Another tatty toadstool!

[solus]

Me again, with another fungus I found on Saturday under Beech and close to Ash saplings in a Cotswold wood. There were two specimens in the vicinity, both pretty well eaten and the first seemed to have some sort of secondary fungus or mould growing on the gills - shown quite well in the second photo. The cap was tan/brown, about 4 inches (10cm) across, the flesh thin and greyish; the stem (shown broken halfway up in the last pic) hollow but fibrous; the gills creamy-buff. It had an odd sort of smell, not mushroomy, but one I couldn't place, my best description being "sort of an antiseptic smell". (But don't place too much reliance on that please, as I am worse at describing smell than I am colour!)

There has been quite a lot of rain over the past week in heavy but generally not prolonged showers with mostly "muggy" temperatures and I assume I should still be concentrating mainly on those fungi which appear in summer when hunting for ID?

Any help and comments welcome, pleae.

[solus]

Any ideas, please? Anyone??

[CloudedYellow]

Sorry, but no idea. I have not been doing this very long and have learnt already that many are too difficult to id. I walked past some similar ones last week and decided not to even try to id those.

I would get a spore print to find out the spore colour then use a key to try to pin down a genus at least. I usually start with Michael Jordan's key but sometimes try Rogers Mushrooms | Mushroom Pictures & Mushroom Reference as well. I would also try Marcel Bon's book.

Richard

[Adam Cheeseman]

Wild stab in the dark - Melanoleuca melaleuca

Cheers,

Adam

[AlanS]

Originally Posted by Adam Cheeseman

Wild stab in the dark - Melanoleuca melaleuca

Cheers,

Adam

My first thought was Pluteus cervinus, which has that radiating fibrillose cap-surface and stem, but which should have pink gills when mature. It is likely that the parasitic mould has discoloured the gills so the lack of pink might not be important. Yes, a spore-print would have been important here, or microscopic examination of cells on the gill face. Macroscopically, the gill attachment would also have been very useful to know, but this is hidden by the mould.

However, Adam's suggestion of a Melanoleuca is a good one. It is very unilikley to be M. melaleuca, which is now known to be a rare species which is mis-described in British books. (The majority of records should actually be referred to M. polioleuca.) However, with recent changes in taxonomic treatment and some differences of opinion between current authorities, I wouldn't care to speculate on the identity of a Melanoleuca without good microscopic data, especially when it is not at all certain that it is indeed a Melanoleuca!

I suspect this material would not have produced a spore-print, so I cannot really sit here and say that a spore-print would hace settled the issue, but often it would have done.

The mould, incidentally, does not look to have reached a sporing stage, so its identity will also have to remain unknown. There are quite a few specialist fungal parasites of other fungi but this one might well be one of the opportunist moulds that grow on nearly anything.

Alan

[solus]

Wow! Thank you Adam and Alan. Having read Adam's suggestion, I "Googled" the images and agree that there is certainly some resmblance to the examples there. With the cotton-wool like mould and the eaten-away rim to the cap there wasn't too much left to aid identification of this one! (Note to self: must try to remember to take samples home & try for spore prints! If Himself will let me have 'smelly old toadstools' in his car!)

Interesting to learn that M. melaleuca is now considered scarce! My copy of Jordan describes it as "late summer to autumn, common"! As regards Pluteus, I sort of rejected that as this did not appear to be growing on rotting wood... As to the gill colour, I initially described it in the woods as "cream" ...

I didn't pick the other specimen, growing within about 8-10 feet of the photographed one - that was slightly paler on the cap but in just as bad a condition as the first, being equally eaten away. Looks like I got it wrong AGAIN, as I don't think there was any mould on that one so it might have given a clearer picture of the gills...

[AlanS]

To be fair to Jordan, while his book has been the subject of various criticisms, his comment on Melanoleuca melaleuca was probably written before the genus became better understood.

Pluteus cervinus frequently comes up from buried wood, so then appears to be fruiting from soil. However, if there was a non-mouldy but mature specimen that also had creamy gills, then that would definitely tip the balance of probability towards a Melanoleuca.

Alan