Volume 9, Part 3, August 1995

SOME RESUPINATE FUNGI FROMHERTFORDSHIRE

KERRY ROBINSON

71 London Road, Baldock, Herts SG7 6NA

After the main flush of fungi in October frostynights draw in and the world offungi seems quietand uninteresting, larger toadstools have largelydisappeared except those few hardy winterspecies, and even the micro-world of the ascomy-cetes is slow. My attention turned to Corticiaceae,which thrive during the winter months, especiallyduring the last couple of years with wet and fairlymild conditions. All the old logs and wood havebecome well soaked producing a host of resupinatefungi. Many appear as white coverings, somethick, some thin, others waxy or hard, but under astrong lens they have a certain beauty of textureall their own.

The Corticiaceae are by no means an easy groupto study since they all look very much the same inthe field and microscopic identification is essentialin all but a few species. My interest in these andother resupinates developed with a great deal ofhelp from Alick Henrici (AH) and I began torecord some ofthe species found in Hertfordshire,of which I have listed in this paper some of themore interesting. Most are included in Breiten-bach & Kranzlin (1986), and for these I give a B& K figure number.

All specimens have been identified or confirmedby AH and many of the comments are quotes fromhim.

Ceriporie escelse (S. Lundell) Parm.Comb's Woodnear Benington, 13 November 1994.Covering l} small area on a fallen silver birch log.White in colour and bruising pink with smallround pores (B & K 371). The only other Ceriporiawhich is also pinkish-purple is C.purpurea(B & K372) but this tends to have longer spores, deeperpores and darker colours; I have collected it onlyonce, at Sherrardspark Wood near WelwynGarden City, February 1992. Both species arecollected infrequently unlike the much commonerspecies C. reticulata and C. viridans.

Galactoporia pennocincte (Romell) NiemalaGobions Wood, Brookmans Park, 28 September

1994. On turning a fallen log by the water I saw alarge whitish patch with an olive-greenish tinge.Close examination showed that it was coveredwith very tiny pores. This is the second Hertford-shire record; it was previously found on a HertsNatural History Society foray to Panshanger in1991. It had not been recorded from Britain untilit was discovered in the New Forest in 1990(Pegler & Legan, 1992), but since then it has beenfound in quantity there, although there are noother British records (B & K 367).

Heterochaetella dubia (Bourd. & Galz.) Bourd.& Galz.Royston Heath Nature Reserve, 15 February1995. Growing on a piece of rotting wood forminga thin covering, whitish to greyish in colour and atfirst mistaken for a Tubulicrinis species. This isactually a heterobasidiomycete but the septatebasidia are rather inconspicuous. The hymeniumusually contains large spiny globose mineralcrystals. It was first reported as British by DrDerek Reid from collections made by F. Parker-Rhodes in the Cambridge area in the 1950s (Reid,1970). There are not many records although it isprobably fairly common.

Leptosporomyces fuscostratus (Burt)HjortstamAstonbury Wood near Stevenage, 14 December1994. Forming a thin white covering on the barkof a conifer log, also showing the orange-brownrhizomorphs which are a distinguishing feature ofthis species. Not well known but it seems to be afairly common species on conifer bark in England.(B & K 58 shows the rhizomorphs and is believedby AH to be of this species, though it is claimed tobe of Fibulomyces septentrionalis, a rare northernspecies)

Leucogyrophana mollusca (Fr.) Pouz. (Fig 1)Gobions Wood, Brookman's Park, 23 October1994. A lovely orange colour, whitish and cottonytowards the edges with quite a thick merulioidtexture (B & K 241 as L. peeudomolluscai.

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Volume 9, Part 3, August 1995

Apparently my collection had rather small spores,4.5-6 x 3.5-4 um. A species not on the British list,L. romellii Ginns which comes close to this, waspreviously included in L. mollusca. The Britishcollections seem to be intermediate between thetwo.

Lindtneria leucobryophila (P.Henn.) JulichIn a small strip ofwoodoffthe A6141 road south ofBaldock, 29 December 1993 (Fig 2) and BanfieldWood near Benington, 18 December 1994. Bothfound under very rotten wood, the first collectionspreading on to the soil. Whitish in colour with alemon tinge and a soft texture. Myfirst record wasthe first collection received at Kew in 40 years.There had only been four other British collections:Surrey 1918, Devon 1924, Cambridge 1925 andSussex 1953. Since my find it has been recorded inseveral other .localities by various collectors. Mysecond collection was interesting in that thespecimen had a ± smooth hymenium even thoughthe material was mature and fruiting well.Usually British collections are grandinioid (=bumpy) to shortly hydnoid. AH advises that mostof the collections at Kew have been madebetween December and March, except for one inearly May.

Phellinus contiguus (Fr.) Pat. (Fig 3)Along the old lane leading from Clothall toCromer, 8 February 1995, on a piece of rottingwood slightly buried in the grass. A strikingspecies with its large pores and reddish-browncolour (B & K 311). Apparently collections in thewild are rare and most of the material at Kewcomesfrom the building industry, particularly oldwindow frames and it is also found as a thininfertile layer on thatch.

