Pizzazz!

I am learning as fast as I can. About mushrooms, anyhow.

These, I think, are Zeller's boletes. Boletes, at least. They have pores, rather than gills.

Boletus zelleri? So far, nobody on iNaturalist has confirmed this.

Two more on the same mossy lump.

These are growing beside a trail through once-cleared, scrubby, boggy low land, on a chunk of broken tree roots. Whether they grew from the wood or from the mud that covers it, I couldn't tell. Which makes identification iffy.

Note: This is an elegant mid-fall bolete that is easy to identify. Its cousin — B. mirabilis — looks very similar, but always grows on wood. Another cousin — B. chrysenteron — is virtually identical, but has a somewhat lighter cap with cracking in the velvet and less red on the stem. (Kitsap Mycological Society)

And then there's this:

One of two phylogenetic species from western North America that used to be called "Boletus zelleri," Xerocomellus atropurpureus is gorgeous when young and fresh, featuring a dark brown cap, a red and yellow stem, and a yellow pore surface. With age, it begins to lose some of its pizzazz, but still retains much of its original glory. (Mushroom Expert) (These are two distinct species.)

Pizzazz! I like that word. Mushrooms with pizzazz. :)

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Trato de aprender lo más rápido posible. Acerca de los hongos, por lo menos.

Estos, creo son Boletus zelleri. O por lo menos, hongos Boletus sp. Las esporas se producen en poros en la superficie inferior del sombrero, una característica de los Boletos.

1. ¿Boletus zelleri? Por ahora, esperando confirmación en iNaturalist.
2. Otros en el mismo sitio.

Esto fue al lado de un sendero que atraviesa terreno que fue "limpiado" y ahora es tierra pantanosa, con los arbustos y árboles decíduos que son los primeros en reclamar sitios maltratados. Los hongos están creciendo en un montoncito a base de raices rotas. Si crecen desde la madera, o en el lodo que la cubre, no pude ver, lo que hace su identificación sospechosa.

Este es un bolete elegante que aparece a mediados del otoño, fácil de identificar. Su primo — B. mirabilis — es muy parecido, pero siempre crece en la madera. Otro primo — B. chrysenteron — es virtualmente idéntico, pero su sombrero tiene un color un poco menos fuerte, y el terciopelo está agrietado. Y el tallo tiene menos color rojo. (Kitsap Mycological Society)

Y hay esto:

Una de dos especies filogenéticas del oeste de norteamérica que antes llamábamos "Boletus zelleri," Xerocomellus atropurpureus es bellísimo cuando es joven y fresca, luciendo un sombrero marrón oscuro, un tallo rojo con amarillo; la superficie de los poros es amarillo. Al madurar, empieza a perder algo de su "pizzazz", pero todavía retiene mucha de su gloria original. (Mushroom Expert) (Nota: estas son dos especies distintas.)

¡Pizzazz! Me gusta esa palabra, que se traduce como, "un toque extravagante, estilo, dinamismo, chispa".  ¡Hongos con pizzazz! ☺

Now I'm hungry

They look like whole-wheat bread dough, viewed from above.

Boletus mushrooms.

Boletus are easily recognizable because instead of gills, the cap has a fleshy, pored underside.

On these, the pores are yellow.

E-Flora has 25 species of Boletus and 5 other boletes under different species names in BC. My guide book, Common Mushrooms of the Northwest, adds another. They are extremely variable, even those of the same species, coming in a variety of colours, white, red, orange, brown, black. But they all have that mass of pores under the cap.

Slightly purplish

Many of them are edible, some delicious. I used to harvest them up north; the local species made a good, beefy gravy. Squirrels eat them. So do slugs. And worms. And famously, pigs.

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Estos hongos se parecen a masa para pan de grano de trigo entero. Son boletos; se conocen porque en vez de tener lamelas, bajo el sombrerete llevan una masa de poros.

El sitio de E-Flora registra 30 especies de boletos en Colombia Británica; mi libro guía añade una más. Son muy variables, aun dentro de una misma especie, presentándose en muchos colores: blanco, rojo, anaranjado, café, y hasta negro. Pero todos llevan los poros.

Muchos son comestibles, algunos deliciosos. Cuando yo vivía en el norte, los buscaba en el bosque. La especie de la localidad hacía una buena salsa, con sabor a carne de res. Aparte de los humanos, las ardillas los comen. Y las babosas. Y muchos gusanos. Y tan famosos son como alimento de cerdos, que unos llevan el nombre, B. porcini.

Whenever it stops raining

A dozen mushroom photos.

I find these encouraging, hope-inducing. Because it's blowing and storming outside these days, the forest floors and fern beds are layered with soggy, slippery, browning leaves, the night falls far too soon. And I have damaged my shoulder, and instead of getting better, it is stiffening and aching, possibly because of the cold and damp. Even my rain-loving cat has holed up under a feather blanket. I'm tempted to brood. To think that the forests and shores are closed to me now, until the spring.

And then, here are these mushroom photos. Taken in November, in December, even in January, of previous years. This weather is temporary, they tell me. The sun will shine again, on mushrooms and lichens, on tree lace and moss. It's time to dig out my winter boots and jackets. And clean the innards of my camera.

Down in the grass, Tyee Spit. October 30.

