How do clean black specs on the side of white cars? It's fungus!
 

I bet if you have a white car you know what I am talking about. These little black specs develop all over the side of my white car and on the rims. This whole time I thought it was tar and struggled removing them. If you scrape it off with your nail it leaves a little brown spot which is a pain to wash off. Luckily this hasn't started happening to my P car yet.

It turns out it is not tar but something called Artillery Fungus! A freaking fungus! If I had known i wouldn't have touched it with my nails thats for sure! It is actually so interesting and so freaky it sounds like it came out of a science fiction movie.

See below:

The fruiting body of the artillery fungus orients itself toward bright surfaces, such as light-colored houses or parked automobiles. The artillery fungus "shoots" its black, sticky spore mass, the "egg," which can be windblown as high as the second story of a house. The spore mass sticks to the side of a building or automobile, resembling a small speck of tar. You may also find them on the undersides of leaves on plants growing in mulched areas.

Once in place, the spore mass is very difficult to remove without damaging the surface to which it is attached. If removed, it leaves a stain. A few of these spots are barely noticeable, but as they accumulate, they may become very unsightly on houses or cars.

What do artillery fungi look like?
They resemble a tiny cream or orange-brown cup with one black egg. The cup is approximately 1/10 of an inch in diameter. Areas of mulch with the artillery fungus may appear matted and lighter in color than the surrounding mulch.

Here is a video of it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SgEjnZa5Gs

My car is white and it is not host of any fungii.

no fungi here, sounds like a local to you thing.

No fungus here but this is my last white car. I never thought it would be more difficult to keep clean than my black cars . It a different type of difficulty . Black shows the dust and can swirl easily but white shows and magnifies anything that is not white. The exhaust soot , any insect, a black spot -- a white car presents it as some type of featured announcement .

Next car .. Silver !!!! I have had many silver cars but they are so easy to keep clean that it can even look clean when its dirty.

Oh no! Did you really scratch the fungus off with your finger? That's it's preferred method for taking over a host's body. Just ask all the Docs on this board.

It's all about coevolution. Artillery fungus evolved over the past 40 years as an adaptation to the 911. Nutty Porsche owners get close to its spores and try to scratch them off with their fingers. The spores then gets under your nail, into your bloodstream, into your brain. This causes you to buy another Porsche and the cycle begins anew. But this time you buy a black Porsche to avoid the black spots, but there's the white spot artillery fungus lurking just around the corner.

Well the only specs I get are normally from tire shine, but I just use bug n tar remover if something decides it wants to be difficult

holy crap! I wish i would have saw this a few years ago, my mulch when i lived in NJ def had this fungus. when i would be lazy i would park my car in the driveway and must have gotten sprayed. they are a pain to get off. I basically had to use tar and bug remover and follow up a clay bar. I dont think they make their way past the clear coat.

also noticed these on my silver and black cars, but havent had any since i moved to NYC