First Nature Blog

Fascinated by Fungi - the Book Launch

2011-09-25T11:29:00.000-07:00

We had a tremendous attendance at the launch of Fascinated by Fungi, Pat O'Reilly's amazing new book. More than 150 people turned up for the launch at the National Botanic Garden of Wales on Saturday 24th September 2011, and among them were several noted experts from the world of mycology including David Harries the county recorder for Pembrokeshire, Nigel Stringer (who needs no introduction to fellow fungi enthusiasts) and Ray Woods, who ranks among the all-time greats in communicating a fascination with the kingdom of fungi to those of us with a much more limited experience of mycology.

Dr Rosetta Plummer, Director of the National Botanic Garden, opened the proceedings and welcomed people to not only the book launch but also the exhibition From Another Kingdom, a mushroom cookery demonstration by Gary Whiteley of Maesllyn Mushrooms, and special mushroom menu in the on-site restaurant, and after lunch a fungus foray that despite poor weather attracted a huge following and was acclaimed a great success. Many thanks to Bruce Langridge and Ray Woods, who held the participants spellbound throughout the foray.

Roger Thomas, chief executive of the Countryside Council for Wales, formally launched the book, which he confidently expects will become essential reading for anyone, whether a lay person or a professional mycologist, with an interest in fungi.

Fascinated by Fungi is now available at the Stables Bookshop in the National Botanic Garden of Wales, priced at just £25, and copies can also be obtained via www.first-nature.com where a private collector's edition, casebound, is also available.

Mushroom of the Month, December 2010

2010-12-28T12:04:00.000-08:00

There are two very similar brain fungi with yellow jelly-like and both are members of the family Tremellaceae. Most often here in West Wales we come across Tremella mesenterica, which is parasistic on crust fungi of the genus Peniophora. The other is Tremella aurantia, and it is not quite so common in our area; this jelly fungus is parasitic on Stereum hirsutum, the Hairy Curtain Crust. There is little to distinguish these two, and perhaps the best way to identify them is to take a close look at the substrate they are attached to; you should find that your brain fungus is growing from the remains of some kind of crust fungus, and you now know which is which (if you know your Peniophora from your Stereum, that is! Ain't fungi fun?).

Here is a picture of Stereum hirsutum:

And here is a Peniophora species:

Incidentally, the normally reddish-brown Leafy Brain (Tremella foliacea) has a pinkish-white form that could also cause confusion; however both Tremella mesenterica and Tremella aurantia are yellow or orange (or brown when totally dried up!) so if you do come across a whitish brain-like fungus it's neither of them.

Here's hoping you have/have had a very Happy Christmas!

Pat

Mushroom of the Month, November 2010

2010-11-14T11:50:00.000-08:00

What makes a mycelium decide that it is time to produce fruitbodies? Is it when conditions are good for spore production and distribution, or are fungi more like desert orchids, producing potential offspring (seeds in the case of orchids and spores in the case of fungi) when the parent is stressed and at risk of dying? We may guess at the answer, but we will never really know. Anyway, what brought this thought to mind was the paucity of Parasol Mushrooms this summer and autumn... until in early November, when I came across several in perfect condition and obviously coping well with weather quite different from what would be 'normal' in their traditional fruiting season.

Oops! There I go, falling in to the trap of using the word 'normal' in the same sentence as 'weather'. What I should have said is 'in the days when patterns of British weather bore at least some resemblance to normality'. Climate Change (Climate Chaos, as I prefer to call it) has abolished all norms. Where I wandered, at least, the early November weather seems to have suited August-fruiting fungi rather better than August did.

What is special about Parasol Mushrooms (Macrolepiota procera) apart from their undeniable gracefulness is their perfect fit in a frying pan. I won't go in to recipes here - I'm saving that topic for my new book about fungi, which is at last entering the home straight towards completion - but these really are Pizza-on-a-Stick pickable if you enjoy eating wild mushrooms.

The genus name Lepiota simply means scaly, while the specific epithet procera, meaning tall, is self-explanatory when applied to these stately parasols. Found in grassland, Parasol Mushrooms have a strange habit of springing up on roadside verges on the most dangerous of bends, diverting drivers' attention from the road at critical times. Unfortunately, fungi are very good at accumulating heavy metals and other toxins, and so it is best to avoid eating Parasol Mushrooms (or other edible fungi) from roadside verges. Golf course margins, parkland and dune slacks are better places to try - the latter, warmed by the sea air, often proving to be fertile fungi foray territory well in to winter when inland sites have been thoroughly frosted off. Food for thought...

Mushroom of the Month, October 2010

2010-10-29T01:04:00.000-07:00

It has been a great autumn for Amanita fungi here in Wales, and a few of the rare or at least infrequent finds have 'turned up' to add sparkle to forays.

Somewhat similar, much less common but hardly less glamorous that the Orange Grisette (Amanita crocea), the Snakeskin Grisette is mycorrhizal with hardwoods and conifers. Amanita cecilae (syn. Amanita inaurata and Amanita strangulata) is an uncommon find in Britain and Ireland, but widespread in most of mainland Europe. Here's a brief ID guide...

