Slime Molds and Stinkhorns

Posted by
Barbara M. Martin
Jul 19, 2007

Nature is a great recycler. Mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of underground growth that helps decompose organic matter (or sometimes fresh manure but who's counting) yadda yadda. But sometimes these fruiting bodies are just plain weird. Slime molds (not even mushrooms but I am not into splitting hairs here) are disgusting looking (vomit is one common description) and just ask to be raked up. But I recently learned about a new one that may go one step beyond the essentially ignorable grossness of slime molds.

One person described it as a crabclaw sticking out of the ground and attracting flies. At first I thought someone's seafood picnic trash had been carted off by a happy puppy for lackadaisical burying, but nope. It's a stinkhorn! Wow. I learn something new every day. Just another wonder of nature. Have you ever seen -- or better yet smelled -- a stinkhorn? (They stink to attract flies on purpose.)

Actually, it might be fun to get out the yellow crime scene tape, fence it off and call it a case for CSI and see what happens next.

Cool photos and more information on stinkhorns!

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