Mock Oyster Mushrooms

Description:

Cream to orange colored fungi with highly hirsute cap surfaces growing in shelf-like clusters. Each cap is fan-shaped. Pale orange gills are crowded with some short gills. There are no prominent stipes. These fungi were quite moist and felt like wet, fuzzy, sponges. Phyllotopsis nidulans is notorious for emitting a rather unpleasant, sulphurous smell. Some of the pigments responsible for the yellow-orange color of this fungus are keto-carotenoids. Also of interest, P. nidulans contains its own amino acid, 3-(3-carboxyfuran-4-yl) l-alanine

Habitat:

Growing in clusters on deadwood at the base of a ridge in a dense mixed hardwood/conifer forest.