Cap: olivaceous fawn, darkest at the centre, margin much paler; margin has strong radial lines; irregular grey veil fragments mainly in cap centre; convex, eventually flattening; 6 to 12cm across.
Gills: creamy white, greying with age; free, with frequent short gills; not very crowded.
Stem: pale grey, surface developing snakeskin pattern of scales; no ring; 8 to 17 cm long, 1 to 2cm dia.; stem base not swollen; bag-like white volva that soon collapses leaving patches on stem base.
Spore print: white.

I have pictures of fully expanded caps, but I am saving those for my new book, which is nearing completion... probably! The trouble is, it's such a fascinating subject that deciding what to omit is very difficult. It's not an ID guide, but a broad introduction to the beauty, science, fantasy, uses and modus vivendi of fungi of woodlands, grasslands and some marginal habitats. Early next year, I hope... I'll keep you posted via this blog and I'll be making chunks downloadable as PDFs to (I hope) whet appetites. Thanks to all who have offered pictures - much appreciated.

Happy foraging,

Pat

Mushroom of the month - September 2010

2010-09-24T22:37:00.000-07:00

There is something very strange about this very attractive little mushroom, and it puzzled experts for a very long time. It was thought to be a mycorrhizal fungus, creating a symbioltic relationship with pine trees, but some sharp-eyed mycologists spotted the fact that wherever Gomphidius roseus appeared another, much more common species invariably showed up (although not necessarily at the same time).

Suillus bovinus, the Jersey cow bolete, is also found under pine trees, with which it forms an ectomycorrhizal relationship, the fungus and the tree providing each other with some of their nutrient needs.

In fact we now know that Gomphideus roseus is a parasite, feeding on the mycorrhizae created by the bolete and the pine tree. This month I came across a group of these fungi so closely packed that it looked almost as though the Gomphidius and the Suillus species were conjoined at the base. Here's a picture showing the stem bases of one of the spike caps and two young boletes:

Tempted to make a meal of these gorgeous little mushrooms? Although they were collected for many years in some Eastern European countries there are now serious doubts about all of the spike caps, so perhaps it's better to make a meal of the Jersey cow boletes... or maybe the cow itself (although a whole one would probably be too much for most people).

Mushroom of the Month - August 2010

2010-08-01T01:50:00.000-07:00

Marasmius oreades, the Fairy Ring Champignon, is a small, pale-brown mushroom that is particularly common in the Autumn. You find these edible fungi on garden lawns, in graveyards, on parkland and most other kinds of short grassland that is not heavily dosed with fertilisers or weedkillers. This year, due to a wet July here in the west of Britain, the fairies have been out dancing earlier than usual, and rings and groups of Fairy Ring Chanpignons are already plentiful.

There is a logical explanation for fairy rings (unfortunately!). It is expandings underground discs of mycellium that causes these ring formations - not necessarily the work of fairies, therefore - a circle in a grassy area marking the periphery of a buried fungal growth. The disc becomes an annulus once the mycellium has consumed all it can from the central area, and so the diameter of a ring is an indication of the age of the fungal organism that is causing it.

The most common types of fairy ring cause the turf to grow a darker green, but other types of fungi may cause the grass to turn yellow or reddish. The grass inside a ring may die back because the soil there has been depleted of organic material and resists watering. When two fairy rings meet they gebnerally cannot cross one another (because the nutrients needed by the mycellia have already been consumed) and so the rimgs break and become arcs. Ring expansion is also broken when the perimeter comes up against a deeply-rooted tree, a wall or a deeply sunk concrete post etc. These grassland fungi don't always form rings, therefore, and in fact lines of the little brown mushrooms are rather more common than complete rings.

Up to 5 or 6cm tall and with a cap diameter of typically 2 to 4cm, this is one of the many mushrooms that change colour between dry and wet weather. Caps are usually pale beige when dry, turning rather darker when wet. Often the edges of the caps are shallowly scalloped, while the main gills are widely spaced and just free of the stems, and they are interspersed with shorter intermediate gills.

Although quite small, this is a good edible mushroom, and it's very easy to gather enough for a meals small because they fruit in such great numbers. Discard the tough stalks and dry the caps on a radiator, in an open warm oven, or threaded on twine and hung up in a warm dry place (an airing cupboard will do, provided it is well ventilated. Stored in jars, dried mushrooms can be kept for as long as you like.

The family Marasmiaceae (within the order Agaricales) are white-spored fungi, many of which are able to survive drought and near desiccation and can later recover when it rains. Another edible mushroom within this family is the Shiitake mushroom, Lentinula edodes.

Of course, it's impossible to prove a negative, and just because we have a scientific explanation for fairy rings of mushrooms doesn't mean that fairies do not exist. They may even have the power to determine where fungal spores can meet, mate and make rings. Who knows?

Mushroom of the Month, July 2010

2010-07-04T12:08:00.000-07:00

Quite a rare find, Boletus parasiticus (synonym: Pseudoboletus parasiticus) is commonly referred to as the parasitic bolete. It is always found with common earthballs, Scleroderma citrinum. That seems to suggest that this bolete consumes the earthball to which it appears to be attached, and yet some scientists are now suggesting that the relationship may not be parasitic after all. Well, perhaps so, but I remain to be convinced: just look at how the earthball in the picture above appears deflated, as though something is consuming its innards.

