i'd like to use it.

I was going to cut it up into pieces and create little wooden hut hides for my leos. Any recommendations on sealing the cut ends? Now that I think of it.. Hmm, if I did make that hide and it needed to be baked again in the future. What adhesive would be non-toxic yet heat resistant enough to withstand that? Or is there none?

 

[DrCarrotTail]

I have similar issues in my spider tanks. It may be due to it being in a part of the container that doesn't have enough air circulation and stays more humid. I wouldn't stop using it but I would keep an eye on it and get it out of there or clean it if it starts to mold.

Sorry I don't know what temperature/method would be best to kill the mold. I usually just throw away things that grow stuff in my tanks and use new pieces. I think Silicon would work as a sealant but its gloppy. I've seen some other folks do some cool stuff around here and their stuff seemed to look better than it would have if they used the silicone I'm thinking of...

 

[Herpluver]

Yea the mold was in the middle of the tank where the two pieces of bamboo came together and a lot of foliage was covering.

I wonder if anyone else would be willing to verify the 350 @ 40 minutes thing? I'd hate to cause a fire.

 

[DrCarrotTail]

I didn't read anything about temp/length of time but I've read that you should soak it in water and wrap it in tin foil to prevent it burning. I was thinking abotu doing that with my cork bark but I only had little pieces so I popped them in the microwave for a 30-45 seconds.

 

[Herpluver]

We're slightly old fashioned in my house, in the sense that we make all of our food via the stove top and oven. No microwave exists in my home unfortunately

 

[FBody355]

I looked further into it, I haven't done it in a while. Some people do 200 @ 30 minutes, and others around 300 @ 30 minutes. A little longer in the oven won't hurt it either. It will smell a lot like wood in a firepit so don't let the smell alarm you. It's not a burning smell though. If you look at a lot of tarantula forums they have a lot of information there. And like someone already mentioned, cork/cork bark is really mold resistant and works great.

 

[Mclaughlin]

I do 325 for 45 minutes then 450 for 10-15.... But I use drift wood