We will try to ID your mushrooms here

[Andy Hamilton]

If you are not 100% about your mushrooms then post them up here and between our knowledge we will try and postively ID them. SO post a picture or two with a link to a bigger and more detailed picture if you can.

It would be benefical for us to know

a. Where you picked the mushroom - was it under a beech tree, by the seaside in sand, wasteland, edge of a field etc....
b. The dimensions of the mushroom
c. The spore colour
d. what the stem is like, does it have a ring, is it bulbous etc
e. gills. - what colour, what shape and how do they attach to the stem.
f. overall colour and description and any other distingusing characteristics such as the smell.

I must point out that this can be a potentially very dangerous thread. So we can't take responsibility if any of us here are wrong, I have put this up mearly as a guideline for anyone. - It could be wise to let more than one person anwser before you agree and also do cross check with a book or another site.

[Cheezy]

Initally looks like a perfect button mushroom, smells faintly mushroomy, turns into a parasol. Parasol is about 6cm wide.



other photo's at:

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... /mush2.jpg

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... /mush1.jpg

Background is where I found it on a grass verge.
Photo's are poor from my phone.

[Andy Hamilton]

whoa! could be a death cap is my first thought. Need a bit more info though. Is the cap 4-12cm across? IS the flesh white with with a faint yellowish flush under the cap cuticle? What does it smell like, if it is sickly sweet with a smell that gets stronger then it might just kill you.

Although the habitat is wrong for a death so can't be 100% without more info.this link might help if it is a death cap. - If ingested the poison will first start to destroy your liver and kidneys resulting in a slow and painfull death over about 2 days.

[Cheezy]

I didn't see the yellowness. But I'm definitely leaving it. I wasn't a strong mushroom smell, and not sweet.

Ta. for the help.

[Cheezy]

Had a walk down to the lotties where hopefully we'll be getting a plot v soon, and came across these on grass verges by the side of the road.

99% sure its a Bay Boletus, stains if you touch the flesh a bluey colour, smells only very faintly of shroom. No sign of worm either.

Thats a 10p for scale, they're huge!.

Tonight I'm getting that bit of oganic steak out of the freezer I've been saving for an occasion!.

[Andy Hamilton]

You got a death wish cheezy I think it is from the boletus family but it looks more liek boletus satanoides which is poisionous although you have found a pretty rare mushroom. Mind you it could also be boletus impolitus which is edaible - although I can't be sure.

boletus satanoides

or try this page for a bunch of Boletus pictures.

Sorry if I keep being a party pooper with your mushrooms but you do have to be 100% sure before you munch on some.

[Shirley]

We've been talking about this on Neeps! too - I'd be sooooooooooooo wary unless absolutely 110% sure...

[hedgewizard]

Don't think it's Satanoides, they're very garish... but can't really tell from the picture either. Bays aren't that orange, but we're looking sideways at the thing in this shot so it's difficult to know.

Pictures - for the best chance of a good positive ID we'd like to see a a whole mushroom, intact with the base and any "root" still there; another specimen sliced right through so we can see it in cross section; and preferably the cap of a third so we can get a "top-down" view. I don't normally go into big images but the higher the res we get on these the better. Just to go over Andy's comments about information, if I can go into a little more detail;

a. Where you picked the mushroom - was it under a beech tree, by the seaside in sand, wasteland, edge of a field etc.... nearby trees (within 20 feet or so) are particularly important

b. The dimensions of the mushroom

c. The spore colour - you find this out by cutting the cap off one and putting it on a piece of 50:50 black and white card or a section of newsprint with an expanse of each colour, typically a big advert. Put the cap on sitting the right way up, and cover the whole thing with a glass and leave if for about four hours. The spores continually fall out of the underside of the mushroom and in the still air under the glass they will form a distinct pattern (the spore print) on the paper, and it's easy to describe the colour no matter if light or dark, because with the 50:50 paper you always get a good contrast.

d. what the stem is like, does it have a ring, is it bulbous etc and is there a "bag" or the remains of one at the base, where Cheezy's fingers are in that photo?

e. gills. - what colour, what shape and how do they attach to the stem. These fall into three broad types, and you'll be able to see them nicely in your cross-section. Attached gills join onto the stem directly, like the letter P. Decurrent gills run down the stem for a way, like the letter r. Sinuate gills stop short of the stem, leaving a little "moat" around it.

f. overall colour and description and any other distingusing characteristics such as the smell.

[Andy Hamilton]

Cheers mr Hedge (well you do wear a tie) - could not have put it better myself. You are right about the pictures it is difficult to id them without proper ones. Do try and get a book cheezy even if it is just from the local libary even experienced mushroom collectors need to refer to an image for some mushrooms.

[Cheezy]

Thanks everyone.

I do have a fairly basic book, but I'm going to invest in a better one. It nearly had me convinced that Bay Boletus could get this colour. (I said 99% sure, hence why I posted.)

This is an excellent website for mushroom i.d. THe best I've found

http://www.rogersmushrooms.com

reading the descriptions in Rogers mushrooms I'd have to agree it could well be the devils mushroom.

It bruse's brown on touch,goes blue on cutting, fading to browm, and doesn't smell partlicualy nice, the stem is remarkably swollen, and is saffron coloured towards the apex.

The underside is red ocre in colour.

I found them at two different locations half a mile apart, both on the side of the road in grass verges, near single tree's. So not classic locations.

Heres links to photo's of my latest find:

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... CN0271.jpg

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... CN0270.jpg

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... CN0269.jpg

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... CN0268.jpg

http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m114 ... CN0267.jpg

Ah well the steak is deforosted now, guess I 'll have have to make do with dried shrooms.

[Shirley]

Was just about to post the link to that site - that's the one we've been looking at on Neeps.

[hedgewizard]

Ah, right. Red underneath - that's Satanoides. Don't!

[hedgewizard]

Okay, a bit of a disappointing walk this morning, as it seems that the season hasn't really got going down here yet. Some interesting non-edible ones to ID, a manky bay boletus that the maggots have had half of, a few wilty chanterelles, and a bunch of these. I so wanted them to be edible, but I don't think they are.



Oh, sorry. That's what happens when you mix a 3-year old, a mushroom walk, several inviting muddy puddles and a blackberry bush coming off worst. Where was I?


and from underneath;


I thought these were dryad's saddle even though they were on the ground, so similar are they. But when I got them home I realised they are scale-free, and the yellowish pores are too small to see. Otherwise they're tan with darker brown bands, and a white powdery stuff over the middle of the bloom (not spore mass). Flesh fibrous, as with chicken of the woods. Growing on the ground right under a beech tree. Size of the rosette was up to 20cm, and I can't get it to spore print right now but I'd guess at white or pale yellow. I'm thinking giant polypore. Opinions?

[Cab]

Giant polypore in my opinion. Tasty when really young and tender, but the specimens you've got there are a bit old for my tastes, verging on too bitter and a little indigestible.

[hedgewizard]

Thanks for that. There's lots of it, even young ones, but my book says that some people get an upset stomach so I shan't bother.