Jocie says “Now that you’ve all digested part 1, here’s part 2 of Alison’s late fall & winter fungi review: the fabulous Polypores!”
Click a photo to enlarge it.

Notes on polypore fungi in the Comox Valley, late fall into winter 2023-2024

Polypores are much tougher and more durable than gilled fungi, even the annual ones such as the Trametes species.   Many have a shelf-like or bracket/hoof-like growth pattern, others have stipes; some are hard (Fomitopsis, Ganoderma spp.),  others leathery and pliable (Trametes, Stereum), others quite soft (Postia and Phlebia). Some have shallow pores on the spore-bearing underside, others are wrinkled, still others smooth.  A few have what look like “gills” (see Gloeophyllum below).

Picipes badius, blackleg (formerly Polyporus badius), is found on dead and downed wood, with a smooth, leathery bright orange cap, white underside with small shallow pores, and a stipe that is mostly black (caps and one underside show in photo 9.)

Clusters of Trametes versicolor, turkey tail, have been prolific this winter on a range of hosts; see photo 10 plus Jocie’s earlier photos. The various species of Trametes have a white underside with white tiny pores.  Another common ruffled shelf polypore is Stereum hirsutum, false turkey tail, with  orange cap and lighter border, while its underside is orange and smooth. The specimen in photo 11 shows both cap and underside.  Unlike the Trametes species it is found only on dead hardwood, alder here, and often together with one of the yellow jelly “witch’s butter” fungi (Tremella aurantia) which parasitizes the Stereum (no photo of T. aurantia).

The Postia caesia  group, blue cheese polypore (photo 12), is a soft spongy shelf-like fungus on dead conifer logs, with white and bluish-green colouration on the slightly hairy cap and white angular or maze-like shallowish pores on the underside. According to MacKinnon and Luther, edibility is unknown — it only looks like blue cheese.

In photo 13, Rhodofomes cajanderi, rosy conk, is just developing. It will take on the form of a hoof-like conk with zoned cap, almost black in the centre and pink round the rim, with pink pores on the underside.  In the upper part of the photo there are diminutive “hoofs” in the making.  The red droplets however were stunning. 

Gloeophyllum sepiarum, conifer mazegill. Photos 14A and 14B show the bracket-like polypore whose underside has what look like blunt gills. The orange on the cap of this example is much brighter than the more common reddish brown.

Report by Alison M. circulated to the Botany/Mycology Group on January 26. Watch for part 2 (polypores) coming later. Click a photo to enlarge it.

Notes on colourful fungi in the Comox Valley, late fall into winter 2023-2024

To add to the bright yellows, oranges and purples of Jocie’s report on the group’s visit to Kitty Coleman Park…. Who said that winter shrooms were all dull?

First, the mystery shroom from the Kitty Coleman report – it looked most like a Nolanea holoconiota, so photos 1A and B show a specimen (a little more pointed that the mystery specimen), complete with its base, which is typically quite fuzzy. Photo 1B shows the spore print of the Nolanea on the right – a strong deep pink. The spore print on the left is from a Pluteus exilis (deer mushroom) which is a more salmony pink colour. The mystery shroom, given its size, might have been the latter, though the cap was paler than often seen, and the usual streaking on the stipe not clear.

Waxy caps

In October I circulated a photo of the bright scarlet Hygrocybe coccinea (or possibly miniata if one follows MacKinnon and Luther) from our forest (photo 2). In late December we found the yellow Hygrocybe flavescens (photo 3).

On a walk along Rosewall Creek on January 7 we found the seldom noticed parrot waxy cap, Gliophorus psittacinus (formerly  Hygrocybe psittacina) (photos 4A and 4B). The cap of this fungus starts out a brilliant green (hence “parrot”, psittakos being the Greek for parrot), but the cap within a day will fade to a dingy yellow-beige. In photo 4A there is a young cap in front, and an older cap behind, the former not easy to spot in the moss on the shaded forest floor. In photo 4B the cap on the right still retains some of its green colour. The photo in MacKinnon and Luther, p. 87, has been illuminated with a flash.

One Mycena

Photo 5A shows the somewhat dingy cap of Mycena aurantiomarginata, but underneath the brilliant orange edges of the gills show up against a white ground (photo 5B).

Fragrant fungi

Some waxy caps are scented;  Hygrophorus bakerensis (photos 6A and 6B) has a lovely almondy fragrance (as do some of the Clitocybe species).

However, probably the most memorable scent (excluding the spicy old socks of the pine mushroom – Tricholoma murillianum) is that of the Aphroditeola olida (photos 7A and 7B). The very strong fruity perfume of this pink fungus gives rise to its common name, pink bubblegum mushroom, though its new genus name associated with Aphrodite and the perfume ought to suggest a more elevated label. The fungus was formerly in the Hygrophoropsis genus, its form, with vase shape and decurrent gills very like the false chanterelle, Hygrophoropsis aurantiaca.

One toothed fungus

Hydnellum fuscoindicum (formerly Sarcodon fuscoindicum) has a dark scaly cap that blackens with age. The cross-section of this old specimen shows the still blue flesh clearly, along with the profile of the spines. Hard to make out on the forest floor, the cap showed up better using the camera’s flash although that does alter the colour. This fungus is one of the few from which one can obtain blue colours for wool in an alkaline bath.