There seems to be little dount that Boletus parasiticus cannot live without its earthball associate, and every specimen that I find is with an earthball partner. Often a single earthball is 'host' (if that is an appropriate term for the true relationship between these two fungi) to several fruitbodies of the parasitic bolete. Parasitic boletes are hard to find, and stumbling across a patch of common earthballs is no guarantee that you are about to see this rather dull and unimpressive member of the family Boletaceae: most earthballs occur without parasitic boletes.

If you ever go across the sea to Ireland, as the song says... some way south of Galway bay is the lovely town of Killarney and its nearby lakes and mountains. Within the woodland there, and most particularly near Mucross Abbey, common earthballs line many of the drainage ditches, and quite a high proportion of those earthballs have parasitic boletes attached to them.

Where else is good? Well. my favourite hunting ground is in the narrow strip of woodland along the gorge of the River Teifi at Henllan, in West Wales. There, every year, while hunting rare fungi and lichen I come across dozens of parasitic boletes with, of course, common earthballs.

I have looked out for these intriguing boletes in so many other places and failed. The New Forest, in southern England; the Caledonian Forest, in Scotland; the Forest of Dean, in the Wye Valley; numerous pinewoods in France, Portugal, Bulgaria... But of course, not finding them doesn't mean that they are not there. These are fairly inconspicuous fungi, almost always in deeply shaded habitats with plenty of leaf litter, with which backgrounds they blend in very well.

One final point... this is always a woodland mushroom, as indeed are most if not all other boletes. The common earthball, Scleroderma citrinum, is ectomycorrhizal with both hardwood and softwood trees (broadleaves and conifers), meaning that it lives in a mutually beneficial relationship (termed symbiosis) with the fine rootlets at the ends of the roots of trees. The fungus in effect feeds the tree and the tree also delivers vital chemicals to the fungus. Meanwhile, within this ménage à trois, the parasitic bolete is also up to something, and I suspect it is up to no good! How often we find that these interrelationships between fungi and plants are far from simple. For example the rare wild orchid Limodorum abortivum is now known to depend on certain kinds of Russula fungi which themselves require pine trees - explaining why the violet limodore, to quote the orchid's common name, is found only beneath pine trees.

We certainly do live in an amazing (and amazingly complex) world.

Do let me know if you are able to add to (or correct) any of the above...

Happy hunting!

Mushroom of the Month - June 2010

2010-06-20T01:58:00.000-07:00

I had to rub my eyes the first time I saw a group of Woolly Milkcaps, Lactarius torminosus, in bright sunlight beneath a tall silver birch tree. They are the archetypal Tellytubby mushrooms - perhaps even more so than are the Fly Agarics of fairytale fame - and equally dubious as a source of food. One common name for this relatively uncommon mushroom is Poison Powderpuff. Enough said? (Actually, torminosus means 'cause of colic', and so the scientific name is also a warning.)

The Woolly Milkcap generally occurs either solitarily or in small scattered groups, always with trees and almost invariably close to birches in grass-covered glades and woodland edges. One on the larger fungi in this genus, Lactarius torminosus is one of the easiest species to identify without microscopy or chemical tests - some of the smaller milkcaps can be very tricky - and the only common species with a similar woolly cap is Lactarius pubescens, also associated with birch trees. Full details of both species can be found on www.first-nature.com/fungi

All Lactarius and Russula fungi - the Russulaceae family - are ectomycorrhizal: they form mycorrhizae that sheath the tiny rootlets of trees or shrubs. Through these mycorrhizae the fungi and trees exchange chemicals in a mutually beneficial (symbiotic) process. More about that and many other fascinating facts about mushrooms, toadstools and the like in my forthcoming book on fungi due out later this year... watch this space (blatant self publicist!).

Pat

Mushroom of the Month, May 2010

2010-05-09T09:26:00.000-07:00

Where did April go to? No blog post... because we were away photographing wild orchids on Crete and then on the Gargano Peninsular, Italy. And we should add that the wildflowers, including dozens of orchid species, were absolutely marvelous. We are continually adding pages to the Wildflowers section of the First Nature website, so that's the place to go if you are a wild orchid fan. Meanwhile, what about an early season mushroom for May... well, there are plenty to choose from. St George's Mushroom, supposed to appear on 23rd April but rather delayed because of the cold winter and delayed spring, is now in evidence, but that was the subject of this blog a year ago (Mushroom of the Month, April 2009), so here's another mushroom that is easy to find in May; and it is a useful edible mushroom at that!

Auricularia auricula-judae is known as the Jelly Ear Fungus (or, perhaps less politically correct but nevertheless a strict translation of the scientific name, Jew's Ear). To find these rubbery (in anything but very dry weather, that is) purplish-brown fungi you need to look on dead elder wood - either standing or fallen trunks and branches that have decayed to the point where the bark is peeling or has fallen away. Shady, damp places are generally best of all.

