Trametes     Genus

This is a key to gilled mushrooms, that is, mushrooms having a definite cap with a fertile surface consisting of gills. The fruiting body usually also has a stem, although that may be lateral or absent (usually, then, the mushroom is growing from wood). You can use this key to identify mushrooms that you find.

Fertile surface usually a layer of vertical tubes, of which the mouths are visible as pores on the underside of the cap or shelf.
Fruiting bodies usually tougher or harder than the "normal" gilled mushrooms, being leathery, corky, or woody. But they can be quite tender while actively growing
Once grown, they do not decay easily, remaining on the substrate for months or years
They often grow on wood, although a few are terrestrial (even those are usually growing on buried wood)
Fruiting body is usually a flat shelf, or hoof-shaped, protruding directly from the substrate, although sometimes it may have a short stalk.
Some forms never grow away from the substrate at all, so that all that is visible of the fruiting body are the pores.
Sometimes the pores are so minute that the fertile surface seems solid, until you look closely

Growing on wood

Not fitting the other choices, not stipitate
In making choices below based on texture and size, place the emphasis on texture: if left alone, some of the smaller ones can eventually get quite big; and even the huge ones have to start out small at first

Individual caps small (max. 2-3" across)
Soft or tough, but not hard when fresh, although they may become hard when they dry out
All thin-fleshed fruiting bodies go here, especially if compound or imbricate

Small Imbricate Polypore     SemiTribe Fruiting in dense clusters of thin-fleshed shelving fruiting bodies

Links from Look-alikes Whiteoporus     Tribe Sessile cap entirely white to buff Pores concolorous or yellow or pale grey, sometimes darkening in age to grey or even black Sometimes with moss or algae growing on the cap (coloring it green)

Trametes     Genus     Fries

Microscropic Characters

Diagnosis

• Cap surface usually furry
  
• Cap either thin, tough and zonate; or whitish, thick and corky
  
• Trimitic hyphae, yet fruiting body not hard
  
• Spores inamyloid, cylindrical

Comments

Narrow down your identification:

• Fruiting bodies thin, duplex (at least at the base of the cap), hairy (sometimes very finely), usually zonate (sometimes rather subtly)

• Entire fruiting body white to cream, including flesh; corky
  
• Individual caps up to 14" wide, but more often 6-8"; up to 1" thick

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