Cleaning Lichens From Your Roof

LESLIE: Now we’ve got Lawrence calling from New York, who’s dealing with a roofing issue. Tell us about it.

LAWRENCE: Yeah, I’m trying to sell my house. I’ve been going around looking at the roof and I thought it needed a new roof but when I got close to it, it was like a scale that’s on the roof. And after checking it – I think they call them lichens (pronounced LEECHINS) – I want to know how to get rid of them.

TOM: Hey Lawrence, I think what you’re talking about are called lichens, not (pronounced LEECHINS).

LAWRENCE: Oh, I was close. (all chuckle)

TOM: You were. And you know, lichens – as well as roof moss and algae – are all roof growths. They all can come off the same way and that is with a good roof cleaning. Not an easy process but not an impossible process. There’s a product out there called Jomax that will work well for you. You mix it with bleach. You apply it, let it sit for a little while and then you can either scrub it off or you could pressure wash it off. Just be really careful with the pressure washer so that it doesn’t – it is not like too terribly intense.

And once you have it off, there’s another trick of the trade that will stop it from coming back and that is to take a strip of copper and place it at the ridge of the roof – at the peak of the roof – all the way down. And what will happen is as the rain hits that, it releases some of the copper and that acts as a natural mildicide. It will keep the roof much cleaner over a longer period of time.

LAWRENCE: That’s great. I’ll give it a shot.