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”
Yellow Fieldcap
Gilled
An extremely fragile, short-lived agaric whose slimy egg-yolk yellow cap expands, fades to grey and collapses within a day, leaving a rusty ochre spore print.
Spore print · Rusty ochre-brown
Platterful Mushroom
Gilled
A broad grey-brown mushroom streaked with dark radial fibres, with unusually wide, well-spaced white gills and a stem base tied to conspicuous white cord-like rhizomorphs.
Spore print · White
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
Tinder Conk
Polypores
An unmistakable hoof-shaped perennial bracket with a hard grey banded crust and a soft brown fibrous interior. It is one of the classic decay fungi of birch and beech across the northern hemisphere.
Spore print · White to pale yellowish
Corn Smut
Other Fungi
A smut fungus that turns maize kernels, tassels and leaves into swollen silvery-grey galls which rupture to release masses of sooty black spores. It occurs wherever maize is grown.
Spore print · Not applicable
Egghead Mottlegill
Gilled
A pale, egg-shaped dung fungus with mottled grey-black gills and, unusually for the genus, a distinct membranous ring on a long slender stipe. The cap is often shiny and wrinkled as it dries.
Spore print · Black
Aspen Scaber Stalk
Boletes
A North American scaber stalk of aspen groves, with an orange-brown cap, dark scabers even when young, and pale flesh that greys and takes on lilac tones when cut.
Spore print · Ochre-brown
Hen of the Woods
Polypores
A large rosette of many overlapping grey-brown spoon-shaped caps rising from a branched white stalk at the foot of oaks, with a white pore surface running down the branches.
Spore print · White
Nitrous Waxcap
Gilled
A drab grey-brown waxcap identified less by colour than by its sharp nitrous, bleach-like smell and fibrous, matt cap.
Spore print · White
Purple Brittlegill
Gilled
A common brittlegill with a deep purple cap darkening almost to black at the centre, cream gills and a firm white stipe that ages dirty grey.
Spore print · Pale cream
Tiger's Eye
Polypores
A small, thin, leathery funnel-shaped polypore on a slender central stalk, its cap silky and banded in concentric rings of rust, ochre and grey-brown with a brown pore surface underneath.
Spore print · Yellowish brown
Ornate-stalked Bolete
Boletes
A firm woodland bolete recognised by its brilliant chrome-yellow stipe covered in a raised network of ridges. Grey to olive caps sit above yellow pores that darken when handled.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Wine Cap
Gilled
A large mulch-bed mushroom with a wine-red cap fading to tan, purple-grey gills, and an unmistakable thick white ring whose upper surface splits into radiating cogwheel spokes.
Spore print · Dark purple-brown to purple-black
Old Man of the Woods
Boletes
An unmistakable bolete covered in coarse, shaggy, blackish-grey pyramidal scales, with a woolly stipe and white flesh that turns red and then black when cut. Its spore print is nearly black.
Spore print · Blackish-brown to black
Artist's Conk
Polypores
A large perennial shelf fungus with a hard, lumpy grey-brown crust and a chalk-white pore surface that instantly bruises dark brown where scratched, the feature behind its name.
Spore print · Brown
Star Rosette Lichen
Other Fungi
A small, neat grey foliose lichen forming star-like rosettes of narrow radiating lobes, usually crowded with black, often frosted apothecia.
Spore print · Not applicable
Yellow-juice Cup
Cups & Discs
A dull grey-brown woodland cup whose brittle flesh releases a watery juice that turns bright yellow within moments of being cut.
Spore print · White
Conifer Tuft
Gilled
A tightly clustered woodland fungus of conifer stumps, recognised by its tan-ochre cap and gills that shift from whitish to a distinctive smoky grey.
Spore print · Purple-brown
Jelly Tooth
Jellies
A translucent grey to whitish gelatinous tongue whose underside is covered in soft, blunt spines, the only jelly fungus with a truly toothed fertile surface.
Spore print · White
Club Foot
Gilled
A grey-brown woodland funnel identified at a glance by its markedly swollen, club-shaped stipe base and deeply decurrent creamy-yellow gills.
Spore print · White
Devil's Matchstick Lichen
Other Fungi
Slender grey stalks rising from a granular crust on shaded rock, each topped by a glossy black spherical head like a burnt match.
Spore print · Not applicable
Rosy Conk
Polypores
A small, tough perennial bracket whose dull grey-brown top gives no hint of the striking rose-pink pore surface beneath. Pink flesh running right through the context confirms it.
Spore print · White
Brown Puffball
Puffballs
A round grassland puffball whose white outer skin peels away to reveal a shining purple-black inner ball. Larger than the Grey Puffball and equally prone to breaking loose and rolling.
Spore print · Purple-brown
Pink Earth Lichen
Other Fungi
A pale grey-white soil crust studded with short white stalks bearing rounded, pale pink heads, common on clay banks and roadside cuttings.
Spore print · Not applicable