Bluish discomycete

Hi James

on wood this is probably a Mollisia. Not an easy area – in the past this would probably have been called Mollisia cinerea by most people (a bit of a dumping ground, in the same way that old “Scutellinia scutellata” will have covered several species).

If you haven’t already download this: http://www.mollisia.de/start.html click on the British flag first. Then read the introductory notes carefully. A lot of the key characters are those listed by Andreas in response to your white discomycete post. The amount of oily droplets in the spores is important. The first thing to check, however, is that the paraphyses contain oily refractive bodies – that separates Mollisia from Pyrenopeziza (which lacks these). Also having KOH is important; some species give a colour reaction – like this:http://www.ascofrance.com/search_recolte/3202” class=”bbcode_url”>http://www.ascofrance.com/search_recolte/3202 (though your fungus is definitely not M. rosae). That reaction is due to the reaction of those paraphyses contents with the chemical; it can be quite quick, so is best seen (if it happens) by feeding a little KOH at the edge of a water mount and then watching down the ‘scope until it reaches the specimen.

Hope that helps a bit.

Chris