River Dampness and Black Mold
Milford is built on the river. The air is always wet here. Morning fog covers the cemeteries and leaves the stones soaking wet until the afternoon.
This constant moisture feeds black mold. It grows deep into the pores of the stone. It turns gray granite almost black. Families looking for headstone cleaning services near me often think the stone is just dirty. It isn't dirt. It is a living infestation. You can't just hose it off. We use a biological cleaner. We kill the mold down to the root. The black crust dies and washes away with the rain, leaving the stone clean.
Farm Dust and Green Algae
We are surrounded by farmland. When the tractors run, the dust flies. That dust is full of fertilizer. It lands on the wet stones in the cemetery.
That fertilizer is like rocket fuel for algae. We see green slime growing on stones here in a matter of weeks. If you scrub it, you just spread the spores. The nitrogen in the dust keeps feeding it. We use a biocide that kills the algae and neutralizes the surface. We stop the food source so the green doesn't come back immediately.
Fragile Historic Marble
In the old sections of Odd Fellows or Christ Church, the markers are from the 1800s. The marble is soft. It feels like rough sugar. We call this "sugaring."
The stone is crumbling. A pressure washer would blow the lettering right off the face. Even a stiff brush is too dangerous. We clean these by hand. We use soft bristles. We get the grime off so you can read the name, but we don't try to make it look brand new. If you scrub too hard, the stone falls apart. We aim to keep it standing.
Sinking in River Mud
The water table is high near the river. The ground is soft. Heavy monuments don't float. They sink.
We find markers where the dates are buried in the mud. Adding topsoil is useless; the stone just pushes it down. During cemetery plot maintenance, we lift the monument. We dig out the wet mud and pack in a base of crushed angular gravel. The gravel locks together. It drains the water and holds the weight.
Brackish Air Corrosion
The Mispillion is tidal. The air here has salt in it. That salt eats into bronze markers and iron gates.
Bronze turns a chalky green. This is corrosion, not patina. It destroys the metal. We strip that green oxidation. We apply a protective clear coat. This seals the metal against the salty air and keeps it looking brown and polished.
Oily Soil Stains
In the older lots near the river, the soil has history. Sometimes, heavy rains bring up oily residues from the old shipyards or coal yards.
It leaves a dark, greasy ring around the base of the stone. Water won't touch it. It stains the granite. We use specific poultices for cleaning stone gravestones. We draw the oil out of the rock. We get the stain out without damaging the rough-cut base.
Bird Droppings and Acid
Being near the water, we have gulls and other birds. Their droppings are highly acidic.
If a dropping sits on a marble marker, it burns a rough spot into the polish. We see these etched spots all the time. We clean the droppings immediately. We can't fix deep etching, but we clean the area to stop the acid from eating deeper into the stone.