Topics

SAM'S ANSWER TO JON WEBB'S "A CAUTIONARY TALE"
STRANGE DESIGNS ON WOOD FUNGI!
SPRING MUSHROOM POISONINGS
MYCOLOGICAL WONDERMENTS
SWAMP BEACONS AT JURASSIC PARK 6/29
Massabesic Experimental Forest Foray 8/10
75 Rove Beetles in Broad Gilled Collybia
The Yurt Girls - Leccinums and Chanterelles
Dry, dry - 8/9/02
NEW BOOK IN THE LIBRARY
OF A STRANGE WHITE JELLY FUNGUS AND TAR SPOT ON GOLDENROD
 
 

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Dear Walking Zombie - I mean Jon Webb, I was fascinated by your article on how to become a mortician's ward, but also got goose bumps as big as marbles!!! I have been collecting fungi since 1935. In those 67 years I have been involved with 600 poisonings (directly or indirectly). There were five near fatal poisonings and one death with Galerina autumnalis. Let me tell you how you fell into several traps. First, you said "could this be Flammulina (Collybia) velutipes?" The wisdom the namer placed in the trivial name could have saved you hours of agony viz. veluti = velvet; pes = foot or stem. If you close your eyes and feel the stem it would feel like you were stroking a pussy cat. Moreover, your 10X hand lens would show you the velvety hair which your specimens didn't have. That would have lead you to the first mycological commandment - "Am I 110% certain?" If not, read the second commandment - "Place the unknown in refrigerator and wait patiently until a guru provides the 110% certainty."

Now if you or your guru had a compound 'scope, you could have learned the following without a spore print unless the specimen was very young: (A) F. velutipes has white = hyaline spores; (B) G. autumnalis has brown slightly rough spores. You could also have learned another even more elementary fact with 20/20 vision. Flammulina velutipes has no ring - your autumnalis did!!

In paragraph 5 you said the toxicologist learned the stuff you ate was "mucking up" your RNA, a sign of amanitin poisoning. This signal tells the following: Amanitin compounds by-pass the stomach and attack the liver enzymes and kidneys. Obvious symptoms are vomiting and dry heaves, 10 - 15 hours after you ate the mushrooms.

In paragraph 7 you say G. autumnalis contains the same type of poison as the well known Amanitas, which is an erroneous statement. Many Amanita species such as muscaria, rubescens, and brunnescens do not contain the deadly amanitins but virosa, bisporigera and phalloides do. On a dry weight basis, G. autumnalis is as deadly as the white and green "borgias" viz. LD50 is 0.1 - 0.5 mg/kg - or putting it another way, the 20 small caps you ate had somewhere between 8 - 20 mgs. of amanitin. Enough to kill you and several of your best friends!!!!

We reprinted your article in our Maine bulletin. We will print my rebuttal of your article so all the members in our club will read it three times and live as long as I have!

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Deveda called asking about the strange designs on her wood fungi. One fungus in hand was better than five on the stump, so Deveda delivered the specimens. "Wow," I said when I saw the hieroglyphics!! The remarkable designs are the etchings of a slug or snail. The etchings are teeth marks. The teeth or radula are thin curved sharp leathery structures that help the slug eat leaves and surfaces of fungi. As the slug moves, it scrapes the surface of the fungus and swallows the tiny pieces. There were many etchings on the surface of Deveda's Ganoderma applanatum = artist conk. If you spray these designs with clear lacquer, they make remarkable pieces of jewelry you can show your friends - and explain how these unique designs were made!!

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A four year old boy was admitted to the Penobscot hospital in Lincoln with stomach pains and diarrhea. From the description the nurse gave me - I guessed Agrocybe pediades. I asked her to wrap the extra specimens in paper towels, put them in a container and place in the refrigerator. Two hours later the nurse called and said she did an internet search on the information I gave and concluded the specimen was Conocybe tenera. Its first cousin Conocybe filaris is very poisonous, since it contains amanitin. See the photographs in the Audubon field guide.

And another mushroom poisoning two days after the first one!! The Brunswick hospital called telling me a four year old boy got nauseated about an hour after he ate raw mushrooms from his lawn. I asked that they "taxi" the specimens to me. The specimen looked like a Mycena with dark gills. I put a piece of the gill under the microscope to check the spores. They were elliptical amygdaliform = (almond shaped) verrucose = (rough) thick walled with an apical pore = (thin spot) on the opposite end from the apiculus. It also had ten pin like cystidia along the edges of the gills. Size 8 x 15 microns. All a good fit for the lawn mower's fungus Paneolus (Psathyrella) foenisecii. Literature has conflicting reports on its edibility. Miller and other mycologists report poisoning in children. Others report hallucinogenic symptoms. Chemically this species has a high titre of psilocybin and serotonin.