A plate of these fungi would make a very disappointing meal, but if you add a few, chopped into thin strips, to any other mushroom dish the jelly fungi take in the flavour of the rest of the dish and add a very pleasant 'al dente' element. (There may be other ways of cooking Jelly Ear Fungi that we don't know about, so if you do then please post a message to this blog, as we are always interested in new recipes for nice fungi dishes.

Mushroom of the Month, March 2010

2010-03-28T01:40:00.000-07:00

The tarmac surface of an old road is no barrier to this determined mushroom!

Pisolithus tinctorius (synonym: Pisolithus arrhizus) is an ectomycorrhizal earthball, sometimes referred to as a dyeball - a reference to one former use for the mature spore mass that this mushroom produces.

Up to 20cm tall, the fruitbodies burst through dry ground and eventually turn into a brown powdery mess that blows away on the wind or gets carried away by rain. Most common in southern Europe but occasionally seen in the UK, these massive fungi have another extremely valuable use: they form mycorrhizal associations with just about any plant that can be grown in soil, and so they are used to produce 'mycorrizal inoculants'. The fungi in effect feed the plants, scavenging vital minerals from the soil via tiny mycelial threads that in effect extend the plant's root system. The fungi also gain nutrients from the plant's photosynthesis process. This is termed a symbiotic relationship.

Here is a picture of the inside of a young specimen of Pisolithus tinctorius:

The spore-producing material looks like rice grains densely packed together. At maturity the appearance is not unlike a pile of rotting horse dung. The one shown below is splitting open and the brown spore mass can be seen:

Foresters use an inoculant made from Pisolithus tinctorius to help young conifers (especially pines) get started on poor or contaminated soil that has lost or perhaps never had the mycorrhizal fungi necessary for trees to survive there.

Mushroom of the Month, February 2010

2010-02-01T07:48:00.001-08:00

Only a minority of fungi from the phylum Ascomycota produce large and conspicuous fruitbodies, but among them are some tough (fun)guys that can be found all through the year. This month's mushroom (well, fungal fruitbody might be more appropriate) is candle-snuff fungus, and it is easy to find in winter when dead wood on the forest floor is not hidden by long grass, bracken or other tall vegetation.

Xylaria hypoxylon belongs to a group of fungi known as the Pyrenomycetes (meaning 'fire fungi' - a reference to their blackened and burnt appearance). The generic name comes from the same Greek word xýlon (as does xylem - wood, in the sense of the tough cellular material that forms the roots, trunk and branches of trees). The specific epithet hypoxylon is yet another reference to wood, and with the prefix 'hypo' usually meaning below or under, but in this case perhaps 'reduced', since this fungus is able to consume timber whose cellulose and hemicellulose (the softer material) have already been fairly comprehensively broken down by other fungi, for example sulphur tufts or honey fungus. Any other suggestions?

One question I have never been asked in respect of candle-snuff fungus is 'are they edible?' Even if they were, why would anyone want to waste time on collecting them when there are plenty of really good edible fungi available throughout the year?

Xylaria fungi (and there are plenty of other species in the genus, including Xylaria polymorpha, commonly called dead man's fingers) are able to reproduce sexually and asexually. In the case of the candle-snuff fungus, the antler-like fruitbodies, or 'stroma' to use the technical term, are black at the base of each stem and almost white further up and along the branches, which are the places where the asexual spores (conidia) are produced - but you will need a high-power microscope to see these features. This fungus also produces sexual spores from asci that develop on the inner walls of vessels called perithecia, which are embedded in the surface of the stroma, and if you cut across a fruitbody and look at the section under a strong hand lens or a low-powered microscope these vase-like perithecia are easy to see.

That's what I find about most Ascomycetes: they are only of passing interest... until you look more closely and then they are quite fascinating in their structures and habits.

Mushroom of the Month - January 2010

2009-12-29T16:43:00.000-08:00

Winter is not the best time for cap-and-stem fungi, but if we get a mild spell there is a group of fungi ready to spring forth in woodland - the Cortinarius mushrooms. I am using the term 'mushrooms' in the broadest sense rather than in its narrow 'edible-fungi' interpretation, because many Cortinarius species are known to be poisonous - some of them deadly - and nearly all others are of dubious or unknown edibility. For that reason the total number of Cortinarius species that I can recommend for eating is... zero. These are look-at-me mushrooms, and not feast-on-me fungi.

Cortinarius cinnamomeus is a wonderful winter woodland species, as it generally appears quite late in the autumn and often fruits through the New Year and occasionally into February. It's also a very distinctive mushroom, unlike most species in this difficult group.

In the UK I find this gregarious mushroom most often in coniferous woodland, but it is also found under birches in dry heaths. All Cortinarius fungi are mycorrhizal (they form symbiotic associations with the roots of trees), so they do not occur in grassland (at least not significantly beyond the point where tree roots extend into the fields).

For identification details see the fungi section of http://www.first-nature.com/ where this and several related species are pictured and described.