Amanita. November, Oyster Bay

Boletus, November, Oyster Bay

Slug-nibbled boletus and tinies, Oyster Bay. November.

"shroom, moss, evergreen needles. November

Those same boletus, on my return trip through the Oyster Bay woods. I liked the fern decoration.

These grow out of cracks in well-aged logs in the Salmon Point woods. December.

Salmon Point, December

Polypore on wet log, Salmon Point. December

And the end of January. Tyee Spit, after the snow melted.

On my favourite big log on Tyee Spit, January 29. All summer it sits there inert; any fungi are in hiding. They come out when it rains.

Log along the shore, Tyee Spit. January.

Now, where did I stash those boots?

Springtail feast

I always look for slug bites on the mushrooms. It's one of a slug's favourite foods. I didn't think to look for springtail nibbles until I blew up these photos.

Amanita. No good for humans, but the springtails love it. There are 16 on this cap.

Boletus. Only one springtail here, but he seems to have eaten out a small cavity.

Flattish beige mushroom, with 3 springtails.

'Shroom heaven

The sun shines through dripping curtains of hanging moss, warming layers of black bark and orange maple leaves. Slugs feast on white mushroom meat. In the dark crevices between the fallen trees, polypore fungi gleam. It's fall in the rainforest.

Sunlight and hanging moss

Blending in. Big-leaf maple leaves and five big mushrooms to match.

This creamy-capped mushroom has slightly purplish grey gills.

Red-belted polypores with a pinkish cast.

Spore-laden firs and glistening mushrooms

These gilled mushrooms are common in the Grove. They all have freckles in the centre of a slightly pinkish cap.

Down in the mud under a log, we found these large, muddy boletes, identifiable as boletes by the dense pores instead of gills. I had to "see" them with my fingertips, as there was no way I was going to put my cheek in that cold mud.

More to come, tomorrow. This was a mushroom-rich forest!

Mighty miniatures

The forest along the south bank of the Campbell River is made up of mixed evergreen and deciduous trees, mostly alder, big-leaf maple, and Douglas fir. Beneath them, moss-blanketed fallen trees and branches crumble softly into the soil, helped along by clusters of miniature mushrooms.

It gives some perspective on the importance of fungi when we consider that without them the world's forest ecosystems would collapse. (From Trees for Life)

Tiny, fragile, long-stemmed grey mushrooms.

Yellow mushrooms, with red-eyed fly.

Another branch, another cluster.

I picked one to see the gills. They're a pale cream colour, with a greenish tinge.

Witches butter. Almost every clump of moss had a dab or two.

Unidentifiable mushroom, so loved by slugs that only a few scraps of cap are left. With a baby banana slug, just leaving.

The underside of another slug delight in the same clump.

A bolete with a striped red stalk, and yellow tubes. Note the fly: red eyes, black thorax, orange abdomen. Compare to the one above: red eyes, orange thorax, black abdomen.

Except for the witches butter, which is unmistakable, I've given up trying to make a precise identification for these. I explained why in 2007.

How many different mushrooms are there in British Columbia? Nobody knows for sure, but the number of species is in the thousands, not hundreds. ... There are many more mushrooms out there than we imagined. If you cannot identify your shroom after carefully looking in a mushroom book, do not feel discouraged. Even the experts cannot identify a large number of them, because there are many that have yet to be named. Of those which are named, a large percentage require microscopic study before they can be distinguished from their close relatives. (From Terry Taylor's Ecology Notes)

Shelf polypores tomorrow.

Orange mosscaps and brown boletes

Moss is everywhere in our coastal rain forests. It forms thick cushions under the evergreens, buries rotting logs, climbs the trees and dangles from overhead. Out in the open, it carpets rock outcrops; there, in summer when the rains fail for a while, it turns grey-green, dry and crisp; it makes a crunchy sound when you walk on it. The rain comes back, and overnight, the moss is soft and bright. It holds the water like a sponge, providing a cozy home for moisture-loving mushrooms, slugs, and sprouting ferns and salal.

On one of these rock outcrops, I found Orange Moss Agaric mushrooms (aka Orange Mosscap).

Tiny mushrooms. The largest is about 1 cm. across the cap.

These mushrooms grow around the world, but always in association with moss. Seemingly identical mushrooms found on wood turn out to be a different species.

A large, pale beige mushroom, growing under salal at Echo Lake. With slug nibbles.

A bolete, after a hearty slug meal.

There are hundreds of bolete species. Some are edible and quite good. I used to harvest them in the Bella Coola area; added to a meat dish, they disintegrated to make a smooth, nutty gravy.*

Instead of gills, the boletes have tubes that end in small pores on the underside of the cap; it looks like a fine plastic foam, soft to the touch, and usually damp. Inside, I often find small, white worms beating the slugs to the delicious flesh. (I never cooked the wormy ones.)

The underside of the boletus above, greatly magnified. To the naked eye, it was just foam.

The large mushrooms were on the shore of Echo Lake. The mosscaps were a bit further down the highway, on a rocky hillside.

*Want to try boletes? Here's a useful page on preparing them for cooking. And here's a recipe.**

**Caution: some boletes are poisonous. Be sure you know what you're collecting before you try them. Never eat one with red pores. And it is rumoured that the Orange Mosscaps are mildly hallucinogenic.