Roger Phillips - Mushrooms: A comprehensive guide to mushroom identification

for Nicky Foy

A SSISTANT DESIGNER : Debby Curry

E DITOR : Candida Frith-Macdonald

E DITORIAL ASSISTANCE : Penny Price & Jean Maund

P RODUCTION : Chris Gibson

Firstly I must give credit to all the mycologists who have made this book possible. Dr Derek Reid looked at a very great number of my specimens and verified the identifications; Ronnie Rayner oversaw the earlier work on Russula and Lactarius. For the new volume I have had an enormous input from Geoffrey Kibby, and I am greatly indebted to Alick Henrici for for his detailed work on the current taxonomy of the Basidiomycetes and Dr Brian Spooner of Kew for his work determining and updating the Ascomycetes.

To collect the fungi needed for the 1,200 photographs in this book, I calculate that more than 35,000 actual specimens have passed through my hands over the last 30 years. This has only been possible through the help enthusiastically given to me by mycologists in the field. Firstly, I would like to thank Ted Green, who has given up so much of his time, energy and skill to the project. Geoff and Jenny Stone, Malcolm Storey, Audrey Thomas, Irene Palmer, and Joyce Pitt also must have a special mention, and Nicky Foy for her continued support and tireless help in the field during all my travels.

Among the others who have helped me in one way or another are: Buck McAdoo, Susan Alnut Dede and Roland, Claire Appleby, Beverley Behrens, Rod Bevan, Bert Brand, Alan Christie, Beverly Clark, Malcolm and Marjorie Clark, Ray Cowell, Jenny Deakin, Vincent Demoulin, R. Evans, Sheila Grant, Margaret Holden, F. Bayard Hora, Bruce Ing, Richard Jennings, Paul Kirk, Stephan Koepf, Joy Langridge, Alan Lucas, Marie Mann, Jack Marriott, A. Newton, Mary Oubridge, John Palmer, Bobby Phillips, Cathy Phillips, Ian Phillips, Philip Phillips, Simon Plant, Jos Putsch, Mervyn Rayner, Martyn Rix, George Taylor, Shimon Tzabor, Roy Watling, Jo Weightman, John and Jean Williams, Mike and Jean Woolner.

The following institutions have been invaluable:

The British Museum (Natural History)

The British Mycological Society

The Nature Conservancy Council

The North American Mycological Association

The Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh

The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

The Socit Mycologique de France

In the introduction to my first book I said that one day I would have to produce a second volume. It has taken 25 years but, at last, I have it ready for publication.

There are four main reasons for a second book. Firstly, I have lots of new pictures, and more than 200 are of species that were not included in my first volume. Secondly, the massive amount of research work on nomenclature in the last few years has resulted in a great many changes to the Latin names, all of which have been updated in this volume. Thirdly, English Nature and the British Mycological Society (BMS) have published a list of English names for all the major fungi in the British Isles; these have also been included. Fourthly, because of the considerable time that British people now spend travelling in Europe, I have included some European species that are not, as yet, recorded in our isles, but which travellers might find on their visits abroad. Many of the recent Latin names given to well-known fungi will be new to the experienced reader so, to avoid confusion, I have given the older, probably better-known names as synonyms, and included them all in the species index.

What is a Mushroom?

A mushroom, or indeed any fungus, is only the reproductive part of the organism (known as the fruit body), which develops to form and distribute the spores. Fungi are a very large class of organisms which in their structure have some similarities to plants, but they lack chlorophyll and are thus unable to build up the carbon compounds essential to life. Instead, they draw their sustenance ready-made from living or dead plants or even animals, as animals do.

A fungus is made up of minute, hair-like filaments called hyphae. The hyphae develop into a fine, cobweb-like net, known as the mycelium, and grow through the material from which the fungus obtains its nutrition. Mycelium is extremely fine and, in most cases, cannot be seen without the aid of a microscope. In other cases, the hyphae bind together to make a thicker mat, which can readily be observed. To produce a fruiting body, two mycelia of the same species band together in the equivalent of a sexual stage. Then, given the right conditions of nutrition, humidity, temperature and light, a fruit body will be formed and, with sufficient water, expand into a mushroom or fungus.

The larger fungi are divided into two distinct groups:

T HE SPORE DROPPERS , B ASIDIOMYCETES (). In these the spores are developed on the outside of a series of specialized, club-shaped cells called basidia. As they mature, the spores fall from the basidia and are normally distributed by wind. Most of the fungi in this book are of this kind, including the gilled agarics, boletes, polypores, and jelly fungi.

T HE SPORE SHOOTERS , A SCOMYCETES (). called the Ascos, these form spores within club- or flask-shaped sacs called asci. When the spores have matured, they are shot out through the tip of the ascus. The morels, cup fungi, and truffles belong to this group.

Cup fungi and allies ()

The Third Force

Fungi are the third natural kingdom, just as important as animals and flowering plants. As work on the ecology of fungi progresses, we realize that the world of plants is incredibly dependent on fungi in every sense of the word. Fungi break down leaf litter and dead wood and thus ensure that the surface of the world has a fertile layer of soil rather than being a heap of detritus, but it is through the intimate relationship of fungi with the roots of trees and plants, the mycorrhizal relationships, that the most important contribution is made. Trees and woodland live in a symbiotic relationship with a vast number of fungi, and were it not for the help given to the plants through these relationships many, perhaps most, woodland areas would fail. In fact, without the third force of the fungal world, life as we know it would not be possible for plants and thus also impossible for the animal kingdom.

In evolutionary terms, it is thought that the first plant-fungal symbiosis dates back to the very origin of plants, some 460 million years ago. Virtually all plants form mycorrhizal relationships; probably only 510% function without fungal help. It is calculated that there are over 7,000 species of fungi that form mycorrhizal relationships with a similar number of plant species.

Summer truffles (Tuber aestivum) with beech leaves

In this symbiosis, the fungus receives carbon from the plant and, in exchange, passes to it phosphorus, nitrogen, and zinc, plus a greatly improved water supply, especially in dry conditions. These supplies are passed through the mycorrhizal tips to the tree. It has been calculated that in the region of eight million tips are needed to form one fruit body of Boletus edulis (Cep).

The North American Space Agency (NASA) has been investigating the effect of fungal symbiosis for about 50 years. It carried out a long-term, controlled experiment by planting a pair of young pines, both 1m tall, in very poor soil: one, with a sterilized root system, was planted in totally sterilized soil; the second was infected with one of the