Here's another picture of Cortinarius cinnamomeus:

One final point about winter mushrooms... after heavy frost it's generally a week or ten days before any new fruitbodies emerge from the forest floor, but some of the wood rotters and parasites that grow on trunks and branches cope much better with the cold.

Happy New Year, and happy fungi hunting!

Mushroom of the Month - December 2009

2009-11-30T12:32:00.000-08:00

This month's mushroom is an alien. Clathrus ruber looks alien and it doesn't really belong here, having arrived fairly recently, so experts believe. But here it is and it seems determined to stay; and, with the climate becoming ever more favourable to it, this mainly Mediterranean species is likely to be seen ever more frequently in the British Isles. Already it is fairly common in some southern parts of England (most particularly in the Westcountry and on the Isle of Wight) but also in southern Ireland too. In the Channel Islands these striking fungi are now very often a decorative feature of compost heaps and grassy orchards. That said, you can count yourself lucky if you do come across this remarkable relative of the stinkhorns... unless you happen to sit on one accidentally. If you think the common stinkhorn (Phallus impudicus) is smelly, save the superlatives for this rotter! For close-up photography a scuba outfit would be a good investment.

In much the same way that setting out to find giant puffballs is pretty much a futile quest (unless you already know a site where they occur), so seeking the cage fungus is also something best suited to masochists; these are fungi you just come across once in a (very long) while. The one pictured below was spotted in a shallow, leaf-litter filled ditch in the Serra around Monchique, in southern Portugal. They are not common there, but we did manage to find three in one day.

The half-buried 'eggs' from which the cage fungi emerge look very much like those of the common stinkhorn, but as the time nears for an almost explosive emergence the outer skin ruptures and the embryonic cage is clearly visible - see below.

The eggs are typically 3cm in diameter, but when fully expanded the cage is three times that size, with dark olive-green gleba coating the inner surface. Flies love them, of course, attracted to their stench of rotting meat, and the short-lived fruitbodies last just one or two days before collapsing and turning to mush.

Also known as the latticework fungus, Clathrus ruber occurs in summer and autumn, but with the heat emitted by rotting compost or wood chippings they can even be found in November unless the weather turns icy cold. Like us, they are not at all keen on frost.

If you know someone whose garden is infested with these amazing fungi, that's the place to go to see them... But take a clothes peg for your nose, and just be glad that it's not your garden!

There are more pictures and information about this mushroom (and its darker red relative Clathrus archeri) on www.first-nature.com/fungi - and we wish you much happy fungi foraying throughout the forthcoming festive season.

Mushroom of the Month - November 2009

2009-11-04T03:16:00.000-08:00

Earthstars are like busses: they keep you waiting for ages and then suddenly a whole host of them arrive at once. We go for years without stumbling across these remarkable fungi and then, when conditions suit them, we have a bumper year (as it seems, in some places at least, we have been enjoying this year). The earthstars shown above are Geastrum triplex, commonly referred to as the 'collared earthstar' because in many instances the arms crack as they bend, with the result that the spore case seems to be sitting on a separate saucer-like layer.

The opening on the top of the spore-sac is pointed at first, and is surrounded by a fuzzy ring slightly paler fawn-brown than the rest of the spore-sac outer surface.

Look in woodland for this member of the (hopelessly jumbled, taxonomically, but useful from an identification point of view) Gastromycetes group. They are most often found under hardwood trees, but we have also found them in coniferous woodland and in parkland under Coast Redwood trees. Collared earthstars are larger than other earthstar species, and they have a spore-sac diameter up to 5cm and arms that span twice that distance when fully outstretched. If you cut through a young fruitbody the interior is white, but it gradually turns into a dark brown powdery mass as the spores mature. Spores are emitted from the apical hole as breezes blow across it, and much larger puffs of spores escape when raindrops hit and compress the spore-sac.

Earthstars are mysterious mushrooms. Why, for example, do some collared earthstars split open with just four rays while others produce five, six, seven or occasionally eight rays? Let us know if you have seen specimens with more than eight rays...

For pictures of more earthstars and other Gastromycetes fungi see www.first-nature.com/fungi/gasteromycetes/

Mushroom of the Month - October 2009

2009-10-01T00:29:00.000-07:00

Sarcodon imbricatus is a rare mushroom in southern Britain but increasingly more plentiful as you go further north, so that in the Caledonian Forest of northern Scotland these remarkable hedgehog fungi are quite a common sight.

When fully expanded the caps can be up to 15cm and occasionally 20cm across. The name 'sarcodon' means scaly tooth, and indeed the cap surface breaks up into sparply-pointed scales towards the centre while the underside of the cap has a spore-bearing surface comprising a neat aray of spines, as shown below, which are typically 5 to 10mm long:

Found under coniferous trees, and most commonly pines (Scots Pine in Scotland, of course!), these fleshy fungi are reportedly edible when young, but the taste is rather bitter and they are prone to maggot infestation; so, rather like Dryad's Saddle, Beefsteak Fungus and many other visually attractive large woodland fungi, they are probably best enjoyed in situ rather than being seen as a source of food.

