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 “Not a mushroom/fungus”
Winter Stalkball
Puffballs
A miniature stalked puffball with a pea-sized spore sac raised on a slender woody stalk, opening by a small tubular mouth ringed with darker colour. It grows in mossy sand and old mortared walls, mainly in winter.
Spore print · Rusty brown
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
Early Morel
Morels & Allies
A thimble-capped spring ascomycete whose longitudinally wrinkled, tan to yellow-brown cap hangs free from the very top of the stalk like a bell. The stalk is stuffed with loose cottony pith rather than being hollow.
Spore print · Pale yellow to cream
Grooved Bonnet
Gilled
A firm grey bonnet distinguished by its rigid, silvery-grey stipe marked with fine longitudinal grooves running its full length. It arises from buried hardwood roots and decaying stumps.
Spore print · White
Dune Stinkhorn
Stinkhorns
A stinkhorn of sand dunes and light soils, rising from a distinctly violet to pinkish-lilac egg on pink cords. The white stalk carries a pitted, honeycombed head coated in olive spore slime.
Spore print · Olive-brown (spores in the slimy gleba)
Lactarius scrobiculatus
Gilled
A large yellow, zoned milkcap with a shaggy bearded cap margin and a stipe pitted with distinct coloured hollows (scrobicules). Its white latex turns sulphur-yellow within seconds of exposure.
Spore print · Pale cream to pale yellow
Deceiving Milkcap
Gilled
A small, pale pinkish-tan milkcap whose white latex turns bright yellow within seconds of exposure. A faint geranium-like odour and a preference for hornbeam and hazel help confirm it.
Spore print · Pale cream
Devil's Dipstick
Stinkhorns
A slim, tapering, orange to pinkish stinkhorn with no distinct cap, its pointed upper third coated in dark olive spore slime. It rises from a white egg in mulch and rotting hardwood debris.
Spore print · Not applicable
Clustered Bonnet
Gilled
A small bell-capped bonnet that grows in dense tufts on oak and sweet chestnut stumps, recognised by the finely toothed, scalloped cap edge and a slender stem that turns golden then rusty orange-brown below.
Spore print · White
Bleeding Bonnet
Gilled
A minute reddish bonnet that releases dark blood-red juice from its thread-like stem and carries matching dark red edges along its gills. It fruits in mossy litter in both conifer and broadleaf woodland.
Spore print · White
Blushing Morel
Morels & Allies
A pale, greyish to yellow-brown morel of mulch and disturbed ground whose ridges and stalk stain pinkish, rusty or ochre-brown where handled or with age. It is one of the earliest-branching lineages in the genus.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Beechwood Sickener
Gilled
A compact scarlet brittlegill restricted to beech woods, distinguished from its conifer relatives by firmer flesh, a matt cap whose skin peels only part-way, and crowded white gills.
Spore print · White
Gem-studded Puffball
Puffballs
A small white to buff puffball shaped like an inverted pear, covered in detachable cone-shaped spines that leave a net-like pattern of scars when they fall. It releases spores through a neat apical pore in the top of the head.
Spore print · Olive-brown (spore mass)
Porcini
Boletes
The archetypal stout bolete, with a smooth brown bun-shaped cap, white pores ageing yellow-olive, and a swollen pale stipe netted with fine white reticulation. Flesh stays white and unchanging when cut.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Black Morel
Morels & Allies
A conical spring morel whose pits are arranged in vertical ladder-like rows between ridges that darken to grey, olive or black. Like all true morels it is hollow throughout with the head fused to the stalk.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Milk-white Brittlegill
Gilled
A large, chalk-white funnel-shaped brittlegill that pushes up through the soil, often emerging still crusted with earth and litter. Its decurrent, widely spaced gills are unusual for the genus.
Spore print · White to pale cream
Purple-spored Puffball
Puffballs
A large grassland puffball whose mature spore mass turns a distinctive purple-brown and whose sterile base persists through winter as a vase-shaped cup. The skin cracks into polygonal patches as it expands.
Spore print · Purple to purple-brown spore mass
Train Wrecker
Gilled
A tough, cream-coloured agaric patterned with flat brown scales, whose deeply decurrent gills have coarsely sawn edges; it is famous for rotting railway sleepers and other conifer timber.
Spore print · White
Sculpted Puffball
Puffballs
A firm white ball of western mountain conifer forests, covered in low pyramidal felty warts each marked by a darker central point. The interior is white and homogeneous before turning to olive-brown powder.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Western Giant Puffball
Puffballs
A very large white puffball of dry western rangeland, its surface broken into a mosaic of flattened polygonal warts. The interior is uniformly white when young and turns to olive-brown powder with age.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Western Black Elfin Saddle
Cups & Discs
The stout western counterpart of the black elfin saddle, with a large charcoal saddle-shaped head on a thick, deeply chambered pale grey stalk. It fruits in conifer duff along the Pacific coast and inland mountains.
Spore print · White
Mosaic Puffball
Puffballs
A stout grassland puffball whose white surface cracks into a mosaic of polygonal scales, later collapsing to leave a persistent bowl-shaped base. It is typical of upland pasture, heath and dunes.
Spore print · Olive-brown spore mass
Tumbling Puffball
Puffballs
A smooth round puffball that sheds its white outer skin to reveal a bronze to purplish-grey shell, hanging from a single tough cord until it breaks free and rolls. Common in open woods and pasture across North America.
Spore print · Olive-brown to dark brown
Thick-footed Morel
Morels & Allies
The traditional name for the largest yellow morels, distinguished by a swollen, deeply furrowed and chambered stalk base beneath a broad ochre honeycomb cap. Specimens can exceed 25 cm in height.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow