November / December 2005 Mushroom Log

RETURN TO HIRAM….mini-foray time.

by Pauline Munk

Saturday, September 17, 2005 fourteen folks arrived on a gray, dreary morning to foray for fungi. We welcomed two students of Dr. Matt Hils, 2 nearby residents and eight OMS members. For those of you who attended the dry summer foray here two months ago, the J.H. Barrow Field Station in September offered far more specimens. Even though the recent rainfall had been sparse our trek along the short loop trail provided over 60 species. After a quick lunch on the Hiram campus at their Arts & Cultural Festival we returned to the challenging task of identification. Seven of us worked under the guidance of Dr. David Miller. 58 specimens were certain leaving over 10 unknowns, much better than last summer’s collection. Our smelliest, much like propane gas, was Phyllotopsis nidulans. The two less obvious coral specimens proved too much for me---very handsome but defying those book descriptions: Ramaria stricta and R. botrytis maybe? I have new found respect for this group described by Arora as “ motley, artifical grouping”(for Clavulina) and “ it is the largest and most complex (for Ramaria). We also had some tapioca looking growth which would suggest a Tremella but oh the confusion! There was so much to work on but we ran out of time. The gray day held right until the very end. Upon loading the cars the rains came! Perfect timing for a great fungi filled day at Hiram’s field station. Thank you Matt Sorrick, our host.

Hiram Species List at the J. H. Barrow Field Station

Agarics

Amanita sp.

Amanita vaginata

Amanita virosa

Armillaria mellea

Cantharellus cibarius

Clitocybe gibba

Collybia dryophila

Coprinus micaceus

Cortinarius sp.

Entoloma abortivum

Hygrocybe sp.

Inocybe sp.

Laccaria ochropurpurea

Lepiota cepaestipes

Lyophyllum decastes Marasmius rotula

Mycena leiana

Mycena sp.

Panellus stipticus

Paxillus involutus

Pholiota squarrosa

Pholiota terrestris(?)

Phyllotopsis nidulans

Pleurotus ostreatus

Pluteus cervinus

Russula aeruginea

Russula brevipes

Russula rosacea

Russula teniceps

Xerula furfuracea

Beetle

Forked Fungus Beetle Bolitotherus cornutus often found in association with Ganoderma applenatum collected by Matt Sorrick, identified by Bob Bartolotta

Boletes

Boletus parasiticus

Gyrodon merulioides

Gyroporus castanea

Leccinum sp.

Suillus americanus

Suillus grevellei

Polypores

Daedaliopsis confragosa

Ganoderma applanatum

Laetiporus sulfurous

Polyporus badius

P. conchifer

P. mori

P. radicatus

P. squamosus

Schizophyllum commune

Stereum ostoyea

Trametes elegans

T. versicolor

Trichaptum biforme

Tyromyces chioneus

Puffballs, etc.

Crucibulum leave

Gauteria morchelliformis

Lycoperdon perlatum

Scleroderma citrinum

Tooth Fungi

Hericium coralloides

Steccherinum septentrionale

Corals

Ramaria botrytis (?)

R. stricta (?)

Ascomycetes

Hypomyces chrysosperma

H. hyalinus

Fall Foray at Dawes Arboretum

The fall foray this year at Dawes Arboretum on Oct. 1 & 2.was a great success. There were about 35 members attending, with only a very few visitors, probably because of the location change (to a spot rather off-the-beaten-track), but it served our purposes fairly well. About 11 banded together at the Jacktown Pub for a pre-foray dinner Friday evening.

Morning forays were followed by our usual excellent lunch put together by our hospitality crew from dishes brought by our culinarally-skilled membership.

On Saturday afternoon, during the pm forays, Dick Grimm was presented with a birthday card as this was his birthday. Thus fortified, he spent the better part of Saturday afternoon teaching some of our new beginners as only he, with his patience and long years of experience, can do. Walt, Jerry, and others helped with the ID’ing of the many fungi found. These are listed below. After the afternoon forayers returned, Walt did his usual great job at giving a table walk and referring specifically to several unusual finds. Amongst these were Agrocybe arvalis, which grows from an attached sclerotium, which is a hard knot of fungal tissue which is a storage organ. Also Macrocystidia cucumis, both of these from Dawes. Globifomes graveolens was collected at Flint Ridge. A Boletus curtisii, brought in from Adams Co., was, along with the A. arvalis, both firsts for OMS. 2 collections of a rare (possibly undescribed) but locally abundant Amanita were brought in from Granville.

