I have a couple of large terrariums which were colonized by some type of short moss. The media is dead sphagnum. I'm assuming this short moss was either from spores blown in on the wind during the spring or fall when I had my windows open or from spores that were present on the sphag. My 55gal terr. unfortunately, has what appears to be bush snails. These little $#$#%& are not attracted to snail baits nor beer/yeast traps. I have finally gotten tired enough of dealing with them to have decided to take the terr apart and rebuild.

I know that many plants can be immersed in a 5-10% bleach solution for 5 minutes to kill off any animal life -- including most eggs -- without killing the plant. However, I have little doubt that moss would not handle such treatment. (If I'm wrong, please let me know.)

I had it suggested to me, that a 50% alcohol solution might be a gentler yet still effective treatment ... particularly since snails and their eggs are the only pests I'm concerned about. I proceeded to try such a treatment on a swath of moss. After soaking 5 minutes, I gently squeezed out the alcohol, rinsed under cool water, gently squeezed out the water and repeated twice more. Then I put the moss in a tented ziploc bag. The moss did not survive.

The moss carpet was free but took a long time to spread in the terr. I was hoping to save as much of the live moss as I could if possible. Any suggestions?