What did I find in my front yard?

[TN al]

...We have had a lot of rain recently and everything is still wet. This morning I went out and saw next to my walk what I thought to be a pair of mushrooms. They were large and I kicked at them but they resisted my easy kick. I then kicked at them a little harder and they broke away but I could feel the tension as they broke and I judge that they were securely connected to the ground, more than a mushroom would be anyway. They were slightly yellow in color but intead of having a crown like a mushroom they were spherical. The larger one was about the size of a softball. Whatever were these things?

[trotsky]

1. Eat 'em.

If you die, they were mushrooms. Poisonous ones. ;-)

[timber84]

2. gross!!!!

[kedrys]

3. Pods. Do NOT go to sleep. n/t

[EstimatedProphet]

4. Sounds like a puffball to me

They get quite big sometimes, and have a heavy stem. Easiest way to tell: cut them in half, and see if they're solid the whole way through. If it's all mushroom, then it's a puffball. If though, you find that inside there's a hollow space, like a mushroom developing but hasn't released the cap (as if the cap wraps around the outside and makes a shell with a hollow space inside) then it's very likely an Aminita of some sort.
The good news-puffballs are one of the best edibles. Quite tasty fried up in butter!

[TN al]

6. It had a hollow space.

Are aminitas good to eat too?

[meganmonkey]

9. I think you want to be careful with the amanitas -

at least the ones I've heard of...

http://www.erowid.org/plants/amanitas/amanitas.shtml

[EstimatedProphet]

11. One or two are

the rest are the most poisonous mushrooms on the planet.
Wash your hands and tools.

[timber84]

8. Ok you know too much about mushrooms

[EstimatedProphet]

12. That's what I get for being a biologist.

[Minimus]

5. I get the weirdest 'shrooms all over my yard. I had a cluster that

looked like fingers coming up from the ground. Sorta like a gloved hand. They smelled terrible too. They freaked me out.

The rest of my yard has all kinds different shapes and sizes, some are huge. Some are rooted deep and you really have to dig them up.

My father told me I must have alot of decaying tree limbs/stumps under my ground.

[CatBoreal]

7. Go here

http://www.agarics.org/Index.jsp, click on the database and punch in your observations. You'll get a list of possibilities.

[Sporadicus]

10. Puffballs Were Fun When We Were Kids

When they get mature, they spew millions of spores at the slightest poke or prod. They would emit a constant stream of tiny yellow spores that looked like smoke. We treated them like soccer balls, clouds surrounding each kick.

[Sabriel]

13. We ate one the size of a small watermelon

Tasty, tasty, although I was squeamish at first.