Also found were both forms of an oddball polypore. Abortiporus biennis is the name for the “normal” stage of it, of which Arora says “Misshapen fruiting bodies are usually found with pores covering much or most of the mushroom---the best fieldmark of this otherwise unimposing, profoundly forgettable, pitiful excuse for a polypore.” He must have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed the day he wrote that! But wait, maybe not, for Michael Kuo (on Mushroom-Expert.com) says “a true oddball—a gnarly, messy-looking mass of irregular white pores that exude a reddish juice and bruise reddish brown. There is hardly a cap or a stem to speak of…” The other form is a finger-like stage with all surfaces covered by pores called Ceriomyces terrestris, (thanks to John Plischke III for this name). Both forms produce (sexual) basidiospores typical of mushrooms, but also (asexual) chlamydospores. I guess polypores can be fun too.

Finger-shaped form (Ceriomyces terrestris)

(courtesy of John Plischke III)

“Normal” form of Abortiporus biennis (courtesy of Michael Kuo, 2004, November). Retrieved from the MushroomExpert.Com Web site: http://www.mushroomexpert.com/abortiporus_biennis.html

Another puzzling find was a Lepiota with a brown cap and a membranous annulus. These were still quite young, with no fully mature specimens found. Lepiota was clearly its genus, but the species eluded “us”, (which is really Walt, the true expert). I was pushing for L. cortinarius, because of the somewhat cobwebby annulus; plus I had just introduced my class to Hygrophorus russula and I thought another example of borrowing a genus name to describe a species would be instructive. That didn’t last long; Walt turned to a Dutch expert, who ID’ed it as L. aspera = L. acutosquamosa, a name that still stands as of now.

Lesson to this saga? It’s much better to have a range of stages of a mushroom to be able to see how it changes as it moves from button to mature specimen since they often change their appearance considerably.

Sunday morning we had 2 talks: Dr. Joe Strong of Elyria described and illustrated with beautiful slides the fungi he has been collecting at Lorain Co. MetroPark’s Sandy Ridge Reservation for the past 3 years; Walt Sturgeon spoke on “Big Fleas, Little Fleas, Mushrooms and Their Habitats” with an emphasis on the many fungi that are parasitic on other fungi.

OHIO MUSHROOM FORAY at DAWES ARBORETUM: SPECIES LIST, OCT 1-2 2005.

