Warning for pet owners as fungi pop up

A variety of mushrooms have popped up across gardens and lawns across the Hunter following the spate of rainfall across the region.

While they're interesting to look at, it's better to keep a distance for both humans and pets.

Animal Referral and Emergency Centre veterinary director Dr Caroline Romeo says it was best to stick to store-bought mushrooms.

"Mushrooms that are bought at the supermarket are fine for our pets, but the wild ones are going to be of concern," she said.

She said wild mushrooms can cause a range of symptoms if consumed and it was important to look out for early signs of poisoning in pets.

"A lot of animals will have signs such as vomiting and diarrhea to start with. And then they can develop more severe signs later on such as severe seizures and signs of severe liver failure where they'd be looking extremely lethargic and going really downhill," she said.

Dr Romeo said it was more likely to be dogs than any other animal to eat mushrooms.

"Dogs will eat a lot of weird things so it's not surprising to have a dog eat mushrooms because that's what they're like by nature. They like to eat first and think about it later," she said.

"We do definitely see dogs brought in on a regular basis for having ingested a mushroom."

She suggested people pulled out mushrooms in yards if there was a dog using the space.

"If there are any growing, especially in this kind of weather where there's lots of rain and lots of people have mushrooms coming up in their gardens, so I definitely recommend removing them," she said.

If your dog is showing signs of having eaten a mushroom, Dr Romeo recommends taking them to your local vet.

"Bring them straight into a vet because it's much easier to try and decontaminate, remove any mushrooms from their system," she said.

"It's also a good idea to bring some of the mushrooms so we can identify them through the Australian Animals Poison Centre and determine whether or not it is toxic."

University of Newcastle associate professor of Physics Karen Livesey says while wild mushrooms can be harmful to humans and pets, they benefit the ecosystem.

"There's only a couple that are dangerous, but the problem is those can look like ones that are perfectly fine or look like shop-bought mushrooms," she said.

"The moral of the story is don't even try unless you're really an expert because the couple that are dangerous look just like regular ones. Even the ones that won't harm you won't taste very good so I wouldn't eat them."

Professor Livesy said people can pull mushrooms out of their yard if they want to but they are responsible for breaking down dead matter.

"You often find them like where there's mulch, or a dead tree, or a dead plant. They're super important for breaking down that organic matter. So, we actually want them. They're really important in our ecosystem," she said.

"If people can, it's nice to keep them. They're actually a sign that your yard and the ground beneath your yard is doing well and is very healthy."

She said a range of varieties had been popping up across the Hunter from anemone stinkhorns to basket fungus and ghost mushrooms.

"A lot of people have stinkhorns in their grass or mulch. It's bright red and it does actually stink. It's got a brown coating in the middle and is sort of sticky and stinky and it attracts flies because it smells like dead flesh," she said.

"The flies help spread the spores so that they transport to other places and the fungi can grow in other places."

She said basket fungus often pops open like popcorn and remains empty inside resembling a ball.

"It can be 20 to 25 centimetres across in size and has find threads that kind of trace out the pattern on a soccer ball. They're found all over the east coast of Australia and in New Zealand," she said.

There have been recent sightings of ghost mushrooms in Port Stephens and Glenrock, Professor Livesy said.