We had 9 poison calls in July - all with children 5 years old or younger. Seanna Annis was a great help with cases in northern Maine.

'Shrooms have finally sprung: lots of Paneolus foenisecii in my lawn, 2 spp of Inocybe, Laccaria, large A. muscaria, big Polyporus squamosus, Fomes pinicola. There should be lots more for our 6/29 trip.

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Cheryl, Laurie and I have found mycological jewels. The poet wrote that "not all that tempts the listless hearts is lawful prize nor all that glitters gold".

Cheryl hit four cherries on the myco one armed bandit - first a beautiful and new bolete she said was Boletus speciosus var. brunneus and Bessette agrees. Red-brown cap, yellow pores that turn blue when injured, light flesh that turns blue slowly and a gorgeous yellow/red stipe with pronounced reticulations. A large cream like tough Pleurotus with long stipe. The pileus and stipe had dense strigose hair. I think Panus strigosus. Usually in wounds of maple.

I found a decayed log covered with a gray white slime mold, pale spores and strange round cells (book calls these "stuffing cells" vesicles) (25 microns) inside the stipe. The capillitium = (hair net) was decorated with small bumps. Laurie thinks we have Arcyria cinerea.

In early June, I brought Laurie the fresh gelatinous rust Gymnosporangium clavariiforme. After the rains it erupts from the bark of creeping juniper. This is the overwintering stage called telial. These telial spores have a septum. Under the microscope he saw the spores producing hyphae like structures from the suture. These hyphae are called probasidium. The hyphal strands produced sterigmata with spores = basidio spores. Laurie will get the Nobel prize. I have followed this drama for years but never saw the basidiospores. Hope he will share the slide show.

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Thirty seekers came to the Elliott's Jurassic Park to see the dinosaurs and fungi. The foragers found about 60 spp. of fungi but no prehistoric reptiles.

Let me list some of the interesting mycological entities and tell you some stories. Slime molds: Ceratiomyxa, Cribraria spp., Fuligo septica, Lycogala epidendrum, Reticularia = Enteridium splendens, Stemonitis splendens.

Gurus believe the attractive white entity called Ceratiomyxa is not a true acellular slime mold. It exists in two forms, "finger" and coral. 'Tis the only genus that produces spores externally. Five years ago we found a log 10' long in Gardiner, totally covered by this remarkable slime mold.

Stemonitis is called chocolate tubes. This remarkable genus and its look-alike Comatricha are the only genera where the plasmodium travels on the outside of columella (stem) instead of the hollow inside! I am certain your Martian friends would be surprised.

Fuligo septica (Compost slime) and Lycogala are the most common slimes. In 1955, I found a 10' leaf compost covered by this species and circa 1990 on the Isle au Haut, I found about 200 separate eruptions, about 2"- 3" wide in the spruce forest. Why this pattern?

Those enigmatic ascomycetes : We found only 3 sac fungi, i.e. Scutellinia scutellata (eyelash peziza) - Mitrula paludosa (swamp beacon) and Xylaria spp.. Swamp candles are always found in swampy areas as its species name denotes, viz. paludosa. It is attached to leaves. It has long spaghetti like spores - 18 microns x 2 microns. Many of you see dead Women's fingers = Xylaria polymorpha but never stop to ask why is it white and also black. The reason: It has two life stages - when it is young the "fingers" are white from the conidia = asexual spores. As it matures the sexual spores are formed inside, along the rim, in cells called perithecia. There are 5 spp. two thin like toothpicks, carpophilia and filformis; one thin and branched = hypoxylon; pencil size = longipes; large and wide white "stuffing" = polymorpha. The one at Jurassic Park was longipes.

Basidiomycetes - Poroids, Boletes: Tylopilus felleus, Leccinum atrostipitatum, Boletus subluridellus, edulis complex, Suillus granulatus, americanus.

Suillus granulatus and S. americanus are mycorrhizal with white pine. Knowing the symbiotic partners helps you fill your basket more quickly.

Do you know why T. felleus is in the genus Tylopilus? And what are the 3 relatives of B. subluridellus? What are the 4 diagnostic characteristics of T. felleus?

