Part 20

Illustrations: F 27a; Hvass 26; LH 93; NB 141¹; WD 4³.

~Pholiota squarrosa~ (Fries) Kummer

Shaggy Pholiota

Cap: width 50-120 mm. Stem: width 17-25 mm; length 95-125 mm.

Description: Plate 11.

Cap: convex, but expanding and becoming flattened with a slight central umbo, ochre-yellow to yellowish rust-colour and covered with dark brown recurved scales which are particularly dense at the centre.

Stem: variable in length and thickness depending on how it is attached to the substrate, whether in a deep crack or wound, or in a depression, and how many specimens are in the cluster; its colour is similar to that of the cap, exhibits a small, dark brown fibrillose, torn ring or ring-zone and is ornamented with recurved red-brown scales below that ring.

Gills: broadly adnate with a decurrent tooth and crowded, yellowish at first then rust-coloured.

Flesh: with strong, pleasant but pungent smell, yellowish brown, soft in the cap, fibrous in the stem.

Spore-print: rich rust-brown.

Spores: medium-sized, pale brown under the microscope, smooth, ellipsoid, and 6-8 × 4 µm in size.

Marginal cystidia: spindle-shaped, hyaline, numerous.

Facial cystidia: flask-shaped with a small apical appendage and becoming rich yellow when immersed in solutions containing ammonia.

Habitat & Distribution: Common in clusters in woods, gardens or parks, on wood or at the base of the trunks of broad-leaved trees in summer and autumn.

General Information: Although rather a common easily recognisable and aesthetically pleasing fungus growing in its characteristic clusters at the base of trees, it is a weak parasite entering the living tissue after invading decayed areas of the tree. This is the reason why when branches are broken off trees by wind, snow or storms, they should be carefully trimmed to remove ragged edges and the wound treated with a protective tar to stop the entry of rain, cold and fungus spores. Other more destructive fungi may enter a tree through such wounds; P. squarrosa frequently attacks mountain ash or rowan.

It is recognised by the dry scaly cap and stem which helps to distinguish it from the sticky capped P. aurivella (Fries) Kummer with similar habitat preferences but wider spores (6-9 × 4-5 µm). P. adiposa (Fries) Kummer is found on beech trees and it, too, has a viscid cap, but the spores are 5-6 × 3-4 µm in dimensions.

Illustrations: Hvass 134; LH 149; WD 54².

(c) Saprophytes--wood inhabiting or lignicolous agarics

~Hypholoma fasciculare~ (Fries) Kummer

Sulphur-tuft

Cap: width 20-50 mm. Stem: width 6-13 mm; length 40-100 mm.

Description:

Cap: sulphur-yellow, flushed with sand-colour or red-brown at centre then ochraceous yellow throughout, convex at first with margin incurved and clothed with fibrillose remnants of a yellow-olive veil, but then becoming flattened and losing evidence of that veil.

Stem: equal or flexuous, usually with several joined at base, similarly coloured to the cap, fibrillose streaky or with some fibrils from the veil stretching from the cap to the stem in young specimens.

Gills: sinuate and crowded, at first sulphur-yellow then olive-green, but finally with a flush of purple-brown.

Flesh: with rather strong and unpleasant smell, yellow throughout.

Spore-print: purple-brown.

Spores: medium-sized, ellipsoid or ovoid, smooth, purple-brown and less than 10 µm in length (6-8 × 4 µm).