Much more likely finds in the southern part of Britain are Hydnum repandum and Hydnum fufescens, two hedgehog fungi that are fairly common if not widespread as well as very good to eat. Within a forthcoming book about fungi, due to be launched in 2010, there is a chapter on our favourite wild mushroom recipes; one of the recipes is for 'Hedgehogs on Toast'... delicious! More on that subject in the New Year...

Mushroom of the Month - September 2009

2009-09-10T03:02:00.000-07:00

Find one in perfect condition on a lovely sunny day and surely there's no bracket fungus to match Inonotus dryadeus for sheer beauty. The honey-like droplets that emerge like teardrops from the surface glisten like amber.

Oak trees are its main host, and if you see one of these large bracket fungi on a tree just take a walk around the bole; chances are there are several others, invariably very near to the ground. Athough also commonly referred to as the oak bracket fungus, Inonotus dryadeus also occurs sometimes on beech, birch and alder trees.

Up to 40cm across and typically 10 to 15 cm thick, these orange-brown brackets become irregularly shaped as the fruitbody matures. Occasionally they occur in tiers of three or more brackets, and as the infection increases, fruitbodies can occur on roots some distance away from the trunk of the tree. Trees can live for many years with this parasitic fungus attacking them, but ultimately the disease is often fatal. In the meantime, however, they are such an amazing sight, and definitely our favourite bracket species. More details on www.first-nature.com/fungi of course...

Mushroom of the Month - August 2009

2009-08-04T01:13:00.000-07:00

What a brilliant start to the summer. No... we haven't emigrated; we are still suffering the worst of British weather. We say this merely as a reference to the emergence of fungi and not a comment on the almost incessant rain and wind that have ruined so many holidays already... unless of course you are a fungus fanatic.

Fanatical we certainly are, at least when it comes to searching out the very best edible mushrooms, and August has started with some wonderful finds. We have seen quite few field mushrooms and plenty of wood mushrooms (Agaricus campestris and Agaricus arvensis), but we rarely bother to collect when the subject of this posting is available... Summer Chanterelles! This year they are appearing in West Wales in probably ten times the usual quantity; the weather must suit them (meaning perhaps that the mycelium is in danger of drowning and is doing all that it can to secure a future for the species: producing spore-distributing fruitbodies).

Here is an example of the quality of summer chanterelles that we have found in the first few days of August:

In five minutes we gathered a kilo or so. Sue makes the most wonderful chanterelle sauces to go with pork chops, and she has lots of other recipes for these most superb mushrooms. Some of these will apear in Pat's new book on fungi, due out next spring. More details in due course...

Happy hunting!

Mushroom of the Month - July 2009

2009-07-02T03:24:00.000-07:00

Summer is here, and with it comes the finest of all edible boletes. Cep, porcini, penny bun and many other common names have been given to Boletus edulis; in the USA it is known as the king bolete; in Sweden is is called Karljohan svamp after the Swedish King Charles IV.

Edulis means edible, of course - a very confusing term since most boletes are edible and many taste nice (but be aware that several others do taste rather bitter) and very few are toxic. Avoid any red-pored boletes, as some of them are reportedly quite seriously poisonous; and the pink-pored Tylopilus felleus, commonly called the bitter bolete, will spoil a meal if accidentally gathered along with ceps.

Where can you find a good supply of ceps? Currently dried ceps cost around £200 per kg, and that alone suggests they are not easy to gather in quantity. We find ours in conifer forests and sometimes under laneside beech trees, as these are mycorrhizal fungi that are always associated with trees but not tied rigidly to just one type of tree. Forest edges and clearings are good places to try, as also are the banks of woodland drainage ditches.

Ceps can grow to 30 cm in diameter, but by then they are usually maggotty and well past the edible stage. Small, firm caps and stems are the best for eating. They can be dried - we slice ours before drying them - and stored in jars for use throughout the winter months when fresh edible wild fungi are not readily available.

Ceps are our favourite edible mushrooms. Unfortunately (so far at least) their mycorrhizal nature has thwarted attempts to cultivate them in commercial quantities, and so the estimated 20,000 to 100,000 tonnes of ceps eaten each year across the world are all gathered from the wild.

Mushroom of the Month - June 2009

2009-05-30T10:43:00.000-07:00

Wildflowers are at their very best, and the fairies are busy making bonnets from bluebells, harebells and a host of other bell-like flowers. But this must be very tiring work, and at the end of the day the fairies need somewhere to sit down and relax. Dryad's saddle fungi may be a bit on the big side for the average fairy's backside - some of these attractive bracket fungi are more than 50 cm across - but sited conveniently, often quite high up on the trunks of trees, they must provide wonderful vantage points from which a tired dryad can survey the surroundings.

Polyporus squamosus is commonly referred to as Dryad's Saddle. (A dryad is a mythical wood nymph.) This attractive polypore grows in overlapping clusters and tiers on broad-leaved trees. The fruit bodies appear in summer and autumn. Sycamore, willow, poplar and walnut trees are all commonly attacked by this impressively large and attractive fungus, and I have even found it growing on ash trees.

Insects quickly devour these large brackets, and in warm weather they can decay from full splendour to almost nothing in just a few days. The outer edges of young caps are edible and tender, but mature caps have tough flesh - especially near to the stipe.

