Richard's tough, malodorous polypore swamp fungus - Octotemnus

Moved

… Richard Lareau, 7 April, 2007 - 5:48pm

I think I found it...

I basically opened up right to the fungi with this general appearance - the "Cheese" polypores, genera Oligoporus and Tyromyces. There seems to be a little arguing with the taxonomy of these two, I pick up several books with several different names within the two genera. I gather 5 species within the two genera, O. obductus, O. fragilis, O. caesius, T. chioneus, and T. fissilis. I ruled out O. obductus and O. fragilis based on the fact they live on conifers. Given that your bracket seems to be about 10cm wide, I ruled out T. chioneus and O. caesius. T. chioneus is 2-8cm wide and dries white with a chalky feel (yours doesn't appear either). O. caesius is 1-8cm across, and becomes blue-gray when aged (also doesn't appear either). This brings us to Tyromyces fissilis. Description according to Mushrooms of North America by Roger Phillips is this: 6-30cm across, 4-10 cm wide, 1-7cm thick, semicircular; whitish, discoloring or drying yellowish then reddish; almost hairy (will mat if wet). Tubes 4-10mm deep. Pores 1-3 per mm. No stem. Flesh fibrous, though, zoned, drying hard; white to pale flesh colored. Habitat: growing on the wounds of living hardwoods (Tupelo, as well as most deciduous trees, are hardwoods [I should have known that :P]). Found in eastern North America, west to Ohio. This seems to describe your fungus perfectly. You described it as very tough, according to the size of your beetle, your 3rd picture seems to show 1-3 pores per mm, and it looks like it's a bit on the yellowish/flesh colored side. You also descibed it as malodorous. Smell like cheese? The odor of this fungus is not that of fungus, but rather "strong, cheeslike." Hope this helps, I may have got a little carried away with the info, but I one of those who likes to give directions, not a destination.

… Michael Garcia, 2 April, 2007 - 11:01pm

Wow! Thanks for digging and delving, Michael.

A few caveats: Most of the fungal fruiting body in question is still fresh and moist although I am drying out some scraps for shipping and they seem to be retaining their creamy color. (It came out looking a little too orange-tan in my macros and too pale in my photocopier-lens images.) Also I got the impression this fugus was growing in a dead "downed" tree but perhaps it only freshly toppled with the fungus getting its start while the tree was alive and/or upright. Richard should have some input here.

As for the cheesey smell, there are quite a variety of smelly cheeses so I suppose... :-)

I'll run this name by the fungus people on flickr.com.

… Jim McClarin, 3 April, 2007 - 5:29am

I can provide many pounds more of this Polypore; and Ciid also!!

ditto

… Richard Lareau, 3 April, 2007 - 6:44am

I'll take some!

If you want to send me an email, I would love to get some of this polypore and some Ciids too. I'd gladly pay for shipping, I can't say I've ever seen Ciids before, and I'd like to take a shake at raising some!

… Michael Garcia, 3 April, 2007 - 6:48am

Ciids are easy to find.

Just spend a little time picking/tearing apart older, somewhat deteriorated-looking ruffled tree fungi, especially the ones with a gilled undersurface. Ciid tunnels can usually be seen running crosswise through the gills if ciids are in there. Many species have a narrow range of fungal hosts so different types of fungus are likely to yield different ciid species.

I have not previously seen ciids in fresh-looking fungi like the samples I got from Richard. Whether this species would inhabit the tupelo polypore long term is an open question.

… Jim McClarin, 3 April, 2007 - 7:20am

I'll have to check them out!

I've always looked at fleshy fungi and sort of bypassed the harder polypores until last year when I found some Hor*ned Fun*gus Bee*tles. I think we have some of the harder, chalky stuff growing at my grandmother's, but you have to take a machete to it to get it off a log...I'll have to search the next time I get back home. Thanks for the info!

… Michael Garcia, 3 April, 2007 - 8:20am

Smaller!

The tree fungi to which I refer range from about the size of a quarter to the size of a silver-dollar. Even the non-gilled ones can have ciids tunneling between the top and bottom surface where you wouldn't think anything had enough space to live. These fungi are like little ruffles and very easy to remove and tear apart with your fingers. See examples 1, 2, 3, 4.

… Jim McClarin, 3 April, 2007 - 8:50am

Sounds like a good idea!

I know next to nothing about mushrooms, I just looked through a few decent looking guides and cross-referenced. As for the color, it said that the bracket was whitish, drying yellowish and then red, but the flesh itself was supposed to be white or flesh colored. I have no idea what the diffence is between the bracket and the flesh, but maybe it accounts for the color. And I'll ditto your comment on the cheese, my dad is a chef, and I was in FFA for several years, so I've gotten my share of strong-odored cheeses!

… Michael Garcia, 3 April, 2007 - 5:45am

Try Flickr

Have you tried submitting it to Flickr? There is an ID request group and there are some people that know a lot about fungi.

… Beatriz Moisset, 2 April, 2007 - 4:37pm

Thanks, Beatriz.

Yes, I thought I would run it by the fungiphiles there if nobody here had any inkling.

… Jim McClarin, 2 April, 2007 - 5:48pm

Fungus....

Do you happen to know what it was attached to? If you know the tree, or even "hardwood" or "softwood," "coniferous" or "deciduous," I could probably get it figured out...

… Michael Garcia, 2 April, 2007 - 9:38pm

Nyassa spp.

… Richard Lareau, 3 April, 2007 - 6:45am

Whoops....

I found the "Swamp Tupelo" info no the next pic...I'll run go check it out, see what I can find.

… Michael Garcia, 2 April, 2007 - 9:39pm