# Driftwood growing mold, advice please



## innuceinnubibus (May 24, 2007)

Hello.

I have several pieces of driftwood I bought at my LFS that I've been soaking in buckets. I left it out for a while and suddenly there was green and white mold all over it. I assume it wouldn't exactly be beneficial to put speckled wood in the tank. How can I disinfect the wood? The pieces are too large to boil, so that's out. Thank you!


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## furballi (Feb 2, 2007)

innuceinnubibus said:


> Hello.
> 
> I have several pieces of driftwood I bought at my LFS that I've been soaking in buckets. I left it out for a while and suddenly there was green and white mold all over it. I assume it wouldn't exactly be beneficial to put speckled wood in the tank. How can I disinfect the wood? The pieces are too large to boil, so that's out. Thank you!


Completely submerse the wood in water and boil for 30 minutes. Clean wood with toothbrush under tap water and return to tank. If you can't boil, then you can alternately dip in 19 water/1 bleach for 30 minutes. Rinse and put out in the sun for one day before returning to tank.


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## Haeun (Oct 19, 2006)

The white mold goes away eventually, for most wood. I just left it in my tank, and it disappeared in a few weeks. Whether my SAE had a role in it, I don't know; quite likely, but who knows.

If you're impatient, you can indeed do the boil/bleach/dry trip.


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## bigtroutz (Nov 17, 2006)

innuceinnubibus said:


> Hello.
> 
> I have several pieces of driftwood I bought at my LFS that I've been soaking in buckets. I left it out for a while and suddenly there was green and white mold all over it. I assume it wouldn't exactly be beneficial to put speckled wood in the tank. How can I disinfect the wood? The pieces are too large to boil, so that's out. Thank you!


Change the soak water to boiling water - you say you can't bring the wood to boil so bring the boil to the wood. Simple. The effect is the same. Keep in mind that the fungus will possibly return at some point in the tank but to fish like Plecos, the fungus is food.

I would avoid the bleach method, personally, since its alot of effort to completely remove the bleach that soaks into the wood.


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