Strange stuff in my Day Lily bed

16 years ago

Hello All,

This was actually at my client's house. Her side boulevard consists of rows of Day Lilies. I was cleaning up the area today and in between some of the lilies about 18" apart were large mounds of what I first thought was ice. Not cubes but the kind of ice you get with your pop in fast food restaurants. It was yellow in color and as I soon discovered it was gelatinous and slippery. This stuff made me think of something from a Stephen King novel. The mounds were big and pretty uniformly spaced. It was the strangest thing I've ever seen. My client, who is 80 and has been gardening all her life had no clue what it was either. I scoped up a bunch and we put some in a jar. There were 6 or 7 mounds of this stuff, lots of it. Any clue as to what this stuff is? Thanks!

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Comments (6)

cookiebabe
16 years ago
Could it have been the water-holding gel modules that one can buy to put in container plantings?
dmurray407
16 years ago
Yep, it sounds like the descriptions of water retaining crystals I've read . . .could someone have placed them in her garden bed last year? I've read that they can last for 5 years.
sjmarq
16 years ago
Google images 'dog vomit slime mold'.

Harmless to the garden, disgusting to human.
krissiemae
Original Author
16 years ago
Thank you all for responding. I don't think it is the gel modules though. I was the only one that did any gardening for her last year and when I showed her this stuff she was as baffled as I was. What struck me as strange was the mounds were appr. 18" apart and there were 6 or 7 of them. This seemed to me like something that had formed by itself. These weren't in her regular gardens but out on the boulevard where she just has a bunch of daylilies planted. Oh well, just thought I'd try here to see if anyone had ever seen this stuff before. Thanks again, Kris
duluthinbloomz4
16 years ago
Yes - many of us have seen this stuff and we call it, as mentioned above, "dog vomit" fungus or mold.

It's not really a fungus but a slime mold. Calling it the "Dog Vomit Slime Mold" isn't very appealing so its scientific name is Fuligo septica. In other words, "sticky stuff".

Dog Vomit Fungus usually appears in late spring or summer following soaking rains. The slime mold is usually found growing in mulched areas near homes and office buildings, but can appear in the woods, too.

The color is bright yellow or sickly orange. The colorful growth occurs when the mold is beginning its fruiting stage. It can appear overnight causing people to question what it is and how it got there. The first instinct is to blame the dog across the street.
krissiemae
Original Author
16 years ago
This wasn't dog vomit fungus. This stuff looked like a pile of ice. It was appr. 6" deep and 8" in diameter. It was gelatinous and slippery. It did have a tint of yellow but it definitely was not DV fungus.