Fewocappus     Subtribe

This is a key to gilled mushrooms, that is, mushrooms having a definite cap with a fertile surface consisting of gills. The fruiting body usually also has a stem, although that may be lateral or absent (usually, then, the mushroom is growing from wood). You can use this key to identify mushrooms that you find.

Fertile surface usually a layer of vertical tubes, of which the mouths are visible as pores on the underside of the cap or shelf.
Fruiting bodies usually tougher or harder than the "normal" gilled mushrooms, being leathery, corky, or woody. But they can be quite tender while actively growing
Once grown, they do not decay easily, remaining on the substrate for months or years
They often grow on wood, although a few are terrestrial (even those are usually growing on buried wood)
Fruiting body is usually a flat shelf, or hoof-shaped, protruding directly from the substrate, although sometimes it may have a short stalk.
Some forms never grow away from the substrate at all, so that all that is visible of the fruiting body are the pores.
Sometimes the pores are so minute that the fertile surface seems solid, until you look closely

Growing on ground

Large (6-18" or more across), compound fruiting body with irregular caps, usually right next to a tree or even surrounding it
Flesh flexible, tough but not hard

Diagnosis

• Fruiting body composed of a few large caps, each larger than a three or four inches across

• Often, some of the pore walls disintegrate in old age, giving the pore surface a daedaloid appearance

Narrow down your identification:

• Pores creamy.
  
• Caps creamy tan to brown, with yellow mixed in
  
• Usually occurring at the base of hardwoods

• Colorful furry caps and (non-furry) pore surface, darkening to black (and bald) in age
  
• Primarily on living conifers, although it will continue to decay them after they have been killed (standing trees, stumps, and logs); rarely on hardwoods

Glossary

Mushrooms

People

Newsletter

Events