Word.ws English Dictionary

octopus stinkhorn

octopus stinkhorn noun: a fungus of the genus Clathrus, especially C. archeri, featuring pink or white 'arms' and an odor similar to rotten meat.

octopus stinkhorn: a fungus of the genus Clathrus, especially C. archeri, featuring pink or white 'arms' and an odor...
Image: Michel Langeveld, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

octopus stinkhorn (plural octopus stinkhorns)

  1. A fungus of the genus Clathrus, especially C. archeri, featuring pink or white 'arms' and an odor similar to rotten meat.
    • There are many types of stinkhorn fungus, including the orange squid or octopus stinkhorn (Clathrus columnatus) that has branched fingers and secretes a brown gooey-looking substance that smells worse than it looks.2005 December 10, Yvonne Swanson, “Olfactory assault”, in St. Petersburg Times, St. Petersburg, Florida, page 3F
    • A walker was stunned after spotting a rare smelly fungus – which is bright pink with “tentacles” and is known as “Octopus Stinkhorn”.2014 December 27, “Moor walker finds a ‘Octopus Stinkhorn’”, in Western Daily Press, Bristol, page 6

Examples of octopus stinkhorn in a sentence

  • A native fungus, the Octopus Stinkhorn, or Devil's Fingers, still smells of rotting meat regardless of what it's called.2016 March 22, “Devil of a fungus in Bush Capital”, in The Canberra Times, page 8:
  • Meanwhile, a rare octopus stinkhorn or devil's fingertips (Clathus archeri, below right) has popped up at RHS Garden Rosemoor in Devon.2019 October 20, anonymous author, “Tread softly, for you tread on my mushrooms”, in Country Life, Bath, England, page 25:

Synonyms of octopus stinkhorn

Forms of octopus stinkhorn

pluraloctopus stinkhorns

Questions about octopus stinkhorn

What does octopus stinkhorn mean?
Octopus stinkhorn means a fungus of the genus Clathrus, especially C. archeri, featuring pink or white 'arms' and an odor similar to rotten meat.
How do you use octopus stinkhorn in a sentence?
A native fungus, the Octopus Stinkhorn, or Devil's Fingers, still smells of rotting meat regardless of what it's called.
What part of speech is octopus stinkhorn?
Octopus stinkhorn is a noun.
What is the plural of octopus stinkhorn?
The plural of octopus stinkhorn is octopus stinkhorns.

Words near octopus stinkhorn in the dictionary

  1. Octopus cards
  2. octopus hold
  3. octopus holds
  4. octopus ink
  5. octopus inks
  6. octopus stinkhorn
  7. octopus stinkhorns
  8. octopus strap
  9. octopus straps
  10. octopus stretch
  11. octopus stretches

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: octopus stinkhorn (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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