Sistotremastrum niveocremeum (Hahn. &Litsch.) J, Erikss.CombsWoodnear Benington, 13 November 1994,growing on the same silver birch log as Ceriporiaexcelsa. It appeared as a small rather inconspi-cuous thin greyish-white patch. It became muchmore noticeable after drying, turning yellowish.This species has 6-spored basidia. It is not oftenrecorded but is probably not really uncommon.

Tomentellopsis echinospora (Ellis) Hjortst.Banfield Wood near Benington, 18 December1994. On rotting woodand looking very much likeLindtneria leucobryophila, being soft in textureand again with that yellow colouring. They are,

Fig 3 Phellinus contiguus showing the distinctive large poreholes. On a partly buried log, near Clothall, February 1995

Fig 2 Lindtneria leucobryophila growing on soil underneath arotten piece of wood. East of Baldock, April 1994.

Fig 1 Leucogyrophana mollusca at the base of a burnt coniferstump. Maulden Woods, Bedfordshire, January 1992.

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however, not related despite both having spinyspores (B & K 252).

Trecbispore praefocata (Bourd. & Galz.)LibertaSt John's Wood near Waterford Marshes, 1 April1994. Growing on rotten deciduouswood, white incolourwith lots ofneedle-shaped crystals coveringparts ofthe fruitbody and particularly the hyphalstrands. Possibly not very common and recordedin the British Isles only from Galway and Surreyuntil this Herts record.

Trecbispore stevensonii(Bk. & Br.) K.H. Larss.Wood offColeman Green Lane near Wheathamp-stead, 13 March 1994. On rotting wood, whitewith short teeth looking similar to T. farinacea. Itis separated from this species by having longerteeth and narrower hyphae and possessing ananamorph state - white fluffy cushioning sur-rounding the toothed areas. Though describedfrom Scotland it was lumped with T. farinacea formany years, but is now once more considered agood species. It is less commonthan T. farinaceabut wide-spread in Western Europe.

Xenasma pulverulentum (Litsch.) DonkFound in a small strip of wood along the rivertowards Watton House, Watton-at-Stone, 18January 1995. On rotting wood, forming a thinsmooth bluish-grey covering. Under the micro-

Volume 9, Part 3, August 1995

scope it was noticeable that the spores werewarted and arranged in spiral rows, makingidentification easier than with most related fungi(if mounted in potassium hydroxide the ribsdisappear). (B & K 222). AH reports that he waslooking at some notes at Kew by Professor J.Corner ofcollectionswhichwere sent to MissElsieWakefield in 1925-26, which included this spe-cies, from near Cambridge, with a drawing of thespores. She was going to publish it as Corticiumstriatosporum sp. nov. in 1950, but she received apaper from Canada making it clear that thespecies had first been published in Austria byLitschauer in 1939, who had missed the fact thatthe spores were striate. Thus when Wakefield'spaper appeared in 1952 she had to use Lits-chauer's name 'pulverulentum'.

My thanks go to Alick Henrici for making thispaper possible. It is hoped that more amateurmycologistswill take an interest in this group as Iam sure many species are under-recorded.

ReferencesBreitenbach, J. & Kranzlin, F. (1986) Fungi of

Switzerland. Vol 2. Verlag Mycologia.Pegler, D.N. & Legon, N. (1992) Profiles of Fungi 46:

Gelatoporia pannocincta. Mycologist 6: 139.Reid, D.A. (1970) New or Interesting Records of

British Hymenomycetes IV Transactions of theBritish Mycological Society 55: 413-441.

NEW BRITISH RECORDS - A GREY LISTSeveral members of the BMS have been complaining for a number of years about the relative lack ofinformation about New British Records. This prompted the note in Mycologist 8, p. 161, calling for details ofnew records to be sent to Dr. D.N. Pegler for publication. But the appearance in the Mycologist of two or threenew records per quarter is doing little to deal with the massive backlog.

Species new to Britain are being recorded faster than they are being published. (The Sand-dune Workshopbased at Swansea in 1992 produced no fewer than 19 records of taxa new to Britain, for example, and thesehave not yet been written up.)

As a stopgap measure, the compilation of a 'Grey List of New British Records' is proposed. This will be a listof records new to Britain which will be circulated privately to anyone willing to contribute.

It will list authenticated, unpublished new records which are backed by herbarium material. In certaincases, confirmation of identification by an outside referee may be necessary. Details required for each recordwill be based on the fields for the BMS Database, with any appropriate additional information. Illustrationswill be welcome but not essential.

The list will not be for publication as such which means, for example, that it cannot be cited as a literaturereference. However, the information it contains will be freely available to anyone to use in any way they wish.It will, in effect, be the equivalent of computer shareware.

Contributors may send in their data either as hard copy or on diskette and may make contributions in thelatter electronic form also, provided that they stipulate what format, program, etc they are using.

Anyone interested in helping in the preparation of this 'Grey List' should send contributions, together with astamped, self-addressed A4 envelope, to: Maurice Rotheroe, (Deputy Conservation Officer), Fern Cottage,Falcondale, Lampeter, Dyfed SA48 7RX.

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