Any mycologists/fans of fungi?

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This is a very informative and useful thread.....dealing with the stupid inhibitions taught to me
by my mother . Where all mushrooms in the wild , were taught to me that they have a high chance of being poisonous . So was taught to fear mushrooms .But in more recent years have learned with the help of a biology professor (RIP) Whom like to talk about the relationships of
things in the forest floor and their relationship to each other. In the larger microbiome. Hard to believe that finally this information came to me. Later in life .

I'm so glad that you are overcoming your mycophobia. It is quite common, but it seems to be changing due to the growing popularity of foraging. I only wish I had the same hope for people overcoming their entomophobia and ophidiophobia!

On a related note: I think only 1-3% of KNOWN fungi are outright poisonous. I'm not encouraging anyone to go out and start picking fungi to consume here There are many that aren't really fit for consumption (in terms of flavor and texture) as well.

I like to forage for the edible ones I know.Morel, oyster, coral and chicken of the woods.
The others are beautiful but I don’t touch.

I wouldn't call myself a mycologist - I've never gone full obsessive about fungi but I've been fascinated by them for years. I like to photograph them if I see them on my walks and identify them from my books. I used to take spore prints too.

I will forage for the ones I know are safe and tasty like morels, horse mushroom, field mushroom, giant puffballs and parasols.

I've cultivated psilocybe cubensis for...um...research purposes. And I used to buy sacks of pre-colonised compost for growing chestnut mushrooms for cooking but I can't get them any more.

^ Parasols are close to Amanitas. I’ve never been willing to try them. So beautiful. Often in Fairy Rings.

Yes, but they get bigger than any Amanita that I'm aware of so I always feel pretty confident about eating them. And they're delicious. I've seen them with 25-30cm diameter caps - when you get a cluster of them it looks really sculptural, like a sci fi city or something.

Agreed. They also don’t have the volva, but that can be lost or misleading.

You are braver than I.

Not an expert by any means but I do think fungi should be appreciated more.

Some many different ones .And so many different characteristics…… that have beneficial effects on health.
Am just trying to get my own mind wrapped around all of these things.

Some from my walk today - if anyone wants to disagree with my identifications please do, I'm not great on polypores...


Hairy Curtain Crust (Stereum hirsutum)


Not sure, but I think it's Turkeytail fungus (Trametes versicolor)


The jet black of this one threw me for a while but I think it's just Hoof Fungus (Fomes fomentarius) looking darker than normal because it's been pretty wet.


Stump puffball (Lycoperdon pyriforme)

Lovely! Thank you for sharing! <3

General location would help with specific IDs. Your first and third IDs look good to me. I'd need to see a fertile surface/underside shot for the second, but it doesn't feel like T. versicolor to me. T. versicolor typically has concentric fuzzy rings and a lot more variation in color. Your third photo is definitely a very old polypore. Could be Ganoderma as hoof fungi have a tendency to bulk up (get more chunky in appearance). Underside/fertile surface shots might help there as well.

These are all deciduous woodland, southern England. The second is growing on dead birch, didn't get an underside shot to share I'm afraid.

I saw no evidence of a lighter margin on the 'hoof' one which is what I expect on the ganoderma I see around here, but you may be right about it just being super old. It was chunkier than this image suggests but not as hoof-shaped as I'd expect of Fomes. It was growing on a dead hazel trunk.

I wished I'd had a proper camera today, with a macro lens.