Nothing is coming to my mind right now, but I can tell you with certainty that it is NOT tent caterpillars. I really can't think of any insect with reproductive characteristics like this. The eggs of snails and slugs, maybe?

6 inches is quite large! When you say 'goo', you mean that literally, right?

Oh yes. Relatively clear, jiggling goo that holds together pretty well. Appears to be stronger than jello.

Some sort of slime mold, perhaps?

tj

Normally I'd say spittlebug maybe. Not enough information. Pictures convey much information.

Dan

Snails & slugs lay their eggs in soil or on top of it.

As wet and cold as it's been, I haven't seen a single spit bug yet - and those are little globs, with maybe 1-3 nymphes contained.

It sounds large for tree frog eggs, I wonder if some kind of other toad or frog? A guess only, I haven't ever found but tree frogs in my own garden.

Yea morz8! I Googled tree frog eggs and some of what I saw looks about right. But now I feel terrible about tossing the whole thing into the forest and covering it with a pail of pulled weeds.

I'm not all that knowledgeable about amphibians, but don't they all begin their lives in bodies of water? I know that some frogs (which lay the globby egg masses) can deposit their eggs on plants, but those plant usually hang over a pond, swamp, etc. Right? Or have I already forgotten everything I thought I knew.

tj, your idea is worth thinking about, too!

Sorry, toad, but without a picture all we can do is continue to make guesses.

rhizo 1, I understand. I'll keep looking for more of them--this time with my camera.
However, we do have a sizable pond on the property. AND both times I found the egg sacs were after wind storms.

I'm not at all knowledgeable about amphibians either, my whole vocabulary concerning tree frogs would be - cute.

Do they all begin life in water and not just near it? Although, I think the whole west side of the state has been one big puddle for about 6 months now....

Toad, get that photo if you can, now that we are all curious. And wouldn't it be ironic if it did turn out to be frogs eggs - I'm not even going to ask how you came up with toad_ca for your user name ;) Understanding that it's cold and raining, is the mass you disposed of not retrievable? Thinking of photo, not necessarily salvage since we don't know what you might be hatching.

Amphibians in N Am lay their eggs in water bodies. Some in the tropics exploit cavities in trees.

Dan

Yea! I was able to dig it out intact and wash it off a bit. Here's a photo:

I can't think of anything else in the PNW that has that kind of egg mass other than frog of some type.

Anyone?

But its not in the water.

WTH? Obviously I should have lived longer in WA so I could run into this thing.

Dan

dan staley--Well, it was suspended from a shrub the first time I saw one. And it was after a pretty fierce windstorm. And the pond (with MANY MANY frogs) isn't far from the house.

toad, almost all amphibian eggs are laid in water , except some frog species in the tropics and a couple salamanders/newts. And frog eggs are clear individual eggs with black centers, stuck together, not encased in goo. I trust your County Extension would be able to ID that.

Dan

Point taken.
And a friend has sent the photo to WSU for an opinion.

I hope you'll let us know what you find out. I tried comparing to salamander eggs and that isn't quite right - I do find pictures of frog egg masses with that clear protective 'goo' but I don't know if frogs native to here.

How brave are you - you could always 'hatch' them. They don't look especially damaged, I wonder where tips could be found on hatching local/native eggs of that general type :) I'd try it for you, but you are 175 miles from me.

I'm trying to think of a biologist handy/convenient I could get to view your picture - Friday night of course and everyone gone for the weekend.

I posted to northwest forum regarding WSU agent id'd as Salamander egg mass dragged out of pond by raccoons.

Here is a link that might be useful: Northwest forum

Thank you again plantknitter!

We've had two WSU extension votes for salamander now after your photo having been viewed - so that may very well be what they are. :)

We are so often looking for the obvious, that we forget to consider unexpected!

This has nothing to do with salamanders, but reminds me of when my husband and I kept finding, over the course of several weeks, little pink shrimp in our yard. Our totally, completely landlocked, hundreds of miles from the ocean yard. Of course, these were COOKED shrimp! lol

Finally, we observed a crow flying by with something in it's beak....it discarded part of the load but kept flying with the rest. When we walked over to look at what it had jettisoned, we found a little pink shrimp! The crows had found a restaurant nearby and were stealing the leaf overs. They wanted the breading on the shrimp, but not those nasty pink things. We still laugh at that.

rhizo 1--Love it!