Salon spoke to Susan Brawley, professor on the College of Maine Faculty of Marine Sciences, about sea moss, which has been trending on social media apps like TikTok for its purported well being advantages. Brawley instructed Salon that sea moss is a sort of crimson algae. Also referred to as “Irish moss,” or extra technically Chondrus crispus, it grows alongside the rocky components of the Atlantic coasts of Europe and North America and is a basis species within the North Atlantic intertidal zone. “It gives 3-D construction for smaller organisms and meals for invertebrate herbivores within the low zone,” she mentioned. Brawley mentioned that foraged sea moss shouldn’t be harvested from polluted areas, however in any other case, she doesn’t see a detrimental environmental affect if folks forage for their very own Chondrus crispus. “Certainly, for hundreds of years, that’s precisely what coastal folks did throughout the North Atlantic. After I got here to Maine, a colleague who was a local Mainer gave me her handed-down household recipes for the right way to accumulate, clear, and put together Irish moss, in addition to a pudding recipe,” Brawley mentioned.