Do you have ‘summer long balls’? Awkward phenomenon could be uncomfortable — and impact your fertility

Looking for a reason to welcome winter?

Enter the dreaded “summer long balls,” a seasonal condition characterized by the unpleasant engorgement of the testicles.

Like mangoes and other stone fruit that swell when it’s sweltering, men are doing battle with ball bulge.

“It sucks,” one anonymous gent told The Cut, which coined the term. “I wish I could wear sluttier shorts in the summer. But I can’t do so comfortably.”

For some, the condition distends their balls to the point that their bits hit the water in the toilet bowl when they sit down.

Another nameless victim who experienced summer encroaching on his southern hemisphere said that consistent sweat causes his scrotum skin to stick to his leg, creating a dubious “bat wing” effect.

Awkwardly, he said, he feels the need to rearrange things down there — and is worried about people noticing in public.

Experts say temperature changes can cue the body to self-regulate, affecting sperm production and causing a case of testicular migration.

“When it’s a cold environment, the testicles move towards the body, and the scrotum tenses up,” New Jersey urologist Anika Ackerman told The Cut. “The opposite is true in a warm environment. The scrotum relaxes, and the testicles move away from the body.

In effect, the testicles do not enlarge in the heat; they simply move further away from the body.

Experts suspect that men with varicoceles, or enlarged veins within the scrotum, are more susceptible to the low-hanging fruit of summer long balls.

“What you’re describing as summer long balls is, I suspect, really the varicocele becoming more pronounced as a result of the elevated temperature,” said Yaniv Larish, a urologist and surgeon at Fifth Avenue Urology.

“When you have a varicocele, the blood is not moving around efficiently, so instead of circulating around the testicle and pulling the heat away, it’s pooling up and actually insulating the testicle at an elevated temperature.”

Varicoceles, essentially scrotum-specific varicose veins, affect roughly 15 percent of men. Generally harmless, they can decrease fertility. According to research, varicoceles appear 2–3 times more frequently in infertile men and can be treated with minor surgery.

If a case of summer long balls is causing considerable discomfort, there are ways to support your scrotum through the scorch of the season.

Experts recommend wearing tight underwear and spending as much time as possible in cool, air-conditioned spaces.

Other remedies include “Nutsicles,” which, as the name implies, are an ice pack for the testicles. Designed to ease the pain of vasectomy patients, the icy cool can also help those suffering from summer long balls.

The good news? As temperatures decrease as we move toward fall, so too should ball size return to standard circumference.