We are being taken over by mushrooms!
By Barb42
@Barb42 (4214)
United States
September 8, 2008 1:33pm CST
Every day, we can go out into our yard and pastures and find hundreds of mushrooms. We cut our grass at least once a week, but this doesn't kill the mushrooms. Most of them that are small survive the bad blade. We have mushrooms from the size of a small ball to 8 to 10 inches in width, and all colors! My husband had already knocked down all the largest ones before I got some pictures. I had gone through the yard Saturday afternoon, too, knocking them all down. But what did I find this morning on my morning walk around the grounds? More mushrooms, and, as you can see from my pictures, that they weren't all small.
We were wondering what causes these mushrooms to grown on our lawn,so I looked it up on Google. Here's what I found:"Mushrooms are fungi that thrive on dead organic matter so they're probably growing on dead roots that are decaying or old scraps of wood that were buried/ covered by soil. If this is a big problem and you continue to find concentrated areas where the mushrooms are growing, you might want to probe around the soil and see if you can find larger pieces of wood or dead roots that you can dig up." http://www.homeabc.net/Garden-Landscape/2994-3-Garden-Landscape.html
We have cut lots of trees on our land and there are lots of dead stumps under the ground, so we figure this helps them grow. But, there are also lots where there hasn't been any trees cut that we know about, at least not since we've been here the past 38 years.
To see more of the mushrooms growing in my yard today, go check out my Flickr pics. These are only a few of those growing or that have grown this week in our yard. I am sure tomorrow there will be many more. http://flickr.com/photos/80081876@N00/sets/72157607180904840/
7 responses
@hmbw_24 (404)
• United States
8 Sep 08
oh wow i know what you mean. i live in hot and humid climate and because we have had so much rain this year they are popping up everywhere!My kids like to check them out although i won't let them touch them cause my mom always said they were poisonous....i doubt it she probably just didnt want me messin with them.
1 person likes this
@mentalward (14690)
• United States
9 Sep 08
Barb, thanks for posting that site! It's awesome! I mean, I still couldn't tell one from another when so many of them look so much alike, but it's good to know that the majority of them are nonpoisonous! I'm going to print that page out and take it with me around our property to see if there are any obviously poisonous mushrooms around and try to get rid of them before my dogs or cats eat one!
Thanks again! That's an extremely informative site!
@Barb42 (4214)
• United States
8 Sep 08
I found a site where you can determine what is poisonous and what isn't. Most of those in our yard are non-poisonous. But some can make you very sick. This site warns that even those that might not be poisonous may make you sick if eaten raw. http://americanmushrooms.com/lawnandgarden.htm
@Barb42 (4214)
• United States
8 Sep 08
That's the problem. I don't know if these kind would be edible or not. I've seen them in the wild and would never think of harvesting them. But these are in our yard. I think we will pass. I don't know how long the season will be. But they will leave when the weather gets too cold.
1 person likes this
@GardenGerty (169448)
• United States
8 Sep 08
It is true that some of them are very poisonous. I would only pick ones identified by an expert. I would not take a risk with myself or my family. on the other hand, some are very healthy. I just do not know which ones are which.
@MsTickle (25180)
• Australia
18 Sep 08
If you want to get rid of them, you must pick as much of the mushroom and stem as you can. They regrow because they leave spores which are sort of like seeds. When we want to pick more mushrooms later or in following years we leave a couple there. Your mowing them into the ground would cause them to multiply prolifically. If you remove them by picking, it may take a couple of years to remove all traces..
@Barb42 (4214)
• United States
18 Sep 08
MsTickle, I took some more pictures other day. But I haven't taken them off my camera and put them on Flickr. I'll try to do that soon. They have really been plentiful around here this time. I've never seen so many big ones and them lasting so long.
1 person likes this
@mentalward (14690)
• United States
9 Sep 08
Oh, man! They ARE a problem! One thing you don't want to do is mow them down! I found this out from experience, then looked it up. If you chop them to pieces with a lawnmower, you're only spreading the spores around. You might kill that one mushroom, but you'll end up with hundreds of new ones! 
They will also grow wherever it's damp, even in the grass with moisture from dew the night before.
