Fig. 244.
Amanita phalloides;
plant turned to one side, after having been placed in a
horizontal position, by the directive force of gravity.
425. A plant very similar in structure to the Agaricus campestris is the Lepiota naucina, but the spores are white, and thus the gills are white, except that in age they become a dirty pink. This plant occurs in grassy fields and lawns often along with the common mushroom. Great care should be exercised in collecting and noting the characters of these plants, for a very deadly poisonous species, the deadly amanita (Amanita phalloides) is perfectly white, has white spores, a ring, and grows usually in wooded places, but also sometimes occurs in the margins of lawns. In this plant the base of the stem is seated in a cup-shaped structure, the volva, shown in [fig. 243]. One should dig up the stem carefully so as not to tear off this volva if it is present, for with the absence of this structure the plant might easily be mistaken for the lepiota, and serious consequences would result.
Fig. 245.
Edible Boletus. Boletus edulis.
Fruiting surface honey-combed on under side of cap.
426. Tube-bearing fungi (Polyporaceæ).—In the tube-bearing fungi, the fruiting surface, instead of lying over the surface of gills, lines the surface of tubes or pores on the under side of the cap. The fruit-bearing portion therefore is “honey-combed.” The sulphur polyporus (Polyporus sulphureus) illustrates one form. The tube-bearing fungi are sometimes called “bracket” fungi, or “shelf” fungi, because the pileus is attached to the tree or stump like a shelf or bracket. One very common form in the woods is the plant so much sought by “artists,” and often called Polyporus applanatus. It is hard and woody, reddish brown, brown or grayish on the upper side, according to age, and is marked by prominent and large concentric ridges. (This form is probably P. leucophæus.) The under side is white and honey-combed by numerous very minute pores. This plant is perennial, that is, it lives from year to year. Each year a new layer is added to the under side, and several new rings usually to the margin. If a plant two or three years old is cut in two, there will be seen several distinct tube layers or strata, each one representing a year’s growth.
In some of these bracket fungi, each ring on the upper surface marks a year’s growth as in the pine polyporus (P. pinicola). In the birch polyporus (P. fomentarius) the tubes are quite large. It also occurs on other trees. The beech polyporus (P. igniarius, also on other trees) often becomes very old. I have seen one specimen over eighty years old. Not all the tube-bearing fungi are bracket form. Some have a stem and cap (see[ fig. 245]). Some are spread on the surface of logs.
Fig. 246.
Coral fungus. Hydnum coralloides,
spines hanging down from branches.
427. Hedgehog fungi (Hydnaceæ).—These plants are bracket in form or have a stem and cap, or are spread on the surface of wood; but the finest specimens resemble coral masses of fungus tissue (example, Hydnum, [fig. 246]). In most of them there are slender processes resembling teeth, spines or awls, which depend from the under surface ([fig. 247]). The fruiting surface covers these spines.