big - golden jelly fungus

Description:

The fruit body has an irregular shape, and usually breaks through the bark of dead branches. It is up to 7.5 cm (3.0 in) broad and 2.5 to 5.0 cm (1.0 to 2.0 in) high, rounded to variously lobed or brain-like in appearance. The fruit body is gelatin-like but tough when wet, and hard when dry. The surface is usually smooth, the lobes translucent, deep yellow or bright yellow-orange, fading to pale yellow, rarely unpigmented and white or colorless. The fruit bodies dry to a dark reddish or orange. The spores, viewed in mass, are whitish or pale yellow

Habitat:

It grows in crevices in bark, appearing during rainy weather. Within a few days after rain it dries into a thin film or shriveled mass capable of reviving after subsequent rain. This fungus occurs widely in broadleaf and mixed forests and is widely distributed in temperate and tropical regions that include Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North and South America--- Tremella mesenterica has a cosmopolitan distribution, having been recorded from Europe, North, Central, and South America, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Fruit bodies are formed during wet periods throughout the year. In British Columbia, Canada, it is sometimes found on maple, poplar, or pine, but is most abundant on red alder. It prefers to grow in habitats ranging from mesic to wet. The fungus grows parasitically on the mycelium of wood-rotting corticioid fungi in the genus Peniophora. Occasionally, T. mesenterica and its host fungus can be found fruiting together

Notes:

Tremella lutescens is a synonym (see Wong & Wells, 1985). The similar looking Tremella aurantia is parasitic on Stereum hirsutum, growing on conifer wood; it has smaller spores and basidia, and lacks vesicles. Dacrymyces palmatus is another look-alike, but it grows on conifer wood, is smaller, has a tough, white point of attachment, and usually demonstrates colors that are more orange. It is also microscopically distinct; its basidia are Y-shaped. [(part 2 forest 2) same day,different forests--> forest 1 here ( http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/831... ) ] this specimen above was a big one !!