Among the polypores we found P. schweinitzii, F. pinicola, G. applanatum, F. fomentarius. Do you know the hosts of these; what interesting uses each has? P. schweinitzii begins life looking like a yellow slime mold. Do you know its host?

Gilled, White Spore: Amanita muscaria and rubescens, Tricholomopsis platyphylla, decora, Collybia = Xerula = Oudmansiella radicata or furfuracea, Hygrophorus miniatus, chloraphanus or lutescens, Marasmius rotula. Name 3 fascinating features of this remarkable species. Cantharellus cibarius, Laccaria ochropurpurea.

Black, black brown spores: Coprinus plicatilis, Psathyrella (Paneolus) foenisecii. Where are these found 92% of the time?

Brown, purple brown spores: Pholiota = Stropharia albocrenulata - I call this Elliot's enigma because I had to work backwards by checking the spores and cheilocystidia first. There was no visible annulus. The spore anatomy "told me" I had Pholiota or Stropharia not Psathyrella. Spores had a thick wall and strange apical pore. The cheilocystidia gave the gill edges a white and crenulate appearance. Context was gelatinous. Look in Smith's book on Pholiota or Kouftman's Agaricaceae of Michigan.

Fungi imperfect = Deuteromycetes. We found a gizmo resembling an orange jelly but the spores appeared in long chains resembling beads. These were attached to conidiophores = asexual appendages. Could you tell why these spore bearers were not basidia? Remember Alice's prophetic words that every thing that seems to be is not.

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Considering the xerophytic conditions we collected interesting fungi and a rare acellular slime mold, Physarum bivalve. "Hawk Eye" Cheryl found the unique and rare slime mold and Laurie named it. It occurs in two forms, very long thin "tacos" or short razor clams; both have a suture. (There are two examples - a drawing in a book on Myxomycetes by Martin/Alexopoulos or a wonderful photo in the booklet by Peter Katsaros - Illustrated Guide to Common Slime Molds.) I have found it only three times in 25 years!

The other unusual finds included Helminthosphaeria clavariarum, Pycnoporellus fulgens, Dasyscyphus (species perhaps) barbatus, Hypoxylon nummularia and Hapalopilus nidulans. Helminthosphaeria clavariarum is a specific parasite of Clavaria cinerea. (H. clavariarum's imperfect stage, or anamorph, is Spadiaiodes clavariarum.) Pycnoporellus fulgens (= Polyporus fibrillosus) is a beautiful orange poroid that stains red with KOH. Hapalopilus nidulans gives a blue reaction with KOH and is a dyer's dream. It contains a lavender dye.

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Frances Usenick invited us to her Twitchell Pond Shangri-la mid-August. Twitchell Pond is a geological wonderment at Locke Mills near the Mount Abrams ski resort. On the west side of the lake there are impressive perpendicular cliffs - some covered by the rock tripe or belly button foliose lichen Umbilicaria. How does this remarkable lichen get started and survive for hundreds of years on granite! But this is another story. We were here to find fungi!

Ten minutes later Betsy and Sylvia were shouting about some giant (8 inch) gray cap, white gilled fungus. "Look at the very broad white gills and the thick white rhizomorph attached to the rotting wood, " I remarked. "It is Tricholomopsis (Collybia) platyphylla, known as broad gilled Collybia." When we picked it up the gills were covered by insects. I placed the specimen in a plastic bag to transport home

Under the dissecting scope at 40X I discovered the smallest (2.5mm) rove beetle I had ever seen. We find the shiny blue rove beetle in many species of fungi, especially poroid species. This is a unique family of beetles with very short wing covers (a) viz: about 1/4 the length of the functional wings. These flight wings have 4 sutures (b) - so when the beetle takes off it lifts wing pads and unfolds the wings along the sutures like a hand fan.

When it lands the beetle refolds the wings along the sutures and "tucks" each wing under the wing pads.
"Why so much fuss over the wing folding", you ask. My answer is as follows, in an evolutionary sense. Can you envision how one family of beetles out of 110 evolved this remarkable system?

