SCIENTISTS at Bournemouth University have solved the mystery of the blue balls that fell into a garden.
Steve Hornsby, 61, found the jelly-like balls scattered in the grass after a hailstorm.
The 3cm-wide balls are almost certainly sodium polyacrylate.
The substance is an absorbent polymer used in nappies and by florists and gardeners to keep soil moist.
Josie Pegg, from the university’s school of applied sciences, examined them with a spectroscope, which measures how a sample absorbs or reflects light.
She said the balls appeared to be sodium polyacrylate crystals that rapidly increased in size after being saturated in the hailstorm.
It’s not clear how the crystals got into the garden but she said: “Perhaps someone was having a clear-out and chucked them over the fence.”
Steve, an aircraft engineer, saw the sky turn a dark yellow colour during the incident on Thursday, January 23, and found around 20 of the slippery balls afterwards.
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