Make some simple moss bombs to throw at buildings and add some living green to your urban cement-scape.

Step 1: Find Your Moss

Moss can be found in all sorts of corners. I found mine near an abandoned pool. You can also find it online, though expensive, at mossacres.com

Step 2: Gather Ingredients

You'll need:

6 cans of beer. (3 for your bombs, 3 for yourself)
1 box of sugar. (1/2 table spoon per can of beer)
bag of rubber balloons (heavy duty kind will prevent an explosion on your face)
moss (that you collected
acrylic paint (optional)

also:
1 blender
mixing pot
targets
empty soap bottle (to inject solution into balloons) or basting sirynge
empty plastic bottle (or funnel)

Step 3: Grind Moss

Add the moss slowly into a coffee grinder, or blender if you have one. Grind it slowly, because there will be some small rocks that may damage the blender blade or your eye.

Step 4: Mix Ingredients

Throw the beer, moss, and sugar into a large pot and stir it around.

Step 5: Add Paint and Moss

Now comes the hard part. Cut the top off of a plastic bottle or grab a funnel and attach the mouth of the funnel to a balloon. Now pour your paint into the funnel and fill balloon about half full in it's collapsed state. (we'll inflate it with our mixture next)

Step 6: Pour Moss Mixture Into Balloon

This step is a messy one. Pour the mixture of beer and moss into a plastic soap bottle ( or better yet, a basting syringe). Attach the balloon to this and then squeeze the bottle to fill up the balloon. Watch the balloon as it fills to prevent it from exploding.

Step 7: Inflate

Now i might be best to accept that you probably eat sugar, eat lettuce (moss), and drink beer b/c this step is kind of gross but simple. Just inflate the balloon with your mouth to add more size so that the balloon will pop better when it hits a wall. Then tie of the balloon with an overhand knot.

Step 8: Go Outside

Now just repeat these steps for each balloon, and then go outside and launch them. Hopefully within a few weeks the moss will grow into the shape of the exploded splash with some nice moss drip marks.
( north walls tend to be better spots for moss to grow)

this project used ideas and resources from :

green guerrilla's green guerrilla's and moss graffitimoss graffiti

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50 Comments

low-key lysmith

9 years ago on Step 8

why the paint?

Mr. Deeds

15 years ago on Introduction

Interesting. I don't suppose you could put large quantities of this in buckets and use it as a paint of sorts? I personally like the idea of moss painting.

waynevanwijk

12 years ago on Introduction

The easy way to fill the balloon without getting a mouthful of mossy beer would be to add the contents to a bottle that has not been cut or punctured in any way.

Then blow up the balloon to the desired size, twist the neck a few times to stop the air escaping and then stretch the neck of the balloon over the bottle opening. The balloon will stay inflated.

Turn the whole lot upside down and the contents of the bottle will fall into the balloon. Remove the still inflated balloon and tie it off.

I figured out this method whilst making about 300 balloon and birdseed style juggling balls. In fact, I should make an instructable of this.

spark master

11 years ago on Step 5

This is ludicrous, moss may be pretty , but it ruins cement. Your paint filled moss bombs look quite disgusting, But perhaps you need the world to look like vomit or diarrhea. Do this in your bed room, sure to impress mummy and dada.

Consider getting your cities to make more green space parks and kill people who destroy them.

Oh BTW , in the summer, since I was maybe 8, we city kids would have water balloon fights. My parents (et al), would flip if we ran the hose too much. We filled a big bucket with water, from it we filled glass soda bottles, (lord I am ancient), we simply inflated the balloon and pulled it (carefully ) over top of a water filled soda bottle to just below crown (no screw tops) then holding the balloon on the neck , inverted them.

Air goes up, liquid goes down. Never had an issue. After 2-3 never lost a balloon. If you want way more air then only put a little sludge water, whatever, and fill the balloon a tad past where you want it. (Newbies will loose air till they get it right)

In later years plastic bottle made it easier, faster too since then they had half gallon bottles.

mpikas

11 years ago on Step 7

Not a great idea, some mosses and some of the things you'll find with them (mushrooms) can make you pretty sick in pretty small quantities. If you want to get the balloon fuller and pop better just put it over a water faucet or hose nozzle and top it off with some water, that will work better than air and is much safer.

mpikas

11 years ago on Step 4

You're pretty much just adding something for the moss spores to use as fuel, I've never tried sugar but I've done bread and water or bred and beer, both worked about the same. I usually add them in the previous step in the blender to mix/cut everything up well.

j574sbi

13 years ago on Step 3

i'm thinking mortar and pestle might be safer and also not ruin my grinder.

spectacular

11 years ago on Step 7

That. Looks. Disgusting. Haha the paint makes it look like blood (!)

ilpug

11 years ago on Introduction

https://www.instructables.com/id/The-balloon-bomb-filling-device/

i made a filling device for these. pretty simple and makes it a lot easier and cleaner.