so....turns out the 'clay' i found by the river wasnt actually clay at all..

uhhh.. 

so. this morning i went to a stream on a walk with my dad, and there was a little patch of what looked like clay under this huge rock, i got SO excited because i love sculpting stuff out of clay/ spinning pots because its what i do in college. I found wild clay!! YAY!!!! ...

I scooped some up with a stick and put it into a bag. I didn't notice anything weird at all. 

but I was questioning if this was clay or if it was just mud. so when I got home I put it into a tub and started removing any small rocks or sticks. it was still super wet so I rolled it up into little balls and left them in the sun to dry a bit, and then id kind of basically b able to tell if it was clay due to how it would feel afterwards

I came back two hours later....

I picked a piece of it up and it was still really sticky, then I noticed a GROSS smell coming from it. IT SMELLED LIKE A DANG DUNG BEETLE.. 

I THINK IT WAS MAYBE ANIMAL POOP..

SO YEAH GUYS MORAL OF THE STORY IS DONT PICK UP RANDOM SLUDGE FROM A RIVER EVEN IF IT LOOKS A LOT LIKE CLAY. I THREW IT OUT IMMEDIAELY AND JUST HAD A SHOWER PLEASE DONT MAKE THE SAME MISTAKE I DID

(the bold words in dark red are signs I shouldnt have ignored)