Mushroom Identifier

Fungi encyclopedia

A reference for the fungi you actually find

Each entry describes one species the way you meet it in the field — the cap and its surface, what sits underneath, the stipe and its base, the spore print colour, the substrate it fruits from, and the species most often confused with it.

Showing results for Ink cap mushroom (general)

Panaeolus antillarum

Panaeolus antillarum

Gilled

A comparatively large, pale-capped dung mottlegill of warm regions, with a smooth whitish to cream cap that cracks in dry weather and heavily mottled blackening gills.

Spore print · Black

Charcoal Scalycap

Charcoal Scalycap

Gilled

A small sticky-capped Pholiota restricted to burnt ground, appearing on old bonfire and campfire sites with a tawny cap, scaly stipe and clay-brown spore print.

Spore print · Clay-brown

Velvet Brittlegill

Velvet Brittlegill

Gilled

A firm brittlegill with a dry velvety cap in olive-yellow or violet tones and a white stipe washed with lilac or rose. Both cap and stipe carry a fine powdery bloom.

Spore print · Pale cream

Star Pinkgill

Star Pinkgill

Gilled

A slender grassland pinkgill named for its distinctive cross-shaped spores, with a conical silky-streaked brown cap and pink gills.

Spore print · Pink

Larch Bolete

Larch Bolete

Boletes

A glossy golden-brown bolete found only under larch, with a slimy cap, yellow pores that bruise brownish, and a ring on the stem.

Spore print · Ochre-brown

Scarletina Bolete

Scarletina Bolete

Boletes

A stout, dark-capped bolete with blood-red pores and a yellow stipe peppered with fine red dots, whose lemon flesh turns instantly inky blue when cut.

Spore print · Olive-brown

Yellow-gilled Gymnopilus

Yellow-gilled Gymnopilus

Gilled

A colourful rustgill with a purplish-red, fibrillose-scaly cap and brilliant yellow gills that mature to rust, commonly clustered on wood chip beds.

Spore print · Rusty orange-brown

Pearly Webcap

Pearly Webcap

Gilled

A pale silvery-violet webcap of broadleaf woodland with a silky, pearl-sheened cap and a club-shaped stipe wrapped in a whitish veil sheath.

Spore print · Rusty brown

Beautiful Bonnet

Beautiful Bonnet

Gilled

A tufted wood bonnet with a pale ochre-brown cap and a striking bright yellow stipe, most often found on beech. The contrast between pale cap and vivid stem base gives it its name.

Spore print · White

Netted Fieldcap

Netted Fieldcap

Gilled

A delicate wood-inhabiting fieldcap with a slimy greyish-lilac cap embossed with a network of raised veins, and rusty-brown gills on a fragile white stipe.

Spore print · Rusty brown

Spring Polypore

Spring Polypore

Polypores

A small centrally stalked polypore with a scaly tan cap edged in coarse hairs and unusually large angular white pores that run down the stem.

Spore print · White

Depressed Hedgehog

Depressed Hedgehog

Toothed

A small toothed fungus with an orange-tan cap dimpled at the centre and an underside of crowded brittle spines. It grows in sphagnum and moss beds under conifers.

Spore print · White

Bloodred Webcap

Bloodred Webcap

Gilled

A small webcap coloured deep blood-red throughout, cap, gills and stipe alike, fruiting among mosses in damp spruce and pine forest.

Spore print · Rusty brown

Native Bread

Polypores

An Australian polypore whose small funnel-shaped cap rises on a stalk from a large, hard, marbled underground sclerotium buried in forest soil.

Spore print · White

Common Fieldcap

Common Fieldcap

Gilled

A small ringless fieldcap of short turf, with a smooth hemispherical ochre-tan cap, slender pale stipe and dark brown gills and spore print.

Spore print · Dark brown

Crab Brittlegill

Crab Brittlegill

Gilled

A robust brittlegill with a dark wine-red cap, ochre gills and a stipe flushed pink that browns wherever it is handled, accompanied by a strong smell of shellfish.

Spore print · Ochre

Black Velvet Bolete

Black Velvet Bolete

Boletes

A dramatic bolete with a velvety black cap and stipe over a white pore surface. Cut flesh flushes pink then slowly turns grey to black.

Spore print · Pinkish-brown

Grey Veiled Amanita

Grey Veiled Amanita

Gilled

A conifer-loving amanita with a smooth greyish-brown cap washed with purple, a grey membranous ring, and an abrupt rounded bulb finished with a sharp rim.

Spore print · White

Frosty Webcap

Frosty Webcap

Gilled

A small, slender birch webcap whose dark greyish-brown cap is dusted with fine white fibrils like hoar frost. The slim stem carries whitish veil girdles above a hygrophanous, umbonate cap.

Spore print · Rusty brown

Bloody Brittlegill

Bloody Brittlegill

Gilled

A firm pine-wood brittlegill with a matt blood-red cap and a stipe usually flushed the same colour. Its slightly decurrent cream gills and dry cap skin set it apart from other red species.

Spore print · Pale cream

Olive Shaggy Parasol

Olive Shaggy Parasol

Gilled

The woodland member of the shaggy parasol group, its cap a muted olive-grey to greyish-brown with felty scales that barely stand out against the background.

Spore print · White

Mottled Bolete

Mottled Bolete

Boletes

A birch scaber stalk recognised by its patchily mottled grey-brown cap and by flesh that flushes pink in the stem and stains vivid blue-green at the base.

Spore print · Snuff-brown

Star-spored Fibrecap

Star-spored Fibrecap

Gilled

A chestnut-brown fibrecap with a sharply umbonate, deeply split cap and a stipe ending in an abruptly rimmed bulb. Named for its remarkable star-shaped spores.

Spore print · Dull brown

White Cheese Polypore

White Cheese Polypore

Polypores

A soft, moist, pure white annual bracket with a finely downy cap and minute white pores, drying to a light chalky-white shelf on dead hardwood.

Spore print · White