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 “Red-capped Scaber Stalk”
Flame Mycena
Gilled
A brilliant scarlet to flame-orange bonnet of western North American conifer duff, with orange gills edged in red and a tuft of orange fibrils at the stem base.
Spore print · White
Bleeding Fairy Helmet
Gilled
A delicate reddish-brown bonnet that exudes dark blood-red latex from its hollow stipe when broken, growing in tight clusters on rotting hardwood.
Spore print · White
Beefsteak Fungus
Polypores
A soft, moist, blood-red tongue-shaped bracket on oak, unique among polypores in having individually separate tubes rather than a fused pore layer.
Spore print · Pale pinkish-brown
American Caesar's Mushroom
Gilled
A brilliant red-to-orange Amanita of eastern North American oak and pine woods, with yellow gills, a yellow-orange skirt ring and a thick white sac at the base.
Spore print · White
Beaked Earthstar
Puffballs
An elegant earthstar with the longest stalk in the genus and a slender, conspicuously furrowed beak crowning its grey, finely granular spore sac.
Spore print · Dark brown (spore mass)
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
Eyelash Cup
Cups & Discs
A miniature orange-red disc fungus rimmed with stiff black hairs like eyelashes, growing in troops on wet rotting wood and damp ground.
Spore print · Whitish
Blushing Bracket
Polypores
A flat, radially wrinkled bracket in reddish and tan bands whose pale maze-like underside flushes distinctly pink-red wherever it is touched.
Spore print · White
American Parasol
Gilled
A stout parasol with concentric reddish-brown scales over a white cap and a spindle-shaped stem, whose flesh and surfaces stain wine-red to reddish-brown wherever they are handled. It fruits in clusters on wood chips, sawdust and old stumps rather than in undisturbed forest soil.
Spore print · White
Orange Tooth
Toothed
A corky ground-dwelling toothed fungus with a white growing rim, a rusty orange body and a stout felted stalk. Cut vertically it shows uniformly orange-brown zoned flesh.
Spore print · Brown
Desert Shaggy Mane
Puffballs
A tall desert fungus with a woody stalk carrying an elongate, shaggy white capsule that splits to release blackish-brown powder. It persists for months in dry climates long after fruiting.
Spore print · Blackish brown
Zombie-Ant Fungus
Other Fungi
A parasitic fungus of carpenter ants that manipulates its host into clamping onto vegetation before killing it, then sends a wiry stalk out of the ant's head to release spores over the trail below.
Spore print · Not applicable
Dripping Bonnet
Gilled
A minute pale bonnet whose thin stem is sheathed in a thick, glassy layer of slime far wider than the stalk itself. It fruits on twigs, bramble stems and fallen plant debris.
Spore print · White
Lobster Mushroom
Other Fungi
Not a mushroom in its own right but a parasitic ascomycete that encases Russula and Lactarius fruitbodies in a pimpled, brilliant orange-red crust, twisting them into dense, contorted shapes.
Spore print · Not applicable
Rosy Earthstar
Puffballs
One of the larger earthstars, with thick fleshy rays that flush pinkish-red on their inner surface when fresh and a stalkless buff spore sac with a silky, ungrooved mouth.
Spore print · Brown (spore mass)
Pear Fibrecap
Gilled
A pale ochre fibrecap that flushes rusty red where handled and carries a strong sweet scent of ripe pears. A robust species of broadleaf woodland on richer soils.
Spore print · Snuff-brown
Peach Leaf Curl
Other Fungi
A spring-active sac fungus that turns unfolding peach and nectarine leaves into thick, crinkled, red or purple puckered blades. A whitish bloom of spore-bearing cells later coats the distorted surface.
Spore print · Not applicable
Wheat Stem Rust
Other Fungi
The classic cereal rust, forming ragged brick-red pustules along wheat stems that turn coal-black late in the season, with orange cluster-cups on barberry in spring.
Spore print · Not applicable (rusty red spore masses)
Crowned Earthstar
Puffballs
A medium-large earthstar with a dark grey, often bloomed spore sac raised on a short stalk above strongly recurved rays, and a silky fibrous mouth with no grooves.
Spore print · Dark brown (spore mass)
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)
Bovine Bolete
Boletes
A slender pinkish-tan pine bolete recognised by its wide, irregular compound pores that run down the stalk. It is frequently found in company with the pink Rosy Spike.
Spore print · Olive to clay-brown
Heterobasidion annosum
Polypores
A perennial, irregularly shelving polypore found at the root collar and stump surfaces of conifers, recognised by its rough red-brown to blackish upper crust, sharp white growing margin and cream pore surface.
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
Maitake
Polypores
A large clustered polypore that builds a rosette of grey-brown, fan- to spoon-shaped fronds from a branched white stalk at the foot of old oaks. The undersides are covered in tiny white pores rather than gills.
Spore print · White