Individual caps grow to between 10 and 60 cm in diameter and are 5 to 50 mm thick. Often in tiers, the caps are attached to the host tree by a very short lateral (occasionally eccentric but not quite lateral) stipe that darkens towards the base. Beneath the yellow to tan upper surface, the cap flesh is white and tough, and irregularly oval tubes 5 to 10 mm deep terminate in angular pores that are white at first but turn cream as the fruiting body matures. The tubes run decurrently on to the short stem. The spore print is white.

The first dryad's saddles appeared very early this year. I saw one at the end of March and several more in May, but June is the month when they really make their presence known. Although parasitic of trees they are relatively weak parasites, and so trees often survive for many years while bearing these attractive summer brackets.

Mushroom of the Month - May 2009

2009-05-20T12:47:00.000-07:00

It's still spring, and fungi are supposed to be few and far between... but of course if you know where to look there are plenty about. The wood rotters start work early, and already plenty of sulphur polypores and dryad's saddle fungi are fruiting on damaged or diseased tree trunks. One of the most spectacular of all the bracket fungi is the maze-gill fungus, Daedalea quercina.

Labyrinthine, gill-like pores give this bracket fungus its generic scientific name. In Greek mythology, Daedalus constructed a labyrinth at Knossos for King Minos of Crete, and in that labyrinth lived the Minotaur - half-man, half-bull. That may be just a load of bull, of course, but even so this amazing perennial fungus realy does have remarkably maze-like elongated pores.

Oak stumps and large fallen branches are the staple diet of the maze-gill fungus, although you may occasionally find it tucking in to a dead sweet chestnut tree. Don't even think of biting it back: this tough polypore is a poor cullinary substitute for old boots.

Lenzites betulina is similar in appearance, with thinner cream 'gills'; it occurs mainly on birch trees. We haven't seen an of these in recent years... have you?

Mushroom of the Month - April 2009

2009-04-06T13:47:00.000-07:00

Calocybe gambosa is a chunky white mushroom that usually appears towards the end of April - hence its common name St George's Mushroom. You can find them in May and often through to late June, too. 23rd April is St George's Day - but you knew that, of course... er, well, if you are English perhaps you might be blushing now, because everyone in Ireland can tell you that St Patrick's Day is on 17th March, and in Wales it's impossible for St David's Day pass you by unnoticed unless you are comatose... but as far as I can tell neither the Welsh nor Irish Patron Saints has a mushroom named in his honour.

Harvested commercially in Romania and some other European mainland countries, this good edible species is best picked young because older specimens often are maggot infested. It has a mealy smell that puts some people off, but others find it excellent - it must be well cooked, by the way.

The really good news is that these spring mushrooms often appear in groups and even in large fairy rings. Up to 15 cm across, the caps have a smooth texture and are domed when young, flattening when fully expanded. Be sure that you do not confuse this edible species with the relatively uncommon but deadly poisonous Inocybe patouilardii, a bell-shaped mushroom with a fruity smell that appears in similar grassy and woodland-edge habitats.

For more pictures and details of St George's Mushroom see:

www.first-nature.com/fungi/id_guide/tricholomataceae/calocybe_gambosa.htm

Happy hunting!

Mushroom of the Month - March 2009

2009-02-27T12:49:00.001-08:00

March is when the first morels usually appear, although after such a tough winter I wonder whether they will be rather later than usual this spring. Anyway, because they are one of the very best edible fungi it's surely quite appropriate to select them as mushroom of the month.

Although the common morel is Morchella esculenta, it is only 'common' by name: far more plentiful nowadays are the black morels, Morchella elata, shown above. How so? It's all to do with the fashion for mulching flower beds in gardens and parks using woodchip: black morels often erupt in vast numbers among bark and wood chippings put down the previous year.

Notice how the pits on the cap are in neat vertical lines - a distinguishing feature of this much-sought-after edible mushroom. The only nasty that you could possibly mistake for a morel is Gyromitra esculenta. That specific name 'esculenta' suggests an edible species, but in this case it's definitely not - or at least several people have suffered serious poisoning after eating it (even though some people report no problems after eating Gyromita esculenta, the false morel (also called the 'turban fungus'. So here is the enemy, G esculenta:

There are no pits on the cap of this poisonous species, so armed with this information I hope you will feel confident enough to gather and enjoy a few morels this spring.

Mushroom of the Month - February 2009

2009-02-09T02:50:00.000-08:00

Few of the Ascomycota produce large fruitbodies, but Xylaria polymorpha, commonly called Dead Man's Fingers, certainly does. Its morbid eruptions appear throughout the year at the base of beech and ash stumps (and occasionally on other buried hardwoods). Few fungi have more appropriate common names: imagine the shock of walking through a tree-lined churchyard at dusk and seeing a set of blackened fingers apparently clawing their way out of the ground!

Slice through one of the fingers and you find that, surprisingly, the material inside is white with little black flasks just beneath the surface layer. This is where the spores develop inside what are termed ascii, and when ripe the spores are released to drift on the breeze. (It takes very little breeze to carry the minute spores quite a long way.)

