Thank goodness I found this website. I've been trying to figure out what these darn things are. We also live in New Jersey and think they came from our woodchips. We have to pass this bed in order to go into our house and boy the smell is enough to knock you out. It's so disgusting! This is the first time I saw this fungus and it seems from the posts they are throughout the United States. Just curious if this fungus has been seen in past years or for some reason has just popped up now.
Afaik, it (Mutinus caninus or M. elegans or some other stinkhorn) loves yards/gardens and since lots of people have yards/gardens, there's a lot of them. I don't live in NJ (anymore) so I can't comment on whether the weather :) has been particularly conducive to their growth this year.
We have had an outbreak of thses stinkers the past week tere were about 10-15 of all sizes. I poured some bleach on them but they still stunk. I assume as soon as the temperature drops we should get past this bad smell. I have not seen these things in the past only this year.
