Golden Scalycap

Posted on November 27, 2024 by tspuckler

While hiking along the edge of a swamp in southern Illinois last month, these very colorful mushrooms with their golden yellow hues caught my eye.

This species is perhaps the most noticeable member of its genus. It grows in large clusters on live trees, snags, and logs of conifers and hardwoods – most commonly Beeches.

The cap is sticky when young, and bears dark brown or reddish-brown scales that contrast with the yellow cap color.

Having the scientific name Pholiota adiposa, Pholiota means “scaly” and adiposa comes from the Latin word “adeps” which means lard or grease in reference to the texture of the caps.

Like other mushrooms, Golden Scalycap serve as decomposers in ecosystems, breaking down organic matter from dead plants and animals and recycling nutrients back into the soil. They play a crucial role in the carbon cycle.

With its striking golden-brown caps and intricate scales, the Golden Scalycap presents a visual spectacle in an otherwise dark swamp and made for a neat encounter on my trip.

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Ringless Honey Mushroom

Posted on August 30, 2024 by tspuckler

This is an eye-catching organism that I saw while visiting Brecksville Reservation.

Ringless Honey Mushroom grows in clusters, often in large numbers, at the bases of trees, especially oaks. It is common in urban yards. Sometimes it looks like it’s growing right out of the ground, but it is actually growing from low stumps, roots, or other buried wood.

It is most commonly observed from September to November. It can be identified by its convex cap, which is then flattened, featuring a margin that is uplifted with age. The cap is yellow-brown to honey brown, and it lacks a ring on its stalk. There are at least 10 species of this fungus.

Ringless Honey Mushrooms exist most of the time as a network of cells (mycelium) penetrating the tissues of living trees, frequently killing their hosts by damaging the tree’s ability to transport water and nutrients. This particular species may be an exception, however, living on dead, not living, wood. When ready to reproduce, the mycelium forms mushrooms, which produce spores that are released to begin new mycelia elsewhere.

As the fruiting bodies (mushroom caps) begin to deteriorate, numerous insects swarm to them. The mushrooms provide food for a variety of small insects and other arthropods, which in turn become food for birds, salamanders, toads, and other animals.

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Multicolor Gill Polypore

Posted on November 22, 2023 by tspuckler

While looking for reptiles and amphibians in the woods in southern Illinois, I noticed this bracket fungus on a tree stump.

Multicolor Gill Polypore is widespread across Europe, Asia, and North and South America. In the United States it is very common from the East Coast to the Great Lakes states, south to Texas, and on the West Coast.

From the top, it looks very much like Turkeytail Mushroom, but by viewing the underside of the cap, there are gills instead of pores.

The “gills” of the multicolor gill polypore are actually radially arranged tubes that are forked and fused, which can make them look like gills. These tubes are tough and leathery, as opposed to true gills, which are more fragile.

This species exists as a network of fungal cells (mycelium) within rotting wood. The mycelium obtains nourishment by digesting the wood. When ready to reproduce, it develops the brackets outside of the wood, which are reproductive structures.

Multicolor Gill Polypore plays an important role in the ecosystem, breaking down dead wood and returning nutrients to the soil. This species also helps to recycle carbon and nitrogen, aiding in the growth of new plants and trees.

Mushrooms decorate nature the way wildflowers do, adding to our pleasure on hikes. Many mushrooms are most prominent in the fall, when wildflowers are winding down.

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Scarlet Cup

Posted on January 27, 2023 by tspuckler

While hiking in Hinckley Reservation, a bit of red on the forest floor caught my eye. This fungus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisphere and has been found in Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America and Australia.

Scarlet Cup grows on decaying sticks and branches in damp spots in wooded areas, generally buried under leaf litter or in the soil. The cup-shaped fruiting bodies are usually produced during the cooler months of Winter and early Spring.

The brilliant red interior of the cups (from which both the common and scientific names are derived) contrasts with their lighter-colored exterior. The edibility of this fungus is well established, but its small size, tough texture and insubstantial fruitings dissuade most people from collecting it.

Known scientifically as Sarcoscypha coccinea, the specific epithet coccinea is derived from the Latin word meaning “deep red.” The species is commonly known as Scarlet Elf Cup, Scarlet Elf Cap, or Scarlet Cup Fungus. Its cup-shaped fruit measures one to two inches across.

Fungi belong to their own kingdom and get their nutrients and energy from organic matter, rather than photosynthesis like plants. It is often just the fruiting bodies or “mushrooms,” that are visible to us, arising from an unseen network of tiny filaments called “hyphae.”

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Fairy Inkcap

Posted on October 7, 2022 by tspuckler

While looking for snakes in southern Illinois, I noticed a large number of tiny mushrooms at the base of a tree. This species derives its nutrients from decaying wood and is usually found on or near dead tree stumps or decaying logs.

These gregarious little fungi occur from early spring until the onset of winter, and they are at their most spectacular when the caps are young and pale – sometimes nearly pure white.

Common in Britain and Ireland and throughout Europe and North America, the Fairy Inkcap is truly a cosmopolitan mushroom, being found also in most parts of Asia and in South America and Australia.

For most types of inkcap mushroom, the gills and caps melt into an inky black ooze – which is what gives the inkcaps their common name. Though this is not a feature of the Fairy Inkcap.

Rather than melt into mush, the caps of the Fairy Inkcap remain brittle, and easily teared, hence their alternate common name of Trooping Crumble Cap.

