Day 6: It looked like a banana sticking out of the bank above the ditch. I did a double-take and realized I was looking at one of the biggest Stinkhorns I'd ever seen, and it wasn't even fully open yet.
The Stinkhorns are a fairly small family with only a few representatives here in the Pacific Northwest. They call them the Phallales, and here I will detour from the subject of their taxonomy in the interest of keeping this report family-friendly. They are certainly one of the more unusual fungi, and as one field guide puts it, "the sight and smell of a stinkhorn is something most collectors will never forget." Another refers to the "odor of decaying flesh." Edible? No one wants to try!
As the Stinkhorn matures, it will exude a greenish slime which contains its spores. Insects, attracted to the smell, assist in transporting the spores as they stick to their feet. Indeed, even though this specimen had not yet ruptured, flies were already visiting it.
With respect to its identity, I am not sufficiently versed in mycology to make a determination other than to say, "Yes, we have no bananas."
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