Heard a kid call moss 'dirty green stuff' and it stung a bit

I was walking through the park near my place in Richmond last weekend and this teenager pointed at a patch of moss on a stone wall and said it was just dirty. Made me think about how I used to see moss the same way as a kid (maybe 12 or 13) before I got into botany. Now I can spot 3 different species on that same wall and I love how it softens the hard edges of old bricks. Anyone else ever catch themselves feeling defensive about something like moss or lichen that most folks overlook?

3 comments

3 Comments

carr.luna9d ago

yeah totally feel you on this one. it's weird how people just write off stuff like moss like it's some kind of trash. i had a similar moment when my little cousin called a patch of lichen on a rock 'old man scabs' and i was trying so hard not to go on a whole rant about symbiotic relationships. @black.oliver that neighbor story hits close to home, i once tried to explain to someone that the green fuzz on their fence was actually velvet moss and not just dirt buildup. they looked at me like i had three heads but it's like, no, this stuff is literally holding the whole micro-ecosystem together. the way it holds moisture and creates little habitats for bugs and stuff, feels like people just don't see it.

alext529d ago

Respectfully, people know moss isn't trash, they just don't care about the tiny stuff the way we do. It's not about ignorance, it's about having different priorities for what deserves attention.

black.oliver9d ago

...and that's exactly why we can't have nice things like old stone walls or damp forests, I swear. Kids these days call dirt "dirty" and probably think rust is just orange dust. Like, come on, moss is basically nature's carpet for stubborn surfaces. Next they'll say fog is just wet air and ignore how it makes the streetlights glow all soft-like. But yeah, I totally get defensive about lichen too. I once spent ten minutes explaining to a neighbor that the crusty stuff on their roof wasn't a fungus but a perfectly fine colony of Xanthoria parietina. They just stared at me like I was doing a magic trick.