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 “Deadly Cortinar”
White Brain
Jellies
A translucent white to greyish jelly that spreads along dead hardwood branches as glistening cushions which merge into folded, brain-like ridges.
Spore print · White
Rosy Crust
Crusts
A thin waxy crust in warm salmon-pink to coral-orange shades, spreading along dead attached twigs of hazel, oak and gorse.
Spore print · White
Tear Dropper
Crusts
A thin, closely attached crust fungus on dead conifer wood whose cream to pale ochre surface is roughened with fine spines and often beaded with clear droplets when fresh. It is one of the small resupinate fungi easiest to name by that weeping habit.
Spore print · White
White Coral Jelly
Jellies
A cluster of thin, translucent white gelatinous lobes that fan out from dead branches like a frozen flower or a piece of crumpled tissue. Its near-colourless, seaweed-like fronds set it apart from every other jelly fungus.
Spore print · White
Waxy Crust
Crusts
A translucent, waxy-gelatinous layer that develops under the bark of dead oak branches, splitting and rolling the bark back to reveal itself on bare wood.
Spore print · White
Violet-toothed Polypore
Polypores
Thin, flexible brackets massed in rows along dead hardwood, recognised by an underside that is violet when fresh and breaks up into ragged teeth with age.
Spore print · White
Small Stagshorn
Jellies
Small, tough-gelatinous yellow spikes that stand upright in groups along dead hardwood, usually unbranched and rarely more than a couple of centimetres tall.
Spore print · White to pale yellowish
Amber Jelly Roll
Jellies
A translucent amber to tawny-brown jelly forming top-shaped blobs hanging from dead willow twigs, each narrowed to a small point of attachment.
Spore print · White
Bear Lentinus
Gilled
A stalkless, fan-shaped bracket with a dark velvety-hairy base and pale, sharply saw-toothed gills radiating from the point of attachment to dead hardwood.
Spore print · White
Oak Crust
Crusts
A thin lilac-grey waxy crust on dead oak twigs that curls away from the bark as it dries, exposing a dark brown to black under-surface.
Spore print · White
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
Pink Oyster Mushroom
Gilled
A tropical and subtropical oyster mushroom forming rosettes of thin salmon-pink to rose fans on dead hardwood, the colour fading to buff as the fruit bodies mature.
Spore print · Pale pink to whitish
Orange Mock Oyster
Gilled
A stalkless bright orange bracket covered in dense woolly hair, with deep orange gills radiating beneath, fruiting in overlapping tiers on dead logs in late autumn.
Spore print · Pinkish buff
Aspen Oyster Mushroom
Gilled
A North American oyster mushroom restricted to dead aspen and cottonwood, with pale fleshy caps in overlapping shelves and a buff-tinted rather than lilac spore print.
Spore print · White to pale buff
Golden Oyster Mushroom
Gilled
A vivid golden-yellow oyster mushroom that grows in dense bouquets from dead hardwood, its thin funnel-shaped caps fading to pale ochre as they age.
Spore print · White to pale lilac
Common Jellyspot
Jellies
Minute orange-yellow jelly blobs scattered in numbers over damp dead wood and old fence posts, among the most frequently encountered of all small fungi.
Spore print · Whitish to pale yellow
Black Witch's Butter
Jellies
An olive-black gelatinous fungus forming warty cushions on dead oak branches, its upper surface studded with minute dark pimples that give it a rough, granular look.
Spore print · White
Snow Fungus
Jellies
A near-transparent white jelly fungus forming a rosette of thin, frilly, seaweed-like lobes on dead broadleaf branches, drying to a hard yellowish crust and reviving with rain.
Spore print · White
Cloud Ear
Jellies
A rubbery, ear- or cup-shaped bracket on dead hardwood, greyish and finely hairy on the upper surface and smooth purplish-brown beneath, shrinking to a hard flake when dry.
Spore print · White
Nameko
Gilled
A small amber-brown East Asian Pholiota famous for the thick clear gelatinous layer coating its cap, growing in clusters on dead hardwood and widely grown on inoculated logs.
Spore print · Rusty brown
Mustard Yellow Polypore
Polypores
A thin tiered bracket of dead hardwood whose bright mustard-yellow velvety top contrasts sharply with a dark purplish to grey-brown pore surface of very fine pores.
Spore print · White
Peeling Oysterling
Gilled
A stalkless buff to tan bracket-like gilled fungus on dead hardwood, unique for its gelatinous cap skin that stretches like rubber when peeled back from the margin.
Spore print · Snuff-brown
Witch's Butter
Jellies
A vivid golden-yellow jelly fungus forming convoluted, brain-like blobs on dead branches, most conspicuous in wet winter weather. It is a parasite of crust fungi living in the same wood.
Spore print · White
Yellow Brain
Jellies
A vivid golden-yellow jelly fungus that erupts in brain-like folded lobes from dead hardwood twigs, shrivelling to a hard crust in dry weather and swelling again after rain.
Spore print · White