I’m trying to find out about these orange mushrooms that keep growing at the base of my vegetable plants. Are they okay to leave there? Are they good or bad for the garden? I have lots of questions because I have never had this happen in my garden before.
Read on for the answers I found. (All photos on this page are my own.)
As soon as one “batch” of mushrooms dies down, others begin to form. They seemed to begin around the base of the eggplant, which has been growing for nearly 2 years now. I am wondering if that plant is dying.
So after searching around the internet, many gardeners say that mushrooms in the garden are a good thing. It is a sign that the soil is alive and well, or something like that. But I don’t know about when the mushroom grows off the stem of a plant. Usually mushrooms grow on dead or dying things, like trees. It could be that the mushrooms just look like they are on the plant, but are really coming out of the dirt. It’s hard to tell.
I did dig up the stinkhorn mushrooms that must have arrived when I added certain bags of soil to the bed. They really did stink, and were not something I wanted to look at either. I love nature, but those things were really disgusting.
Some people have mentioned that mushroom compost is excellent for amending the soil, so when these mushrooms die they are helping to compost the dirt in the bed. Mushrooms will grow on organic matter. We’ve had lots of rain lately, and they grow in the shady areas, beneath the bigger plants.
I would love to know what type of mushroom this is. When I search “orange mushrooms” I get info about the chanterelle (good to eat, although I won’t ever eat a wild mushroom found by me!), and “pumpkin, or jack o’lantern, mushroom” (which is poisonous). I don’t believe it is either of those. Of course there are so many types of mushroom, I may never know the identity of this one.
For now I will let them grow and do their thing. I found some “bird’s nest” mushrooms in the garden as well.
Here are some links to more “mushrooms in the garden” information.
Are Mushrooms in My Garden Bad? @ Garden Mentors site.
Gardening With Mushrooms @ Mother Earth News.
Thank you for sharing!
Hydrangeas Blue 
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