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.
Horse Mushroom
Gilled
A large, robust white grassland Agaricus with a distinctive double 'cogwheel' ring, greyish-white young gills that turn chocolate-brown, and a strong aniseed odour. It forms troops and rings in open pasture.
Spore print · Dark chocolate-brown
Horsehair Parachute
Gilled
A pinhead-sized brown parachute perched on a stiff black hair, often accompanied by tangles of black horsehair-like cords running through the needle litter.
Spore print · White
Hygrophorus Milkcap
Gilled
An orange-brown North American milkcap recognised instantly by its very widely spaced, waxy-looking white gills and copious white latex that does not change colour. Its dry, velvety, wrinkled cap adds to the resemblance to a waxcap.
Spore print · White
Iceland Moss
Other Fungi
An erect, tufted lichen of arctic and mountain heaths with curled chestnut-brown straps whose margins are fringed with tiny stiff spines.
Spore print · Not applicable
Indigo Milk Cap
Gilled
An unmistakable milkcap that is indigo blue throughout, cap, gills, stem and latex alike, with a concentrically zoned funnel-shaped cap that stains dull green where bruised or aged.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Indigo Milkcap
Gilled
An unmistakable milkcap with a silvery indigo-blue cap and gills that bleed dark blue latex, staining green where handled. It forms mycorrhizal partnerships with oaks and pines across eastern North America, Central America and parts of East Asia.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Inky Mushroom
Gilled
A grey-scaled woodland Agaricus with a dark-centred cap, a chrome-yellow staining stipe base and a distinctly inky odour.
Spore print · Dark chocolate brown
Inocybe erubescens
Gilled
A stout, silky white fibrecap of chalky beech and lime woods that reddens conspicuously where handled or aged. Its spring fruiting and radially split cap are characteristic.
Spore print · Clay brown
Iodine Bolete
Boletes
A pale, dry-capped bolete of warm oak woodland with lemon-yellow pores that do not blue and a stipe base whose flesh carries a distinctive iodoform-like odour.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Jack O'Lantern Mushroom
Gilled
A vivid orange gilled mushroom that grows in dense clumps on hardwood stumps and roots, with sharp, deep, decurrent true gills whose edges can glow faintly in darkness.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Jack-o'-Lantern
Gilled
A vivid orange clustering mushroom of hardwood stumps with true, sharp-edged, deeply decurrent gills that can glow faintly green in darkness, and a pale spore print.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellowish white
Jelly Baby
Jellies
A small rubbery club fungus with a slimy ochre-yellow head perched on a paler stalk, usually appearing in troops on damp woodland soil. Its gelatinous texture and irregular, inrolled cap margin make it unlike any true gilled mushroom.
Spore print · Whitish (rarely taken)
Jelly Rot
Crusts
A soft, gelatinous crust that turns its upper edge outward into small white hairy shelves, with a shocking orange-pink wrinkled and ridged spore surface beneath. It sprawls in overlapping sheets across fallen logs in late autumn.
Spore print · White
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
Juniper-Hawthorn Rust
Other Fungi
A two-host rust fungus that forms small brown galls with orange jelly horns on juniper in spring, then orange leaf spots with tubular outgrowths on hawthorn.
Spore print · Not applicable
King Bolete
Boletes
A heavy, bun-shaped brown bolete with a stout swollen white stipe carrying fine pale netting, and a sponge layer that ages from white through cream to olive-yellow without bruising blue.
Spore print · Olive-brown
King Oyster Mushroom
Gilled
The heaviest of the oyster mushrooms, with a small greyish-tan cap perched on a thick club-shaped white stem, growing from the dead root crowns of umbellifers in dry grassland.
Spore print · White to pale cream
Lace Lichen
Other Fungi
A pale greenish lichen that hangs in long lacy, net-like curtains from oak branches in coastal fog country, unmistakable for its mesh of interconnected strands.
Spore print · Not applicable
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
Lake's Bolete
Boletes
A scaly reddish-brown bolete of Douglas-fir woods with large radial yellow pores and a ring zone. Flesh at the very stalk base often flushes blue-green.
Spore print · Olive-brown to cinnamon
Landscape Morel
Morels & Allies
A black-clade morel that fruits in bark mulch, flower beds and freshly landscaped ground rather than in forest. Its cap pits are arranged in unusually neat vertical rows, giving a ladder-like appearance.
Spore print · Cream to pale yellow
Lantern Stinkhorn
Stinkhorns
Recognisable by its distinctly ribbed, angular stalk that ends in a cluster of short arms fused into a lantern-like point, with dark spore slime on the inner arm faces.
Spore print · Not applicable (olive-brown gleba)
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
Late Fall Oyster
Gilled
A cold-weather bracket with an olive to yellow-green tacky cap, crowded orange-yellow gills and a short stubby lateral stipe, fruiting on hardwood logs after most other mushrooms have finished.
