We've all been there: you're working in the yard or out walking around and you find something you have never seen before in your life. It could be completely normal or off-the-wall strange, but you don't know, because you don't know what it is.
We used to have to just shrug and resign ourselves to never knowing, but not now. Now, we have the internet for help.
Can I take a moment to appreciate how this person used a shell to hold out the slug? Far too many people just casually pick up stuff on the beach.
But this just looks weird and gross. It's actually the rhizome of a water lily that's come free of the lake bed.
They're the tracks of a very busy snail. It did a better cleaning job than any human worker had managed in a while.
Don't worry; they aren't some sort of spying device.
They're actually pieces from a Snap Circuits kit that some nerdy kid is really missing right now.
It would drive me mad too. The consensus is that they are balls from a silica gel pack that must have been broken somewhere nearby.
And if you weren't in on the game, then it would be easy to wonder about them.
They are markers for a DIY augmented reality game someone in the neighborhood is playing.
They are galoshes, which in North America can sometimes also just mean a rubber rain boot, but in this case it means a rubber overshoe meant to protect your fancy footwear from the rain.
It's the cocoon of a braconid wasp. While the word "wasp" makes a lot of us itch, these guys are good to have around. They prey on garden pests like hornworms.
In this case, people recognized it as an old citrus juicer that's missing a few parts. That's some serious litter.
It's a chimney flue cover, presumably for a chimney that's no longer in use. Unfortunately, the black streaking could mean that there's water getting in.
Thankfully, unlike the stinkhorn, these can be a nice find. They're the bulbs of asiatic lilies, so if the gardener is a fan, he can replant them.
This was found by a worker in rural Sicily, and it's an old strigil. People would use the curved edge to scrape away dirt and sweat before getting into the bath.
Which makes sense when changing the water requires a lot of buckets.
A circle of fungi is often called a fairy ring, and there's actual science behind why the grass may be literally greener.
Some fungi excrete compounds into the soil that basically act like high quality fertilizer to the plants nearby.
If you look super carefully, there is a hermit crab in one and another tiny crab in the other.
That's the hint. These are old barnacle shells that the crabs have repurposed into their homes.
It looks odd, but is actually normal. The neighbor is trying to reseed patched of dead grass and the sticks will hopefully prevent animals and birds from stealing the seeds before they can grow.
It's a "whole house fan" and is a great way to get the hot air out without the extra energy of running your AC. Just open a main floor window and crank the fan. It'll suck all the hot air outside, leaving you with fresher, cooler air.
Nautaliski found this item in 1959 and never managed to figure out what it was.
Two hours after posting it to Reddit, it was identified as a brooch depicting Napoleon II.
They were justifiably concerned about what they might be drinking. Thankfully, this is another case of absorption beads escaping their container.
This is most likely an overflow drain for the home's air conditioning. It's not dangerous, but means that they should probably get an HVAC cleaning.
It's a fungus called Daldinia concentrica, or coal fungus, which is inedible but not dangerous. Definitely unsightly, though.
Because someone will recognize this as part of a 2000 Hyundai Accent LC and now your victim just needs to find that exact car with a broken light.
Sadly, their chimney is probably leaking and if there's already plant growth, it's not going to be an easy fix.
Yikes!
Though it disappeared quickly, people think it was a sea star likely dropped by a bird.
It's not that weird, though. It's actually a BBQ smoker box that someone must has lost a while ago.
It was spotted inside a recycling bin cupboard at a school and is basically a DIY sensor set-up that tells someone when the bin is starting to overflow. Which saves a lot of time wasted checking each bin manually.
The questioner is a kid, so it's okay that they wouldn't recognize a dryer vent. However, people noted that they should maybe mention the broken part to their parents. You don't want animals crawling up in there.
It's a pine nut, which besides being tasty on its own, is an integral part of a good homemade pesto sauce.
Since carpenter ants like moist wood, this could also be a sign of water damage nearby.
It's the camera part of a rearview sensor system. Which made a lot of sense, since milliegrace was recently in a car accident with a deer, so it likely fell off the vehicle later.
This was found in a grandparents' house and is an old UV ray device, which was marketed as a cure-all.
It's not mold or anything, but signs that carpenter bees are living nearby. Thankfully, they're less troubling than carpenter ants, but it's still a pain to get them out.
So this is a nut bowl phone holder for people who really like to snack on nuts while watching videos.
You fill the top with nuts, prop your phone in the slots and then the front opening is a place to toss your discarded shells for easy clean up.
They are plaster bagworms and the case is where they transform into moths. They aren't dangerous and feed mostly on spider webs.
It's a weird thing to be given by neighbors, but it's just a shower curtain hook. The beads make it roll back and forth on the curtain rod easily.
This was seen in an assisted living facility. The color-coding tells staff how immobile patients should be turned and for how long in order to prevent bedsores from forming.
Which is a strange place to find a really old checkers piece, but kind of a cool find.
Which is a very fair question that received a lot of off-color jokes in response.
It's a stinkhorn and it's very aptly named. You're going to want nose plugs when you pull that up.
It's a mantis egg sack, which may make you want to burn the whole fence down, but you should leave it. Mantises are good at killing garden pests.
Yeah, I'd question that too. Thankfully, it's just excess calcium leftover from the forming of the shell.