1. Abortiporus biennis

2. Agaricus placomyces

3. Agrocybe acericola

4. Agrocybe arvalis (only OMS record)

5. Agrocybe praecox

6. Aleuria aurantia orange peel fungus

7. Amanita alba

white grisette

8. Amnanita cf ceceliae

9. Amanita muscaria

fly agaric

10. Amanita volvata

11. Armillaria mellea honey mushroom

12. Armillaria ostoyae

13. Auricularia auricula cloud ear

14. Bisporella citrina

15. Boletus firmus

16. Calvatia craniformis purple spored puffball

17. Calvatia cyathiformis skull shaped puffball

18. Cantharellus lateritius smooth chanterelle

19. Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa slime mold

20. Cheiminophyllum candissimus

21. Clavicorona pyxidata crown coral

22. Climacodon septentrionale

northern tooth

23. Clitocybe nuda

blewet

24. Clitocybe odora anise clitocybe

25. Clitocybe subconnexa

26. Conocybe filaris

27. Conocybe lacteal

28. Coprinus atramentarius

29. Coprinus comatus

30. Coprinus disseminatus

31. Coprinus micaceus

mica cap

32. Coprinus plicatilis Japanese parasol

33. Coprinus variegatus

34. Crepidotus applanatus

35. Crepidotus mollis

36. Crucibulum laeve

bird’s nest

37. Cyathus striatus

striate bird’s nest

38. Daldinia concentrica

King Alfred’s cakes

39. Ductifera puluahuana

40. Entoloma abortivum hunter’s heart

41. Fuligo septica

scrambled egg slime mold

42. Galerina autumnalis Deadly Galerina

43. Galiella rufa

44. Ganoderma applanatum

artist conk

45. Ganoderma lucidum

ling chih

46. Geastrum saccatum

earth star

47. Gymnopus dryophilus

48. Gymnopus subnudus

49. Gyrodon merulioides

ash bolete

50. Gyroporus castaneus chestnut bolete

51. Hapalopilus rutilans

52. Hematrichia clavata

slime mold

53. Hohenbuehelia angustatus

54. Humaria species

55. Hypomyces chrysospermus

golden hypomyces

56. Hypomyces species

57. Hypsizygus ulmarius

elm oyster

58. Irpex lacteus

59. Ischnoderma resinosum resinous polypore

60. Laccaria amethystina

61. Laccaria laccata

62. Laccaria ochropurpurea

63. Laccaria species

64. Laetiporus sulphureus sulphur shelf

65. Leccinum species

66. Lentinellus ursinus

67. Lentinus levis

68. Lepiota americana

69. Lepiota aspera

70. Lepiota cristata

71. Lepiota nigrodisca

72. Lepiota rubrotincta

73. Leucoagaricus naucinus

74. Leucopaxillus species

75. Leucopholiota decorosa

76. Lycoperdon perlatum gem studded puffball

77. Lycoperdon pyriforme pear shaped puffball

78. Macrocystidia cucumis

79. Marasmius delectans

80. Marasmius nigrodisca

81. Marasmius rotula

82. Marasmius siccus

83. Marasmius species

84. Marasmius sullivantii

85. Megacollybia platyphylla broad gill

86. Meripilus sumstinei

giant polypore

87. Metatrichia vesparium slime mold

88. Mycena inclinata

89. Mycena iodiolens

90. Mycena leaiana

orange mycena

91. Mycena luteopallens walnut mycena

92. Mycena pura

93. Omphalotus illudens

jack-o-lantern

94. Panellus stipticus luminescent Panellus

95. Peziza repanda

96. Phellinus gilvus

97. Phlebia tremellosa

98. Pholiota aurivella

99. Pholiota squarrosoides

100. Pholiota spumosa

101. Phyllotopsis nidulans

102. Pleurotus ostreatus oyster mushroom

103. Pluteus atricapillus deer mushroom

104. Pluteus aurantiorugosus

(rare in Ohio)

105. Pluteus petasatus

106. Pluteus species

107. Polyporus badius

108. Polyporus mori

109. Polyporus squamosus dryad’s saddle

110. Polyporus varius

111. Psathyrella candolleana

112. Psathyrella delineata

113. Psathyrella septentrionale

114. us alboluteus

115. Ramaria stricta

116. Russula mariae

mary’s russula

117.Russula species

118.Sarcoscypha occidentalis

119.Schizophyllum commune

split gill

120.Scleroderma citrina pigskin poison puffball

121.Scleroderma verrucosum

122.Scorias spongiosa

123.Scutellinia scutellata eyelash cup

124.Stereum complicatum

125.Stereum ostrea

126.Strobilomyces floccopus

old man of the woods

127.Stropharia hardii

128.Stropharia rugosoannulata

(pale form)

129.Suillus granulatus

130.Trametes conchifer

131.Trametes elegans

132.Trametes pubescens

133.Trametes versicolor turkey tail

134.Tremella mesenterica witches butter

135.Trichaptum biforme violet tooth polypore

136.Tricholomopsis decora

137.Tylopilus badiceps

138.Tylopilus felleus

bitter bolete

139.Tyromyces chioneus cheese polypore

140.Ustilago maydis

corn smut

141.Ustilina deusta

142.Volvaria species

143.Xeromphalina tenuipes

144.Xerula furfuracea rooting mushroom

145.Xerula megalospora

146.Xylaria hypoxylon

147.Xylaria polymorpha dead man’s fingers

148.Xylobolus frustulatus

How to Get (Really) Sick from Eating Wild Mushrooms

By Dave Miller

As most of you are abundantly aware, this year’s mushroom season was nothing short of spectacular. After a protracted hot, dry spell from mid-June into late July, the rains returned to our place in northern Ohio. We were blessed with a series of several strong thunderstorms, and then the remnants of Katrina, followed closely by those of Rita, gave much of our state between 2 and 4 inches of rainfall each.