Spore print · White to pale yellowish
Leafy Brain
Jellies
A brown gelatinous fungus forming rosettes of thin, wavy, leaf-like lobes that look like a clump of seaweed stranded on a conifer stump.
Spore print · White
Leathery Puffball
Puffballs
A large ball with an unusually thick, corky-leathery rind that cracks and splits into stiff star-like lobes as it opens. Found on nutrient-rich, disturbed soil in dry open country.
Spore print · Purple-brown
Lemon Disco
Cups & Discs
Swarms of minute lemon-yellow discs scattered in their hundreds across damp barkless hardwood, one of the brightest sights on the autumn woodland floor.
Spore print · White
Lemon Peel Fungus
Cups & Discs
An ear-shaped yellow cup split down one side, with an apricot-pink flush on the inner surface, growing in leaf litter under broadleaved trees.
Spore print · White
Leopard Earthball
Puffballs
A small ochre earthball whose surface is patterned with tiny dark scales, each ringed by a pale halo like leopard spots. It grows on damp woodland soil and has a thin tough rind over a purple-black interior.
Spore print · Purple-black to blackish brown
Lepiota brunneoincarnata
Gilled
A small dapperling of grassy, disturbed ground whose pale cap is broken into concentric zones of pinkish to vinaceous-brown scales, with fibrous girdles on the lower stem and no true ring.
Spore print · White
Lepiota subincarnata
Gilled
A small pale dapperling with a flesh-pink to tan cap finely broken into concentric scales, girdled fibres on the lower stem and no true ring, common on mulched garden ground.
Spore print · White
Lilac Bonnet
Gilled
A litter-dwelling bonnet with a lilac, violet or pinkish cap, broad widely spaced gills and a strong radish smell. Colour varies widely, so the odour and gill structure matter more than the shade.
Spore print · White
Lilac Fibrecap
Gilled
A small silky fibrecap washed with lilac to violet tones and topped by a pointed umbo, its gills maturing to dull clay-brown. Frequently found alongside its plain white counterpart.
Spore print · Snuff-brown
Lilac-brown Bolete
Boletes
A dark, softly purple-brown bolete whose pore surface is purple-grey from the start and whose stipe is densely peppered with fine dark purplish dots.
Spore print · Reddish-brown to pinkish-brown
Lion Shield
Gilled
A slender golden-yellow shield mushroom with a velvety wrinkled cap centre, a finely lined margin and free gills that flush pink. It fruits on decaying deciduous wood.
Spore print · Pink to salmon-pink
Lion's Mane
Toothed
An unmistakable white cushion of long, downward-hanging spines that grows from wounds on standing hardwoods, looking like a frozen waterfall or a shaggy mane.
Spore print · White
Liver Milkcap
Gilled
A small dark liver-brown milkcap of pine litter on acid soils, whose white latex turns clear yellow when blotted onto a white cloth. It fruits late in the season, often in dense troops among needles and moss.
Spore print · Pale cream with pinkish tinge
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
Lurid Bolete
Boletes
A red-pored bolete of limy soils recognised by the coarse red network covering its stipe and by the thin orange-red line revealed just above the tubes when the fruit body is cut lengthways.
Spore print · Olive-brown
Magpie Inkcap
Gilled
A tall, dramatic inkcap whose blackish-brown cap is broken into a pied pattern by large white felty veil patches. It stands singly in deep beech litter on lime-rich soils and dissolves into black ink within a day.
Spore print · Black
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
Matsutake
Gilled
A dense, heavy, white-fleshed woodland mushroom overlaid with cinnamon-brown fibrous scales, carrying a thick flaring ring and a strongly aromatic odour, fruiting in arcs beneath pine.
Spore print · White
Meadow Mushroom
Gilled
The classic white grassland Agaricus, with free gills that shift from bright pink to chocolate-brown, a simple fragile ring and a dark brown spore print. It appears in troops and rings on old pasture after rain.
Spore print · Dark chocolate-brown
Mica Cap
Gilled
A small tawny-honey inkcap with a deeply grooved cap sparkling with mica-like granules when fresh, fruiting in dense clusters at the base of hardwood stumps.
Spore print · Dark brown to blackish
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
Orange Birch Bolete
Boletes
A tall, striking bolete with a bright orange felty cap, a white stipe studded with blackish scabers, and white flesh that turns pinkish-grey and then near-black when cut. It grows only with birch.
Spore print · Ochre-brown
Orange Grisette
Gilled
A tall ringless Amanita with a glowing apricot-orange cap, free white gills and a stem banded with orange-cream chevrons above a large white membranous sac.
Spore print · White
Orange Peel Fungus
Cups & Discs
Brilliant orange, thin and brittle cups that flatten, split and contort until they look exactly like scattered pieces of orange peel. It fruits in troops on bare compacted soil, track sides and gravelly ground.
Spore print · White