LEARN ABOUT CREATURES
(IN OUR OWN NEIGHBORHOODS)
this project is called LOCAL BIOLOGY (until we think of something better)
Grow Moss
I learned about growing moss at my class last night, "Botany for Artists," taught by Dr. Robert Bergad (Minnesota School of Botanical Art.)
He says it is very easy. So I tried this as soon as I got home, since I had a spore capsule.
Here are some instructions:
1. go look for some moss in moist places. Look at the moss. Do you see any spikey things that stick up, kind of like a flower bud? That's the "sporophyte." It is a monstrous structure, if you look at it with a hand lens. There is this capsule with these teeth that flex with humidity. These teeth help indicate the species of the moss. the teeth help it act like a salt shaker and shake out the spores...which will become the green leafy part of the moss.
2. obtain peat (don't know if something else would work, get peat that isn't obtained through problematic methods) soak it. put in a little shallow dish.
3. sprinkle spores on the moist peat. cover, set in north facing window.
4. after a while...green stuff will form. those are the baby mosses!
I have already done the sprinkling and will share pictures when/if it starts growing.
More references
(referenced from Wikipedia) Moss grower's handbook- 2.39MB, PDF file
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I noticed that when I breathed on the moss in the little dish, tiny filaments would wave around. These might be little fungus filaments of some sort.