If you ever have your house mold tested, don’t be surprised when you find out it passes inspection with a high mold content in the air. You think you’d be aiming for zero mold spores, right? Wrong. There are so many spores in the air that the target value is not zero; it is just lower than the spore content in outdoor air.

The spores are there, floating around in the air and when they land on surfaces, you’d better home those surfaces are dry, because if they’re wet, that spore is going to plant itself and make itself right at home.

So the first line of defense in the battle against mold is not to let it start. Take care of that excess moisture, leaky roof, and leaky pipes or mold will be there to haunt you.

What is it about City Halls and public buildings that seems to draw mold crisis?

Oak Point City Hall is afflicted with mold so bad it was described as “wet and weeping insulation, rotten sheeting and long, fuzzy blooms of black mold and mildew” that disintegrated in your hand.

Wet insulation behind the walls is exacerbating the problems. Considerations regarding this Texas city hall are going to be voted on by the city council

Southern High, with 2 closed classrooms may have more closed classrooms coming up, because the AC unit serving the contaminated area has not been isolated and may be spreading spores all over.

There is mold on the upper walls of the two story rooms, which require special equipment to access. Apparently an earlier attempt at cleanup was incomplete; and an incomplete cleanup just leaves the “seeds” of future problems.

Another in a long list of moldy schools is in the news.

Today it is Salem Community College’s Davidow Hall. The building was closed this summer to handle a mold infestation, but a reopening is planned after the cleanup is complete in November.

The air has been tested and is apparently now safe–but remediation is still going on, and sheetrock is still being replaced.

The best way to deal with mold is not to have the problem in the first place.

How do we do this? By prevention.

• Maintain a dry house.

• Make certain clothes are completely dry before putting them away.
• Maintain plumbing. No plumbing leaks equal no hidden water to feed hidden mold.
• Maintain roof. If you’re roof doesn’t leak, it’s not contributing hidden water to feed hidden mold.
• If mold or mildew develops in humid areas like your bathroom, you can control it on hard surfaces by rinsing with a bleach solution.

If mold does develop in spite of your best efforts, a mold inspector can help pinpoint hidden mold.

Another town’s city hall struck down by mold.

It’s not unexpected. Combine buildings with water, and, well, buildings have a lot of cellulose-eating mold to feed.

This time it is Linn Valley City Hall. They had it tested for mold, and it scored high, i.e. in the “existing serious condition” range. So first the city council spent the $350 for the testing. Then, the same specialist bid $4000 to clean up the building. (We don’t recommend the remediator and the mold tester be the same entity.)

But that was too much money for them. So, the city council is lobbying for volunteers to move the furniture to a new location at the first of the week. Ironically the new location is the former city hall offices, now the Property Owners Association.

I’d recommend then that they take bids for a licensed contractor to come in and do the work.

I wonder if the new building is under warranty?

Schools and dorm rooms are in for a clean-up in many areas of the country due to the frequency of rain this summer. In preparation for back to school, schools buildings and dormitories are turning up with heavy mold growth in locations like Dartmouth Massachusetts. In fact, the problem has been bad enough that new measures are in the works to deal with prevention of a reoccurrence next summer.

Have you really examined your house for mold?

Wall coverings-Mold loves cellulose, and cellulose is used in most wallpapers. So it is not unusual for mold growth to occur on your wallpaper, especially if the room is a source of trapped moisture like a bathroom.

Wall board – Drywall can be a source of food for mold; and especially now, when there’s a major rash of lawsuits of defective wallboard that decomposes into a toxic mess when it gets damp. And of course that toxic drywall is also a favorite meal for mold.

Window Frames-Anywhere two different types of surfaces meet, there can be a gap, and a place for moisture to collect, especially when one of the surfaces is particularly attractive to condensation, like glass. That moisture can seep into those areas and feed mold colonies. It doesn’t take much liquid for mold to gain a foothold.

Bathrooms-Bathrooms are longtime culprits for being mold habitats. It’s because it’s such a source of moisture and an area to contain it in. If water can get in, so can mold.

Store rooms- Any contained area is a potential place where mold can occur, because all it takes is a little moisture trapped inside. And that moisture can come from underground seepage if you have a basement; or it can come from the external walls or any kind of plumbing or roof leak. So check your store rooms and keep them as dry as possible.

Ceilings-Leaks travel downward. So if there’s moisture above your ceiling, there’s probably mold there too. Look for roof leaks, pipe leaks, pipe condensation, defective barriers, and if you find the path of water, you’ll find the mold.

Basement- Water goes downhill. That’s what a plumber told me was the only thing he learned in plumbing school. Don’t be surprised if there is seepage in your basement or water coming from upper areas in your house. If you’ve got the moisture there, the mold will be quick to follow.

With all of these situations, dry up the water. Clean up the area, and keep it dry, or you may be looking at a big remediation project.

Researcher Andy Adamatzky is breeching the gap between science and science fiction in his mold-obitics. He is using plasmodium, a type of slime mold, a “naturally occurring substance with its own built in intelligence,” to create the next generation of “robots.”

In his paper, Towards Physarum Robots which is published by Elsevier Ltd, Adamatzky’s experiments conclude that his mold “is capable of computing a basic spanning tree and manipulating of light-weight objects. We speculate that our results pave the pathways towards the design and implementation of amorphous biological robots.”

* Mechagodzilla is a fictional robot from the Godzilla series circa 1974.