Some remnants!

I know some (perhaps many) of you might be moved to complain that I’m exaggerating the amount of rainfall, because your rain bucket was wanting and so you didn’t have such a good collecting year. Give me a little slack here! I’m only reporting what happened in the Oberlin environs. At any rate, all this rain made my last year of teaching The Fungi a real joy and very easy. No need to scrounge through the woods for a few shriveled polypores. In fact, we had so many fleshy fungi to work with, we gave short shrift to the leathery-woody types.

But, of course, mixed in with all the great edibles were the usual suspects of poisonous mushrooms to tempt the unwary. And we had a real doozy of a poisoning here right in the backyard of your editor. A retired English professor has been gathering edible mushrooms here for years now and presumably should know the difference between an edible and its poisonous look-alike. In fact, he does know the difference! He just got a little impatient.

Along with our abundant rains, we had a pretty hot summer, and since the poisonous Green Gill, Chlorophyllum molybdites is more common the further south you go, we don’t usually have it with any great frequency up here. But this summer was a fairly hot one and from late August through mid-September I (and my students) saw four sizable collections of it, all in its favorite grassy habitat. They are a very impressive mushroom, robust, graceful, and, like the Destroying Angel, very aesthetically appealing.

The professor apparently found them too appealing to pass up and picked a bunch of them to take home for a closer look. He is something of a local expert on edible mushrooms and was fully aware of the poisonous nature of the green-gill and the highly esteemed edible look-a-like Macrolepiota rachodes (the Shaggy Lep), which he hoped these green gills were. He and his wife, a local physician, checked for a spore print, but laid the cap down onto white paper, so when they saw no evidence of any green spores, they decided that the spore print must be white and was just too faint to see, leaving the only option for an ID of their specimens as the Shaggy Parasol. They cooked them up that evening and ate them. They told me later that they hadn’t tasted as good as the Shaggy Parasols they’d had in the past, and they wished they had paid more attention to their taste buds.

Later that night their gastrointestinal tract rebelled rather violently. One of them immediately expelled the remains of the mushrooms (enough said) and felt reasonably well the next day, sort of like recovering from a moderate case of food poisoning. The other victim did not regurgitate them and spent a couple of very uncomfortable days until the toxin(s) worked themselves, at a more leisurely pace, through his body.

I’ve eaten shaggy leps a number of times and find them an excellent edible, firm and meaty with a rich, nutty flavor. But this incident made me wonder if I’d ever want to try them again. Like the green gill, we later found several fruitings of shaggy leps and eventually, my students and I convinced ourselves we could tell the difference between them. Several features help one to distinguish between them.

Habitat: Green gills feed on grass thatch, so they are found in lawns. However there can be trees nearby. Shaggy leps I usually find near spruce, especially blue spruce, though I’ve also found them near an old apple tree. They might be growing in grass which is near a spruce. But you already know I’m largely a suburban mushroom collector, so I’d better quote Mushrooms of Northeastern North America, where it’s listed as being found “among leaves, conifer needles, and wood chips, grassy areas, and in gardens.” So the habitat isn’t exactly a slam-dunk.

Spore color: this would seem to be a no-brainer, but green gills seem to take some time after reaching their full size, before spores form profusely enough to show their true colors. Hence the mix-up. I picked a fully expanded one of these, to get a spore print and it took it two days to develop mature green spores! If you find a collection of specimens of different maturities, check the oldest ones for a grayish-green cast to their gills. And if you’re doing a spore print, be sure to use part white and part dark paper, so if white spores are being deposited sparsely, you’ll see them against the darker paper.

