Brownish-yellow fungi needing ID help

[JennyS]

Most of the following fall into the medium to large, brownish-yellow category, sorry for the uninspiring visuals!

Are the two below both Honey fungus?
First image is from my garden which unfortunately is full of dead stumps and buried roots, second is from mixed woodland.


Pholiota squarrosa, Shaggy scalycap? On and at base of live sycamore


Q1. [w10] On stump in mixed woodland


Q2. [w11] on long-dead sycamore


Q3. [w12] on same


Q4. [w13] on same


Q5. [w14] on base of live Sycamore


Q6. [w15] on dead sycamore


Q7. [w16] Tiny, the heather stem in RH photo was cropped from same image as cap beside it to give an idea of size. On earthy bank below sycamore, other deciduous trees and holly.


Sorry about lack of measurements etc but even just a suggestion of genus would help please!

[mollisia]

Hello,

the first and and also Q1-Q6 are all Honey Fungus - if the common name refers to the genus Armillaria per toto. I doubt that it is Armillaria mellea in the strict sense.
The last one (Q7) is a Cortinarius, subgenus Telamonia, from the group around C. flexipes. It strongly ressembles my (only) collection of C. violilamellatus. But for a definite species determination it needs more then a foto. Especially the odor and the ecological circumstances are equally important.

The 2nd one is Pholiota squarrosa, correct!

best regards,
Andreas

[Chris Yeates]

hi Jenny

Pholiota looks fine and you are correct that virtually all the remainder are honey fungus complex

Q1 looks like Armillaria gallica

bottom one looks interesting but at the moment that's all I'd say!

best

Chris

[JennyS]

Thank you Andreas, I hadn't realised that Honey fungus was so variable with different gill patterns.
Would the correct naming for all of those just be Armillaria sp.?

Thanks as well Chris, just spotted your reply - the tiny is the one I prefer but unfortunately no specimen - should I start collecting these very small ones when I find them?

Jenny

[fairplay]

Hi Jenny,

I WAS going to say you are correct with No 2, and all the rest seem to be Armillaria mellea except Q1 which may be Armillaria gallica/bulbosa.

Then I nearly made a fool of myself by suggesting that Q7 is an Inocybe and a remote possibility it could be I.hysterix but then I spotted Andreas comments.

Hi Andreas,
I'm so pleased you have returned.

Could you tell me please the obvious difference between Cortinarius and Inocybe, or rather, why did you not consider this may be an Inocybe ?

Neil.

Edit. Blimey, I'm slow. I see Chris has replied too !

[fairplay]

If there is a possibility there are several Armillaria species then you would put this down as Armillaria spp.

Neil.

[mollisia]

Originally Posted by fairplay

Could you tell me please the obvious difference between Cortinarius and Inocybe, or rather, why did you not consider this may be an Inocybe ?

Hello Neil,

very good question. And some times not even to answer. The more experience you have with fungi the more you will recognize species or genera without thinking about it. And you get a "feeling" for it. Which doesn't mean of course that this feeling may proof wrong from time to time!!

In this case I thought the gills to have a faint violet tinge, just that little bit that I know from C. violilamellatus. I don't know of any Inocybe with violett tinted gills (except one case where I have found I. serotina in the dunes of the baltic sea once with purple gills ...). "nd is those scaly caps, which are typical for a certain group of Telamonia, e.g. C. flexipes, hemitrichus and diasemospermus just to name the most common. I don't know of a Inocybe with such a cap structure. Hystrix looks diferent because the scales are brown and not white in this species. Lacera is not regularily scaly etc. etc.. And the stipe being quite fibrouse also is not a strong feature towards Inocybe - especially not in combination with the rest of the characters.
And looking at the picture again just now, I found that the stipe has in the left side, in the middle part, rusty colours from the spore print - and that makes it sure that it is a Cortinarius and not an Inocybe!

best regards,
Andreas

[fairplay]

The photo must be alive, because I never noticed those rusty spores before on the stipe.

Many thanks Andreas.

Neil.

[mollisia]

Sure, and I'm pretty certain that there is yet more powder on the stipe now than was yesterday ....

best regards,
Andreas

[Alantb]

That Cortinarius [Q7] looks rather like a very young C. hemitrichus - one of the few I sometimes think I know.
I have a pic somewhere buried in the archives, which I will put on when I find it.
Cheers, Alan