Tag Archives: British fungi

New fungus: Linospora saligna

17 Friday Mar 2023

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Inspired by Gwent birder and naturalist Lee Gregory’s recent (3 March) first record for Wales of the fungus Linospora saligna, which looks like small dark speckles on dead Salix leaves, I went searching last Saturday morning in areas where I knew Willow trees grow. And I was a little surprised at how easy they were to find. I spotted the fungus at two locations along the path around Cardiff’s Grangemoor Park, and I’ve also since found it under Salix trees near Cardiff Bay’s Barrage. Although Lee’s record was a Welsh first and the NBN Atlas shows very few confirmed records for the rest of Britain, this is obviously another instance where a species is under-recorded, presumably because no one knows to look for it. I’m aware that Lee has already found several further records, and I will certainly continue to check for these speckled leaves wherever I see Willow trees.

230317 Linospora saligna

Wobbling no more

03 Friday Mar 2023

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I was hesitant with my identification of this fungus at first as previous examples I’ve seen have been yellow and jelly-like – poke them and they wobble.

Then I read, on the First Nature website, that ‘in dry weather this fungus becomes a hard orange bracket’. Also, this particular fungus feeds on other fungi, crusts in the Peniophora genus, and I couldn’t see any crusts on this branch. First Nature explains it again:

Very little or none of the Peniophora may be visible; this is because Tremella mesenterica feeds on the mycelium of the Peniophora fungus, and that can be deep inside the timber rather than on its surface. The fruiting body of the crust fungus does not even have to be present, therefore, and so it may look as though Yellow Brain is feeding directly on the host wood.

So, reassured by the website’s explanations, I believe I can confidently say this is Yellow brain fungus (Tremella mesenterica). Happy Fungi Friday!

Holly speckle

15 Wednesday Feb 2023

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Have you ever noticed what look like little black spots on the brown fallen leaves of Holly? This is the perfectly named fungus Holly speckle (Trochila ilicina) and those spots, or speckles, are, in fact, the fungal fruiting bodies. When they first develop, they are a dark olive green but, after their lids open and the spores within are released, the speckles come to resemble tiny black craters. If you want to know more, a blog on the Woodlands.co.uk website has a very detailed description of these intriguing fungi, as well as an explanation of how their fruiting mechanism functions.

230215 holly speckle

Golden shanks

13 Friday Jan 2023

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Velvet shanks (Flammulina velutipes) always look to me like they would taste delicious, like layers of crumpets dripping in runny golden honey. And, though I’ve never tried them, they are indeed edible; the commercially grown versions (also known as Enoki) can be purchased in cans and jars, very occasionally fresh in some supermarkets and many specialist food shops.

230113 velvet shanks

Silverleaf

30 Friday Dec 2022

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The pinkish-purple colour of this fungus makes its identification a little easier than many fungi, and is reflected in the epithet of its scientific name, Chondrostereum purpureum. Its common name, Silverleaf (or Silver leaf) fungus, comes from the damage the fungus can do as a parasite of some species of fruit trees.

221230 silverleaf fungus (1)

I’ve only ever seen it on dead wood, as in these photos, where it starts off looking like a crust spread across the surface of the sawn end of a tree, then, as it grows, develops into brackets, with a hairy upper surface and white edges.

221230 silverleaf fungus (2)

Tufts of sulphur

23 Friday Dec 2022

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During my recent walks to marvel at the autumn colours of the Beautiful Beeches of Cwm George in Dinas Powys, I noticed that one of the Beech trees had, at some time in the past, succumbed to the ravages of time and weather and, where once a majestic giant stood tall, there was now a large, crumbling stump.

221223 sulphur tuft (1)

As well as a thick covering of fallen leaves, the greens of moss, ivy and a thin clump of grass, the stump was providing a home – and food – to fungi, a thriving colony of Sulphur tuft (Hypholoma fasciculare), one of our most common wood-rotters. I’m sure this is a fungus almost all my followers will have seen.

221223 sulphur tuft (2)

Ride a White saddle

09 Friday Dec 2022

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There wasn’t a horse to be seen but there were plenty of White saddles (Helvella crispa) poking through the leaf litter. I usually fiddle with the surroundings when I’m photographing fungi, clearing away the odd leaf or grass stem to provide a clearer shot but, today, I decided to show them as they really are, an integral part of this woodland ride.

221209 white saddle

Earthtongues

02 Friday Dec 2022

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Well, these were a surprise sighting from the beginning of today’s walk. They were growing on a road verge, next to a block of flats, in an area now called Penarth Marina but which was once Penarth Port, a huge area of working dockland.

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This seems a bizarre place for earthtongues to be growing – the First Nature website explains that this species, which I’m fairly sure is Geoglossum cookeanum, is found ‘mainly in mossy, sandy grassland, often in dune slacks or on the edges of coastal pine forests’.

221202 earthtongues (2)