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 “Greasy Toughshank”
Dark Fieldcap
Gilled
A sombre brown woodland fieldcap with a greasy, wrinkling cap and a persistent membranous ring that stains dark from falling spores. It grows on rich, often calcareous soil along shaded woodland paths.
Spore print · Dark brown
Wood Blewit
Gilled
A thick-set, late-season woodland agaric coloured violet throughout when young, with a smooth greasy cap, sinuate lilac gills, a fibrous ringless stem and a pale pink spore print.
Spore print · Pale pink
Man on Horseback
Gilled
A stout, sulphur-yellow-gilled Tricholoma with a greasy olive-yellow cap that is usually half-buried in sand under pines. Its notched bright yellow gills and ringless pale stem are the key characters.
Spore print · White
Pale Milkcap
Gilled
A plain, pale pinkish-buff milkcap of beech woods with a smooth, slightly greasy cap, crowded pale gills and copious white latex that does not change colour. Its very lack of markings is its most useful field character.
Spore print · Pale cream
Devil's Urn
Cups & Discs
A dark leathery goblet-shaped cup that erupts in early spring from buried oak sticks, opening from a closed urn to a ragged-mouthed vase.
Spore print · Whitish
Fiery Milkcap
Gilled
A grey-buff milkcap with faint watery zoning and unusually well-spaced ochre-yellow gills, found almost exclusively under hazel. Its white latex dries greyish and its gill spacing sets it apart from other grey milkcaps.
Spore print · Pale cream to pale yellow
Copper Brittlegill
Gilled
A sturdy orange-brown brittlegill of northern pine woods whose white flesh and stipe turn ash-grey and finally blackish as the fruiting body ages.
Spore print · Pale ochre
Willow Shield
Gilled
A slender grey to greenish-grey shield mushroom of damp riverside woods, with free gills that turn salmon-pink, a pale stem often bluing at the base, and a pink spore print.
Spore print · Pink
Girdled Knight
Gilled
A grey willow-associated knight that is unusual in its genus for having a distinct woolly white ring on the stipe. The small fibrillose-scaly cap and faintly yellowing gills complete the picture.
Spore print · White
Ragbag Lichen
Other Fungi
A loosely attached grey foliose lichen forming ragged, wavy-edged sheets on conifer and birch branches, with margins crumbled into isidia and soredia.
Spore print · Not applicable
Grisette
Gilled
A slender grey Amanita with a strongly grooved cap margin, free white gills, no ring at all, and a tall white membranous sac enclosing the stem base.
Spore print · White
Macro Mushroom
Gilled
One of the largest white meadow Agaricus species, with a thick cracking cap that can exceed 25 cm and an unusually massive, felty ring. A grassland decomposer of long-established, lightly managed pasture.
Spore print · Dark chocolate brown
Livid Pinkgill
Gilled
The largest European pinkgill, with a stout ivory-grey cap, gills that turn from yellowish to salmon-pink, and a strong farinaceous odour.
Spore print · Pink
Fire Morel
Morels & Allies
A dark grey, fire-following morel of western conifer burns, coated in fine woolly down when young and often with a thickened, double-walled stalk base. It fruits in quantity in the first spring or two after a wildfire.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Blue Tooth
Toothed
A corky ground-dwelling toothed fungus recognised by the blue tint of its growing margin and the two-toned blue and orange zoning revealed when it is sliced lengthwise.
Spore print · Brown
Hazel Bolete
Boletes
A scaber stalk of hazel and hornbeam with a distinctly wrinkled, pitted olive-brown cap and white flesh that darkens through pink to near black when cut.
Spore print · Ochre-brown
Witch's Hair Lichen
Other Fungi
A pale yellowish-green hanging lichen forming soft tangled tresses on conifer branches, distinguished from beard lichens by the complete absence of a central cord.
Spore print · Not applicable
Willow Bracket
Polypores
A rock-hard perennial hoof on willow and other broadleaves, grey to black and deeply cracked above with a rusty brown pore surface and layered annual tubes inside.
Spore print · White
Fluted Black Elfin Saddle
Cups & Discs
A striking grey to charcoal ascomycete with a crumpled saddle-shaped head raised on a deeply fluted, chambered stalk. Its dark colour makes it hard to spot against woodland litter despite its size.
Spore print · White
Felt Saddle
Cups & Discs
A grey, shallow cup raised on an unusually long slender stalk, with fine felt covering both the outer surface and the stem. Its unribbed, downy stalk separates it at a glance from the fluted saddles.
Spore print · White
Reindeer Lichen
Other Fungi
A pale ash-grey fruticose lichen forming deep spongy mats of repeatedly forked hollow branches, dominant on tundra, heath and open pine woodland floors.
Spore print · Not applicable
Spring Fieldcap
Gilled
An early-season fieldcap of woodchip and grassy path edges, with a pale tan cap, a ring on the stipe, white mycelial cords at the base and a dark brown spore print.
Spore print · Dark snuff-brown
Ruby Bolete
Boletes
A small, brilliantly red-capped bolete of parks and grassy woodland edges, recognised by yellow pores that bruise blue and tiny carrot-orange dots in the stem base.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Bearded Fieldcap
Gilled
A firm, pale cream fieldcap of grassy places whose cap often cracks in dry weather and hangs shreds of white veil from the margin, giving it a bearded look.
Spore print · Dull brown to snuff brown