After a cold October the first week of November has seen temperatures near 70 degrees each day and this has encouraged the crop of fall mushrooms. The oyster mushrooms in the above photo grew on the underside of a fallen tree. Though they often appear to have no stem oyster mushrooms have off center stems that usually grow out of the side of the log and are hidden by the cap.
Mushrooms are often eaten by tiny worms called nematodes that live on plant and fungal tissue, but not oyster mushrooms. Scientists discovered in 1986 that oyster mushrooms “exude extracellular toxins that stun {nematode] worms, whereupon the mycelium invades its body through its orifices.” What this means is that oyster mushrooms are carnivorous. They also consume bacteria (Pseudomonas and Agrobacterium) in order to get nitrogen and protein.
One of the things that attracts me to mushrooms is the wide variety of beautiful colors and shapes they come in. I think these pink and red ones that I saw growing out of the side of a log might be clustered collybia (Gymnopus acervatus,) but I’m not certain of that. My mushroom books say that clustered collybia is a common fall mushroom but I’m not sure that I’ve seen it.
Mushroom spores are carried by the wind so it is unusual to see them dropping to the forest floor like they have in the above photo. I’ve only seen this happen twice and each time it was on a still, humid day.
Jelly fungi like the witch’s butter (Tremella mesenterica) in the above photo seem to start appearing when it gets colder in the fall and many can be found right through winter, even though they sometimes freeze solid. I almost always find them on stumps and logs; often on oak. After a rain is the best time to find them.
If you roll logs over like I do you’ll see some astoundingly colorful examples of crust fungi, like the blue example in this photo. I find this one a lot on oak logs, especially. Though I’ve tried for a year now I haven’t been able to identify it, so if you know what its name is I’d love to hear from you.
Velvet shank mushrooms (Flammulina velutipes) are a common sight in winter because they fruit very late in the season and sometimes even during a warm spell in winter. I’ve seen them a few times when there was snow on the ground and it’s always a surprise. The orange caps of these mushrooms often shade to brown in the center. The stem is covered in fine downy hairs and that’s where this mushroom’s common name comes from.
These older examples of velvet shank mushrooms on the same tree looked as if they had been dusted with confectioner’s sugar but it turned out to be mold. Nothing is wasted in nature; everything gets eaten in one way or another.
Puffballs and little brown mushrooms vie for space on a log. The mushrooms reminded me of vanilla wafer cookies.
Milk white toothed polypore (Irpex lacteus) is a crust fungus common on fallen branches and rotting logs. The teeth start life as tubes or pores in the spore bearing surface, which breaks apart with age to become tooth like as the above photo shows. As they age these “teeth” will turn brown and that’s how I usually see them. This example was very fresh.
Lemon drops (Bisporella citrina) look like tiny beads of sunshine that have been sprinkled over logs, but they are really sac fungi with stalked fruit bodies. The term “sac fungi” comes from microscopic sexual structures which resemble wineskins. There are over 64,000 different sac fungi, including cup and “ear” fungi, jelly babies, and morel mushrooms. Lemon drops start life as a tiny yellow disc and look as if they lie flat on the log, but each disc hovers just above the surface on a short stalk. As they age each disc will become cup shaped. The “citrina” part of the scientific name comes from the Latin citrin, and means “lemon yellow.” The smaller ones in the above photo are barely as large as a period made by a pencil on paper.
At first I thought this was some kind of strange crust fungus but as I looked closer I realized that it had to be a slime mold, which I don’t usually find this late in the year. After some digging I found that it is called the yellow-fuzz cone slime mold (Hemitrichia clavata.) The fruiting bodies of this slime mold open into goblet shaped cups filled with yellowish fuzzy threads which makes the mass look like felt fabric. Though it appears very orange to me my color finding software tells me that it is indeed yellow. Other examples I’ve seen in the past have been bright, lemon yellow.
I don’t know the name of this tiny mushroom I saw growing on a twig but its shape reminded me of the beautiful dome on the Taj Mahal in India. Wouldn’t it be something if the idea for that type of architecture originally came from a mushroom? I’m convinced that the idea for the beautiful and ancient Chinese blue and white porcelain came from silky dogwood berries (Cornus amomum,) pleasingly dressed in the same blue and white for a short time in summer.
Mycelium is the vegetative part of a fungus, consisting of a mass of branching, thread-like hyphae. When mushroom spores grow they produce mycelium, which eventually produces fruit, which is the aboveground part that we see. The mycelium in the above photo grew on the underside of an oak log that was in contact with the soil. Most of the mycelium that I see are white but they are occasionally yellow like those pictured.
I think that the crust fungus in the above photo might be an example of an orange crust fungus (Stereum complicatum.) This small fungus has a smooth whitish underside with no pores. The complicatum part of the scientific name means “folded back on itself” and the above photo shows this example just starting that folding. It likes to grow on the logs of deciduous trees.