Xylaria belong to a group of burnt-looking fungi knows as the Pyromycetes (the name itself being a reference to fire). There are many other Xylaria, including the very common candle-snuff fungus Xylaria hypoxylon - yet another of the woodland fungi that you can see in the winter months.

Many of the Pyromycetes produce very small fruitbodies that almost invariably go unnoticed, but another year-round species, Daldinia concentrica, is very conspicuous; its most commonly used common name in the UK is King Alfred's cakes, but you may find people referring to 'cramp balls' - the connotation being that if you carry these hard black hemispherical fungi in your pocket you will not suffer from cramp. These 'tough cookies' grow mainly on the dead trunks and large branches of ash trees, whether standing or fallen.

All I can say is that I do not kepp my pockets filled with these fungi, and I do (albeit very occasionally) get attacks of cramp. So does that prove anything?

Mushroom of the Month - January

2009-01-18T02:05:00.000-08:00

Sarcoscypha coccinea is January's fungal gem, although this is a mushrom that you will find right through to springtime. Commonly referred to as scarlet elf cup fungus, this Ascomycetes fungus appears throughout the winter on half-buried dead wood (usually hardwood such as hazel, willow and alder) in damp, shady places. Its bright red cup interiors stand out against the green moss that invariably covers the decaying fallen twigs from which the caps emerge. The irregularly shaped caps, which are edible when cooked, are usually 2 or 3 cm in diameter but can be as large as 5 cm and have a smooth, scarlet inner hymenal surface and a much paler felty outer surface. The edges of young cups are usually incurved. There is a very short stipe, often buried in leaf litter, and it is the same colour as the outer surface of the cup.

We find these lovely fungi, often in vast numbers, in shallow ditches beneath hedges, on fallen logs lying across well-shaded wooded streams, and in dark quarries - wherever hardwood twigs lie in damp, shady places and the moss that soon covers them does not dry out. Often it seems as though the cups are simply growing from soil, but they never are: if you dig down a couple of cm you will always find that their short pale stems are attached to rotten wood.

Despite the bright red colour of the fruitbodies, spores from the caps of this fungus are white.

The only common species likely to be confused with scarlet elf cup is Aleuria aurantia, the orange peel fungus, whose caps are usually rather larger and are orange rather than red. Orange peel fungus grows on soil rather than on wod and is appears in summer and autumn.

Lollipop Fungi

2009-01-06T01:17:00.000-08:00

A Happy New Year to all our First Nature friends and, despite the economic gloom and the big freeze with which we start the year, may 2009 be a good one for you all. It has certainly started well for us in terms of enjoing wildlife and scenic beauty.

We visited the south of France to photograph fungi there, and we stayed on for Christmas and saw the New Year in. We also saw eagles, bearded vultures (at fairly close quarters up in the Pyrenees on the border between France and Spain; and down in the lowlands almost everywhere were those delightful birds, the lapwings. They are there in their thousands, and just as shy as our remaining few hundreds are here in our home country of Wales.

But the best sight, from a fungi enthusuast's point of view at any rate, was the vast array of sand-dune fungi on the edges of the pine forests near Bayonne. Tulostoma brumale, tiny puffballs on sticks, were everywhere... well, slight exaggeration perhaps, but they apear in their hundreds and of course in temperatures well above freezing (17 degrees on New Year's Eve) they are there right through to the end of winter.

Other fine fungi seen in the dunes included Amanita gemmata and Stropharia aurata, as well as earth tongues (Geoglossum species) and plenty of LBMs (little brown mushrooms way beyond our expertise).

Waxing lyrical about waxcap fungi

2008-10-15T10:18:00.000-07:00

Well, maybe not so lyrical, but at last our local waxcap sites are starting to show their colours. And what colours! Waxcap (Hygrocybe species) really are the orchids of the fungal kingdom, appearing in almost every colour under the sun (but lasting much longer without too much sun). Red, orange, yellow, white, grey, brown and - our favourite, pink.

The pink waxcap, Hygrocybe calyptriformis, one of the most beautiful of all grassland fungi, is now sadly rather quite rare, but where we live in West Wales we occasionally stumble across one or two in churchyards; but the best place to look is in upland regions on cropped, unfertilised grassland. You might find two or three together, but more often they occur as solitary specimens. We used to travel to the Cambrian Mountains and the Brecon Beacons, each a minimum of forty miles inland, but in recent years there have been quite a few pink waxcaps on Llanlwni Mountain - actually not very mountainous but a wonderful place clad with heather in summer and waxcap fungi in autumn.

On an international scale Hygrocybe calyptriformis is a rare species, and more than half of all known occurrences are in the UK, with Wales particularly prolific. So where else can we see them?

Well, if you visit the National Botanic Garden of Wales (as we do about twice per month) just venture on the short walk to Waun Las National Nature Reserve - it was designated such only a few weeks ago - and you could well see them there on the hill slope behind the old farmhouse. A small group of pink waxcaps was spotted there in early October, and there are several other Hygrocybe species there too.

Anywhere else worth a visit?