The Black and White Fungus Show

A day spent looking for fungi. The result was a study in black (the "extra") and white, the "main" photograph.

Porcelain fungi Oudemansiella mucida, are like Chinese porcelain, when mature they are white and translucent. The Porcelain Fungus, is specific to beech wood. It appears in autumn on dead trunks and on fallen branches, and can be present in vast numbers.

The genus Oudemansiella was named in honour of the Dutch mycologist Cornelius Anton Jan Abraham Oudemans (1825 - 1906) while the specific epithet mucida refers to the layer of transparent mucus that covers the caps of these mushrooms.

The mushrooms in the extra are blackening waxcaps Hygrocybe conica which, as they develop, may be red, orange or yellow in colour. However, as soon as they are mature they turn jet black all over, and in that state they may remain standing for several weeks, often in large groups. 

The genus Hygrocybe is so named because fungi in this group are always very moist; Hygrocybe meaning 'watery head'. The species have sharply conical caps, reminiscent of a witch's hat, and unsurprisingly the specific epithet conica simply means conical. So, we are dealing with the 'conical, watery headed fungus'!

I have back blipped a particularly interesting fungus, the powder puff bracket, for yesterday.