The trip to the Twitchell Pond Shangri-la was worth the time for me but we found interesting fungi also. For example 7 species of boletes - Suillus granulatus, S. americanus, Boletus subglabripes, B. ornatipes, Tylopilus eximius, T. chromapes and Strobilomyces - ornatipes, eximius and Strobilomyces were parasitized by Hypomyces chrysospermus. Now I hope you will take a sheet of paper and list the spore color of each species - and list three important characteristics of each. *I am helping friend Dick Dearborn collect short-wing (called staphylnid) beetles from fungi, gilled, poroid and others. Can you help collect? Put insects into 70% alcohol - label with the name of the fungal host and the date collected.

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I have a remarkable story to tell. In 1975 my friend Tom Dinsmore in Palermo, Maine asked me to help two venturesome young ladies survive in the woods of Palermo. They were living in a Yurt and were building a troglodyte = dwelling inside of an earthen mound. One lady worked in a bank to earn money - the other was cook, gardener and lady of many chores.

Tom wanted me to share my natural history and mushroom knowledge with the two ladies. That year was a bonanza year for Leccinums, Chanterelles, honey mushrooms and the two gallinaceous fungi - chicken and hen of the woods - I taught them how to slice the mushrooms very thin and sun dry on screens - they also sun dried blueberries and northern raisins = Viburnum cassinoides.

Over the next 5 years I returned several times to watch this remarkable experiment. Anyway, on my monthly nature walk along the Sam Ristich North Yarmouth trail last week a lady introduced herself as Pat Chanterelle. She was one of the yurt ladies I helped 20 years ago!! In gratitude for my help she changed her name to Chanterelle !!! Talk about tales!

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Another xerophytic mushroom season - as dry as 2001, but I have found some surprises - Psathyrella velutinum, Amanita rubescens (parasitized), a new? Omphalina with lavender gills on dead hemlock, Amanita fulva, cecilae (beautiful!), four species of Russula (one with a yellow cap). Yesterday I found many Marasmius rotula and two big Pluteus cervinus.

Marasmius rotula has that beautiful free gill design with the spores attached to a ring. Pluteus cervinus was loaded with those diagnostic 3 - 4 prong cystidia.

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Sheldon Cushing has donated Handbook of Mushroom Poisoning - Diagnosis and Treatment, Spoeke/Rumack. The book contains write ups on all types of mushroom poisoning and treatments. It has photographs of the spores and the mushrooms. I think several people should check out the book and compare it with the two I have - Mushroom Poisons and Panaceas, Benjamin, and Toxic and Hallucinogenic Mushroom Poisons, Mitchel and Lincoff. I think Laurie Leonard should have been hired to do the micro and macro photography. Ask Eric to bring it to the next foray and I'll bring mine.

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MMA foray at Turner Center, August 24 - very dry but collected interesting plant galls, lichens and some mosses in addition to fungi. The jelly fungus Sebacina incrustans is new to our Maine list. Look it up in Bessette's Mushrooms of Northeastern North America, pages 428, 433, with photo on page 436.

Other finds:

Ascomycetes: Apiosporina morbosa, Amanita rubescens zapped with Hypomyces hyalinus, Hypomyces lactifluorum, Rhytisma sp. on flat-topped goldenrod

Basidiomycetes: Amanita virosa, Cantharellus cibarius, Craterellus fallax, Cortinarius armillatus, Cortinarius iodes, Hygrophorus cantharellus, Inocybe calaminstrata, Laccaria ochropurpurea, Laccaria sp., Oudmansiella radicata var. furfuracea, Pluteus cervinus, yellow cap Russula, Lactarius camphoratus, Boletus bicolor, Boletus ornatipes, Boletus sp. (small, pores stain blue, crooked stem), Leccinum sp., Strobilomyces floccopus, Climacodon septentrionale, Hydnellum sp., Cerrena unicolor, Coltricia perennis, Daedaleopsis confragosa, Fomitopsis cajanderi, Ganoderma applanatum, Hydnochaete olivaceum, Phaeolus schweinitzii, Piptoporus betulinus, Polyporus elegans, Poria sp., Stereum complicatum, Stereum ostrea, Trametes versicolor, Trichaptum biformis, Scleroderma citrinum

Myxomycetes: Arcyria denudata, Fuligo septica, Physarum sp., Stemonitis - close to S. splendens group, Metatrichia / Hemitricia sp.

Insect galls: knotty rose galls - incitant cynipid wasp, blueberry kidney gall - incitant cynipid wasp, brussel sprout gall on Canada goldenrod - incitant midge.

Keep hunting, though it is dry - Dorothy Spaulding collected 80 ash boletes, Gyrodon merulioides on a lawn under a giant ash. I made some remarkable spore art cards.

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