Pale crusting, dark patches or soft green cushions. From the garden they all just read as a dirty roof. They are three different things wanting three different jobs, and you can tell which is which from the ground.
Inland farmland damp, hedgerow shade and the valley air together mean these roofs hold moisture well into the day. Lichen takes to the older slate, moss builds in the laps behind it, and field dust and tannin darken everything on top.
Part algae, part fungus, and anchored into the surface by a holdfast that sits below the face of the slate. Nothing brushes it off, which is why it is the growth people give up on. Give it a biocide and the time to work and it dies back and goes. We simply come back and check it.
The deep green cushions that build up in the laps and along the shaded pitch. They hold water against the covering and fill the gutters with what they shed. We lift them off by hand first and then treat, so the roof is genuinely dealt with rather than tidied.
Not one organism but the residue of years of growth — algae, spores and field dust colonising, dying and layering into a general discolouration. Out here it is often more dust than growth, which is worth knowing: it makes for a considerably lighter job than the roof looks.
Naming it correctly is what stops you paying for the wrong treatment.
We go off your photographs. Colour, whether it has depth or lies flat, how far it has spread and which side of the house started. That settles it for most roofs without anyone going up.
Each answer leads somewhere different. Staining often washes down. Moss comes off by hand and then gets treated. Lichen needs a biocide left to work and a look back at it afterwards.
You get told plainly what is on the roof and what will shift it. Where it turns out to be dust rather than growth, we say so. That is a much smaller job than you were expecting.
A short read and a one-minute check, both free.
On a shaded rural roof that is quicker than most people expect. The guide explains what regrowth needs and what actually breaks the cycle.
The Render Check runs through what to look for from the ground in about a minute, so you know whether the walls are worth adding while we are there.
We cover Adamstown along with Newtown, Oldcourt, Kellystown and Coonoge, through the farmland and the hedgerow-shaded lanes either side of the village.
Whatever is on a shaded roof is usually on the render and the outbuilding walls as well, and it responds to the same treatment.
What people ask once they have had a proper look at it.
Lichen is part algae, part fungus, and it bonds into the tile or slate rather than sitting on it. The holdfast anchors below the surface layer, so brushing gets nowhere. We give a biocide the dwell time to reach it, and then it lets go.
Lichen dies back gradually rather than lifting on the day, so we schedule a follow-up to check it once it has dried out. That second visit is part of the job, not an extra, and we would rather see it through than leave you wondering whether it worked.
They are two different things and the difference is what decides how long the result lasts. Cleaning clears the surface; treating goes after the spores and rooting underneath it. Do the two together and you get a roof that looks right and stays that way.
It changes how we work rather than whether we can. Clay is more brittle than concrete and takes a lighter touch; concrete is more forgiving but holds growth in its texture. We match the handling to the covering, so either way the roof is safe.
Six organisms, what each one does to tile and slate and what each needs to shift it. That belongs on the main roof cleaning page rather than on every page.
Two shots from the ground is plenty for us to tell you what you are dealing with.
Phone: 089-949-1525
WhatsApp: Send a couple of photos
Email: info@eireshine.ie
Send it over and we will tell you which of the three it is and whether it is worth treating yet. Often it is less serious than it looks from below.
Send whatever you can get from the garden. It does not need to be a good photo.
