Monthly Archives: November 2016

11th November 2016, Hayes Common

There wasn’t a great quantity or variety of mushrooms on the common today. I thought that after the warm, dry (anti-fungal) October there might a sudden explosion of growth in November, but our mycelium friends weren’t interested. Even so, I did record three species previously unmentioned in my blog: Velvet Toughshank, Mycena alcalina, and Calocybe carnea. With fifteen thousand different species in the UK, it’s going to take a while to find them all…

I’m not sure about the Orange Slime Mould. I couldn’t find any similar looking fungus in my books, so I concluded it must be a slime mould, and some of the pictures from a web search do look about right. But slime moulds are not fungi so I’m not going to pursue this shaggy dog.

Velvet Toughshank is a small brown mushroom that I’ve probably walked past half-a-dozen times before, but still deserves a bit of recognition. Mycena alcalina looks rather like a grey porcelain fungus. Porcelain fungus is very pretty but this is quite attractive also. Calocybe carnea is a rather uncertain identification. It appeared on a tiny patch of grass on which I’ve found about eight different fungi species now – I read somewhere that the number of fungi species (especially waxcaps) on a pasture tells you how old it is, so this patch beside a nondescript crossroad must be ancient.


1. Butter Cap (Collybia butyracea).
Growing on leaf litter. A few scattered around. Cap 4-5cm, 7cm high. Slight mushroom smell. Sporeprint White. Spores 5.5-7.5µ x 3.5-4.5µ.

2. Orange Slime Mould (Species not identified).
Growing on moss and dead grass leaves. Several patches, lumps, spots and blobs. Patches up to 15cm across. Little smell but maybe a slight rotten sweet smell. Can't match this with any fungus in my books but it does look like slime mould. There's several possible species but the ones I checked all have much larger spores. ID is possible. Spores 4.5-5.5µ x 2.5-3.5µ.

3. Velvet Toughshank (Kuehneromyces mutabilis).
Growing on rotting oak log. Many clusters. Cap 2-4.5cm. Little smell. ID is almost sure. Sporeprint Reddish brown. Spores 7-9µ x 4.5-6.5µ.

4. Unidentified.
Growing on rotting oak log. A few scattered singly. Cap 3-4cm. Little smell. Sporeprint Reddish brown. Spores 5.5-8µ x 4.5-6.5µ.

5. Mycena alcalina.
Growing on rotting oak log. Several clusters. Cap up to 5cm. No smell. Tough stem. ID is very likely. Sporeprint White. Spores 6.5-9µ x 5.5-7.5µ.

6. Common Inkcap (Coprinus atramentarius).
Growing from marshy soil. Pushing up through dead reeds. Some clusters. Cap up to 12cm when flat, stem up to 20cm. No smell. Strongly deliquesing. There's a lot of inkcap species but most of them are much smaller, so these can only really be Common Inkcaps. ID is very likely. Sporeprint Black. Spores 7.5-9.5µ x 4.5-6.5µ.

7. Veiled Oyster (Pleurotus dryinus).
Growing from crack in horse chestnut trunk. Group of 3. Cap 3cm, stem 10cm. Slight mushroom smell. Tough stem. These are very immature specimens. Sporeprint White. Spores 10.5-13.5µ x 5-6µ.

8. Mycena flavescens.
Growing up through Haircap moss. A few dotted around. Cap 0.5-0.8cm, stem 8cm. ID is fairly likely. Sporeprint White. Spores 6.5-8µ x 4.5-6.5µ.

9. Snowy Waxcap (Hygrocybe virginea).
Growing in moss/grass. Three small groups. Cap up to 2.5cm, stem up to 7cm. No smell. Saw these in the same place last year. Sporeprint White. Spores 6.5-9µ x 4-5.5µ.

10. Calocybe carnea.
Growing in moss/grass. Three. Cap 2-3cm. No smell. Growing close to ground. Difficult to identify small brown mushrooms. ID is wild guess. Sporeprint White. Spores 4-6µ x 3.5-4.5µ.

11. False Chanterelle (Hygrophoropsis aurantiaca).
One growing beside pine. Others growing near gorse and hawthorn, with oak a bit further away, no pine. A few scattered around. Cap 3-4cm. No smell. I thought this only grew near pine, but apparently can also grow on alkaline sites in broad-leaved woods. Sporeprint White. Spores 5-7µ x 4-5.5µ.

12. Beechwood Sickener (Russula nobilis).
Growing next to birch but beeches also close by. A few scattered around. Cap 5-6cm, stem 4cm. No smell. Taste quite hot. Cap nearly 1/2 peeling. ID is fairly likely. Sporeprint White. Spores 6.5-8.5µ x 5-7µ.

13. Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria).
Near various trees, about 5m from surrounding birch trees. Two together. Cap 10cm, stem 10cm. No smell. Sporeprint White. Spores 8.5-10.5µ x 6-8µ.

4th November 2016, Beckenham Place Park

Ironically the drought has been continuing but today was miserably wet. And there were hardly any fungi. I rarely come to Beckenham Place Park but I think that will change in the future. It’s parkland with a long, uninterrupted history and so should be good for mushrooms. But not today. Apart from the species I photographed there were some other commoners – Beefsteak Fungus, Clouded Agaric and Sulphur Tuft.

Hen of the Woods I’ve seen here before, and I cut a lump of this one to take home and eat. It has a mild bland flavour but a rather nice crisp texture. The unidentified mushroom (#2) is one I think I’ve seen and failed to identify on another site before – it should be a Bonnet but doesn’t fit with any of them, but perhaps also could be a Greyling. Shaggy Bracket I’ve probably seen before and not recorded. I generally don’t take much interest in big brackets but I think I’ll start paying more attention and try to record them all. I assumed this was a Beefsteak Fungus when I first saw it, and took some pictures because of its large size, but spore size was completely wrong and also appearance when I looked again.


1. Hen of the Woods (Grifola frondosa).
Growing on base of oak tree. One large cluster. 35cm across. Little smell, perhaps a bit mousey. Mild bland taste but nice crispy texture. Eaten. Sporeprint White. Spores 5.5-7µ x 4-5.5µ.

2. Unidentified.
Growing in grass in a damp hollow. Small group. Cap up to 5cm, stem up to 10cm. No smell. Sporeprint White. Spores 7.5-9.5µ x 5-6.5µ.

3. Southern Bracket (Inonotus hispidus).
Growing 3 metres high on trunk of living oak tree. One but also others in the park. About 50cm across. No distinct smell. ID is fairly likely. Sporeprint Looks light brown but not enough to be sure. Spores 8.5-10µ x 6-8.5µ.