Color Reaction: this is a pretty good way to distinguish between them, which I heard about from our own Dick Grimm. To quote Dick: “One can tell a “Shaggy Lep” (Macrolepiota rachodes) from a Chlorophyllum molybdites (Lepiota morgani) in the early stages, when the gills of both mushrooms are white. Simply pull the stem from the socket of the cap and wait a few minutes. Both the socket as well as the stem apex that was removed from the socket turn a saffron salmon color. If the mushroom is old it is reluctant to turn color. However, if the mushroom is old the gills would be slate green in the poisonous Chlorophyllum.”

Youngish Chlorophyllum molybdites by Michael Kuo (Kuo, M. (2005, October). Chlorophyllum molbdites. Retrieved from the MushroomExpert.Com Web site: http://www.mushroomexpert.com/chlorophyllum_molybdites.html

In this web site, M. Kuo notes “I know very experienced mushroom hunters who have poisoned themselves, mistaking it for closely related edible mushrooms like Chlorophyllum rhacodes and Macrolepiota procera.”

Chlorophyllum rhacodes!!! Good grief! How can a white spored mushroom have green gills??? Chlorophyllum means literally green gills! Again, Michael Kuo: “Chlorophyllum rhacodes has been called “Lepiota rhacodes” or “Macrolepiota rhacodes” in the past, but recent DNA studies (see Vellinga, 2002) have given the mushroom a new home in the genus Chlorophyllum, alongside the very similar Chlorophyllum molybdites.” New home, indeed!

Some day, I’m going to sit down with a modern molecularly inclined taxonomist (a classifier of organisms) and get the lowdown on how they determine the validity of a new name as well as why the older name is no longer valid. But for now I’ll just leave it where it is and use the new name along with the citation of the photo below:

Youngish Chlorophyllum rachodes. Kuo, M. (2005, October). Chlorophyllum rachodes. Retrieved from the MushroomExpert.Com Web site: http://www.mushroomexpert.com/chlorophyllum_rhacodes.html

By the way, you might have noticed that I have been citing the web site Mushroomexpert quite a lot. Walt turned me onto them and it is a great site. Much of what is there is Michael Kuo’s doing. You can enter the name of a fungus you’re interested in and, chances are, it will be among those on their list. Each species has multiple photographs of them at various stages of its development (as with Chlorophyllum molybdites) or in the various forms it takes (as with Abortiporus biennis) as well as extensive information on look-alikes, features of the fruiting bodies, spores, etc., all the ingredients of a field guide and more. Plus there are innumerable other topics you can link to, e.g., Rules for Boletes, The Deadliest Toxins, Digital Photography Tips, and Mushroom Taxonomy. Under the latter is an extensive article (also by Michael Luo) entitled “The Evolution of a Great Big Headache” which does an outstanding job of explaining why mushroom taxonomy (the naming and classifying of mushrooms) is currently in such a turmoil.

It even made me feel a little better about calling the Shaggy Lep, a Chlorophyllum rachodes, though only just a little.

Gift for Ernst Both

Shortly after Ernst Both finished his talk on “New Light on Bolete Relationships” at last summer’s Foray at Hiram, Dick Grimm presented him with a replica of a bolete, which Dick modeled on a species he had been finding for years here in Ohio, but never in any Field Guide. Ernst took care of that by describing and naming it as Boletus rhodosanguineus, back in 1998. A most apt name, meaning “red to purplish blood red”. I even found a group of them on one of my “suburban” mushroom hunts, just 2 doors down from my home!

At the Western Pa Mushroom Club’s Gary Lincoff Midatlantic Mushroom Foray last September, I brought along several collections of boletes to ask him about and one of them elicited a “I’ve never seen that one before!” When I expressed surprise, he told me that no one has done a thorough examination of the boletes of Ohio and he wouldn’t be surprised if there were quite a few as yet undescribed species in our fair state.

Articles for the next newsletter

Deadline –Jan. 31

Dave Miller

352 West College St.

Oberlin, OH 44074

e-mail:

David.H.Miller@oberlin.edu

The Mushroom Log

Russula rosacea

Russula teniceps

Xerula furfuracea

Tooth Fungi