What the heck is this!?!

[conniepr]

I found this branch, blown off a tree, this morning and picked it up. Felt something wet and squishy... turns out it was the black (?) growths (?). Is this some kind of fungus or something? I looked up into my trees and could not find a single spot on any of the branches still on the tree... Here's hoping it's not something real bad...

[Ian66]

Looks like a fungus called Exidia glandulosa (witches butter) or a similar species of jelly fungi.....these fungi tend to grow on branches that are already dead...so I wouldn't be concerned about your tree....

Ian

[conniepr]

Thanks for the ID. I went on line and looked it up. Yep, that's it. Lots of pictures and descriptions, but no info on what to do about it to minimize impact. The one branch is now already at the dump, but there must be more spores around somewhere under those trees. It has been raining more here than usual. That probably activated it.