Are moss balls invasive?

[sonicninja]

Hi everyone,
I just bought a moss ball (Marimo ball) on a whim at my local store. I’ve done a bit of reading and seen that a few people have had issues with them becoming invasive and spreading throughout their tank resulting in bleaching or tank tear down.
I’ve only got the one and it’s for my 16litre planted shrimp tank. Should I introduce it or will it likely be a total pest?

Cheers!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[zozo]

It aint a moss It is a kind of algae cladophora sp. And yes it can become invasive equaly as easy to grow true moss also can. All tho it can easily be controlled as well to pull it off the hardscape soon enough. It's something that spreads in small tufs, regularly do some close inspection and pull it off where you don't like it before it becomes to much. I also got it unintentionaly in one of my tanks, it likely came from the LFS where they have Clado balls in the fish holding tanks.

Decades ago at times when real aquatic mosses where yet not all over available in most lfs than clado was all we had, not having a piece of driftwood overgrown with it was considered a mis. With the introduction of decorative true mosses this shifted a bit because it's a algae, but it still can be very decorative, tho personaly i wouldn't use the balls for that if i wanted too.

 

[PBM3000]

Any photos of it spreading? I thought it only grew in balls? Sounds like something I'd actually want...

 

[zozo]

No, i pull it off as soon i see it comming.. But it is all over the tank, it starts with a small tuff and spreads if i leave it. How hard i try i can't find any at the moment, so it seems i did a good job. But i know it's there it's a matter of time till i see again.

So it grows on hardscape surfaces, if that happens to be a ball than you got a ball.. I never bought them so i have no clue what ball shape object they use to grow it on could be anything porous that doesn't float.