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Witches’ Butter

Posted on November 26, 2021 by tspuckler

While walking along the edge of a cypress swamp in southern Illinois last month, some small, yellow, irregularly lobed, gelatinous masses caught my eye.

Witches’ Butter has fruiting bodies that are brain-like, sulfur yellow-to-pale yellow and have a gelatinous texture. It grows in masses on dead deciduous wood, especially oaks.

This fungi’s full-time job is to inhabit dead wood as a parasite that gets nourishment by digesting the tissues of an unrelated fungus (a crust-like fungus that is itself parasitizing and maybe killing the tree). Witches’ Butter is therefore a parasite of a parasite!

Witches’ Butter has a cosmopolitan distribution, having been recorded from Europe, North, Central, and South America, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Its fruit bodies are formed during wet periods throughout the year.

A type of Jelly Fungi, the investigation of the medicinal benefits of Jelly Fungi has revealed that they stimulate the immune system, reduce inflammation, lower cholesterol and are useful in the treatment of allergies and diabetes.

This fungus is also known as Yellow Brain, Golden Jelly Fungus and Yellow Trembler.

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Chanterelle

Posted on September 10, 2021 by tspuckler

While hiking at Hinckley Reservation, these eye-catching fungi attracted my attention. Their yellow-orange vase-shaped caps were hard to miss on the dark forest floor.

This is among the most popularly eaten species of wild mushrooms. There are many species of edible Chanterelle; the most well known is the Golden Chanterelle Mushroom.

They are often bright in color and funnel-shaped. On the underside, most species have gill-like ridges that run almost all the way down to their stem.

Chanterelles tend to grow in clusters in mossy coniferous forests. In addition to North America, they can be found in Eurasia and Africa.

They are mycorrhizal, which means they have a beneficial, symbiotic relationship with the roots of trees. In Ohio they tend to fruit anywhere from June to September.

The flavor of Chanterelles is often described as fruity or peppery. They’re excellent with meats, fish, or as an entrée topping. They’re also very popular with eggs or as a filling in crêpes.

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Hare’s Foot Inkcap

Posted on January 8, 2021 by tspuckler

Since the rain has started last week, our rock garden has filled with inkcaps. The small, umbrella-shaped fruit bodies (mushrooms) of the fungus grow in grass or woodchips and are short-lived, usually collapsing in a few hours.

This is an inkcap of woodland habitats, where it grows among twigs and leaf litter. Outside of its “natural habitat,” in parks and gardens, this little mushroom is common in flowerbeds covered in woodchip mulch.

Coprinopsis lagopus gets its common English name from the way the young “fur-like” fruiting body begins to come out of the ground before turning into a traditional-looking mushroom. this inkcap has a worldwide distribution, occurring on every continent except Greenland and Antarctica.

The slender, whitish stems are up to 5 inches long and very thin. When the fruit bodies are young and fresh, the caps are reddish brown and can glisten – especially if wet. As the mushroom matures, the outer edge of the cap turn a greyish color while the center remains reddish brown.

This is known as a saprobic species, meaning that it obtains nutrients by breaking down organic matter into simpler molecules. The cool shapes and intricate patterns of this fine, fragile fungus make it a welcome sight on a January day.

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Ganoderma sessile

Posted on May 1, 2020 by tspuckler

This cool looking bowl-shaped mushroom growing in my sister’s front yard is kind of neat. It sprouted out of a buried, decaying tree stump and has been coming up every year.

Although I can’t say I’ve ever seen an example of this mushroom previously, it is reportedly common and found in practically every state East of the Rocky Mountains. Its mature fruiting bodies are shiny and reddish-brown.

Ganoderma sessile has a bright, white, outer edge while growing. This organism is a polypores – part of a group of fungi that form fruiting bodies with pores or tubes on their underside.

This genus of mushroom has long been used in traditional medicine and practitioners of Chinese medicine refer to it as the “king of herbs.”

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Shaggy Mane

Posted on December 21, 2019 by tspuckler

I saw this fungi while visiting Hinckley Reservation, also occasionally known as the Lawyers Wig, this is a distinctive and simple to recognize mushroom. It’s size, texture and shape make it easy to spot even from considerable distance. They are often seen growing on lawns, along gravel roads and waste areas in Summer and Fall. They may grow singly or scattered, but are often in large, tightly packed groups.

Shaggy Mane has an elongated, bullet-shaped, shaggy cap, with brownish upturned scales and a straight fairly smooth stem. The white caps are covered with frilled scales, creating the origin of the common name of this fungus.

This mushroom is known for its unique robust flavor. Shaggy Manes can also be used for dyeing wool, some types of fabric, or paper and will yield a bayberry color when cooked in an iron pot.

Mushrooms and other fungi are one of the most important groups of organisms on the planet. This is easy to overlook, given that most of the organism is largely hidden. The fruiting body (mushroom) is all you see of a vast network of thread-like structures hidden from view deep the soil, wood or other food sources.

Fungi, together with bacteria, are responsible for most of the recycling that returns dead material to the soil in a form in which it can be reused. Unlike animals, that digest food inside their bodies, fungi digest food outside of their “bodies” and then absorb the nutrients into their cells.

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Category Archives: Fungi

Golden Scalycap

Ringless Honey Mushroom

Multicolor Gill Polypore

Scarlet Cup

Fairy Inkcap

Witches’ Butter

Chanterelle

Hare’s Foot Inkcap

Ganoderma sessile

Shaggy Mane