Wrinkled crust fungi (Phlebia radiata) lies flat on the wood that it grows on, much like a crustose lichen would, and radiate out from a central point. They have no stem, gills or pores and they don’t seem to mind cool weather; the two I’ve seen have been growing at this time of year. I think they’re a very beautiful mushroom and I’d like to see more of them.
To be surprised, to wonder, is to begin to understand. ~Jose Ortega Y Gasset
Thanks for coming by.
Spectacular photos as ever.
Thank you Ben!
What a lovely crop of fungi you found. We are beginning to see a few more hear after all the rain we’ve had.
Amazing how quickly they can crop up after a little rain and warmth!
A treat for the eye and an education for the mind.
Thank you, I’m glad you thought so.
I love that ‘Taj Mahal’ mushroom. Interesting post!
Thanks!
I love finding fungi and lichens on my walks but have never taken the time to identify them. You’ve inspired me to start studying up on what I’m seeing. Thanks.
You’re welcome. Learning to identify them can be time consuming but it’s also rewarding because you learn a lot in the process.
It has been warm and wet around here the past few weeks, so Sunday I went out looking for fungi but found very few, and didn’t photograph but a couple of the ones I did find. You find such interesting ones, I find mostly the little brown jobs. I guess that I’ll have to look harder. I did see something under the edge of the bark of a fallen tree, and peeling back the bark, it was an orange crust fungi of some type, maybe.
You’re on to something with your discussion about the shape of the one mushroom and the Taj Mahal, most of the shapes we find pleasing for architecture or anything else for that matter, can be found in nature. I read something about that long ago, too long ago to remember the details, but humans haven’t designed many things that don’t include the shapes and colors found in nature.
Thanks Jerry! That sounds like one of the jelly fungi that was peeling back the bark of the tree. They sometimes look like they’re squirting right out of the tree bark.
Seeing all of these mushrooms was a surprise because it’s been so dry here. It seems like they all decided to pop up in a day or two.
I’d love to read what you did about how we use natural shapes in architecture and design. I’m going to have to do a little digging and see what I can find out. That would make an interesting post!
Wow, you got such amazing shots, the detail is really stunning.
Thank you Charlie. I have my little Panasonic Lumix point and shoot to thank for that!
I enjoyed the photos and the information. It is interesting too to see what you find there, when the fungi here have all but disappeared for the winter.
Thanks Montucky! We’ve had fewer mushrooms this year because of the dryness but these ones apparently don’t mind it. They popped up all of the sudden, like mushrooms do.
Love all your photos!
Thanks very much Deb!
Wonderful post Allen. The photos are excellent and I love your descriptions and explanations. I had no idea oyster mushrooms were carnivores!
Thank you Clare. I didn’t know that either until I was researching oyster mushrooms for a post I did a couple of years ago. I was surprised!
Curiouser and curiouser!
“Nothing is wasted in nature; everything gets eaten in one way or another.”
Perfect and so wise. I love mushrooms and over the years have learned to identfiy only a few that I would consume, but those few always provide a banquet of earthy delights!
Thank you Martha. I know that some people love wild mushrooms but I’ve never cared much for them, wild or store bought. I do like seeing them though. They’re such colorful things!
You find them, I’ll cook them!!
When they reach the plate, I won’t fight you for them!
Great series of fungi, very informative!
Thanks very much Eliza!
Terrific photos, Alan. This is like a guidebook to the Fungi.
Thank you Sue, I’m glad you liked it.
I am new to your blog and I just wanted to send out a big thank you. It is thoughtful, well designed, and informative. I really appreciate it. With regard, Astrid
Thanks very much Astrid, and welcome! I hope you’ll find plenty to interest you here. I never know what I’m going to see out there so there are always surprises.
Fascinating, Allen….
Thanks Scott!
Reblogged this on Dawn of Divine Rays and commented:
Thank you, Allen. Namaste
You’re welcome, and thank you Agnes.
I spent a lot of time staring at the wrinkled crust fungi photo. What a curious thing! Curious as to how big it is – about an inch across? And those other little mushrooms were growing out of it?
Lots of great color in your walks. Thanks.
You’re welcome Judy. That example was about the size of a walnut and the other things that look like puffballs are actually wolf’s milk slime mold. They grew first and then the wrinkled crust fungus kind of grew around them. I’m glad you like it-they’re very hard to find. Worth the effort though, because they’re a beautiful thing.
An excellent selection! What makes identification even more of a challenge for me is how fungi appearance changes over time. A good example would be the “Taj Mahal ” mushroom. I wonder what it looked like a day or two earlier.
Thanks! I agree, and it doesn’t help that many also change color as they age. I’m not sure I’d want to be a mycologist!
Fabulous fungi! Great shots.
Thanks very much Jane.
Boy, those yellow ones are really bright yellow. It has been quite a year for mushrooms and fungi. I’ve seen some of the largest ones ever.
Me too. I never knew mushrooms could get so big. Odd after such a dry summer.
What a great variety of fungi.The first photograph is a wonder of design, well spotted.
Thank you Susan. I was lucky that the oyster mushrooms grew high enough to get under them and get a look at their gills.