Wouldn't it be nice if they were all edible? Actually, I believe that mushrooms are one of those foods that you either love or hate. Personally, I love them, but my husband hates them. We really do have a problem when ordering pizza!
I wish you lots of luck with your mushroom problem. The only way I can think of to get rid of them permanently is by picking them by hand and dumping them right into a lawn bag and sealing it up. That's a lot of work if you have hundreds, or even thousands, of these things growing! You can spend days picking them all just to find more growing the next day, because you have to get rid of ALL the spores before they'll stop growing. Even then, there's always the chance that some spores will be blown onto your property from someone elses! I don't have a clue about whether or not there are fungicides that kill off mushrooms or toadstools. They're as bad as dandilions!
I'd love to see if I could get some spores from button mushrooms I bought from the grocery store to grow under my deck or somewhere like that. One of these days, maybe...
They will also grow wherever it's damp, even in the grass with moisture from dew the night before.
Wouldn't it be nice if they were all edible? Actually, I believe that mushrooms are one of those foods that you either love or hate. Personally, I love them, but my husband hates them. We really do have a problem when ordering pizza!
I wish you lots of luck with your mushroom problem. The only way I can think of to get rid of them permanently is by picking them by hand and dumping them right into a lawn bag and sealing it up. That's a lot of work if you have hundreds, or even thousands, of these things growing! You can spend days picking them all just to find more growing the next day, because you have to get rid of ALL the spores before they'll stop growing. Even then, there's always the chance that some spores will be blown onto your property from someone elses! I don't have a clue about whether or not there are fungicides that kill off mushrooms or toadstools. They're as bad as dandilions!
I'd love to see if I could get some spores from button mushrooms I bought from the grocery store to grow under my deck or somewhere like that. One of these days, maybe...@Barb42 (4214)
• United States
9 Sep 08
I remember reading where they said it was impossible to get rid of them completely unless you just got rid of your lawn. We even have them growing this year on the side of some of our trees. They are really pretty, just a problem. I was out walking again this afternoon when my husband was out in the yard putting out ant poison and picking up other people's trash on our land. I saw more that seemed to have just popped up. The grown is sort of wet which feeds them, I'm sure.
@mentalward (14690)
• United States
9 Sep 08
Yeah, after responding to your discussion, I read more about them and noticed the same thing... you have to get rid of your lawn. I'm sure that goes for trees, too!
I'm just glad to hear that the majority of the ones growing in our lawns are not poisonous! I just wonder which ones are edible. Guess I'll just stick to the ones in the grocery store.
@mentalward (14690)
• United States
9 Sep 08
Oh, I forgot. I wanted to comment on what you said about your husband picking up other people's trash from your land. We've been doing that as well. We just moved here in May of last year and have found all sorts of bizzare things: a stovetop, a car battery, some tires, and fishing equipment! I'm fooling them, though... at least a bit. I'm surrounding our property with fishing line (wrapped from tree to tree), mainly to help keep the deer out, but it should deter any humans if they come across it in the dark. LOL
@wickikitty (532)
• United States
8 Sep 08
I live in the desert no mushrooms here... if you seek safety I would tell ya to move LOL I love mushrooms though they will probably end world hunger =D
1 person likes this
@Barb42 (4214)
• United States
8 Sep 08
Hopefully they want cause us to have to move. Although we've seen them before, it's never been in the number like these are. This has been going on for a couple weeks. Doesn't matter that we kick them over or run over them with the lawnmower, lost survive. And where they don't, there are new ones every day. Some are standing alone and some are in little patches of 3 to 5 mushrooms. I don't think these are the kind of mushrooms I would want to eat, though. I've never been really clear what would be considered a good one or a poisonous one. So I think I'll leave these alone. 
1 person likes this
@ch88ss (2271)
• United States
11 Sep 08
wow, that sure is a lot.
i remember my yard had tons of mushroom too. I learned taht because I was using organice fertilizer, when there is too much organic matter in the ground, then mushrooms will grow. So teh good sign, your dirt is great for planting any kind of crops. the bad signs these mushrooms could be poisonous and since you have your grandchildren coming over often. It is good idea to get rid of them. i know mines overtime will go away. I usually dig them up and find below the mushroom roots a white powedery ball, which is probably the ogranic stuff I once buried in the dirt and over did it.
