Bonnet in moss

[diggleken]

Hi all,

I have seen these, or similar, for a few years now, but have never known which Mycena Bonnet they may be.

They are very tiny and are in moss on trunks. Pretty common.

Grateful for any steer/suggestions before I finally try to sort it out properly.

I cant be the only one spotting these……………

Cheers

Ken

[attachment=0]DSCF9186.JPG[/attachment]

[Leif]

Ken, when you say small, how small? 1mm, 5mm, 10mm?

As you probaby know Mycena hiemalis is one to consider. I’m afraid I have to stick such fungi under a microscope, and go through the keys, I cannot remember any but the most obvious such as M pseudocorticola, and M corynephora, which are obviously not your species.

Fungi that grow specifically on bark are desribed as corticolous, however it might not be corticolous as such.

[Chris Yeates]

I agree with Leif, definitely one for the microscope. I struggled with one of these for days a couple of years ago – details of that and Mal’s helpful suggestions now lost in the WAB debacle . . . . Almost certainly section Hiemales but then it gets a bit tricky – you need to check out whether the hyphae of the pileipellis are smooth or have projections; spore shape is useful as well.

Chris

[Flaxton]

Ken

This find has a slightly colored cap so that fortunately takes out one or two of the small white Mycena that grow in this form. The next thing to look at is the gill attachment, decurrent M spirea is the probable Id not decurrent then M heimalis is the likely species.

Mal

[diggleken]

That’s exactly what I wanted, thanks Mal, I knew you’d be the one…………….

I’ll do some work on these now in that light.

Many thanks

Ken

[Chris Yeates]

Flaxton wrote:

Ken

This find has a slightly colored cap so that fortunately takes out one or two of the small white Mycena that grow in this form. . . . .

Mal

I’m not convinced that cap colour is a constant, and therefore reliable, character. Consulting Maas Geesteranus Mycenas of the Northern Hemisphere he gives for example:

[cap] entirely white or white only at the margin with the centre pale cream to pale yellowish, becoming more dingy yellowish to isabelline * M. olida

[cap] dingy white to cream, sometimes more greyish or greyish with a brownish hue M. alba

and also states:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabelline_%28colour%29

[diggleken]

Quite agree Chris, I never thought it would be easy, I just wanted a steer to get going, so you and Mal have given that.

I have the paper by Penny Cullington which has lots of useful stuff in it and it appears to back up Mal quite a lot – that hiemalis and speirea are most probable, but also cannot rule out M. olida and alba.

However, she describes hiemalis with macro features which fit my pic , but speirea has a darker cap margin, which this does not…….

I need to go back and take a specimen and check gills and also see if my basic microscope skills can sort out those three contenders from cap cuticle.

That should be fun…………

However – In addition, olida has more crowded gills than the other two and alba is apparently not recognised as british on CBIB.

So we end up with hiemalis as having 12 – 16 gills whilst olida has 18 – 28 gills.

Can it possibly be that simple? 🙄

Cheers

Ken

[Flaxton]

Chris

I was not saying that this find was M heimalis/spirea I was saying it is probably one of those species and they can be split by looking at the gills.

As Ken points out M alba is currently classed as “not authentically British” on the British Checklist so a first authenticated find would be unlikey but would certainly need microscopy;)

M olida on the few occasions I have found(identified) it has always been white to very pale cream. Because this has been my criteria in the past for taking a specimen home for further study I suppose it is likely that this bias has led to me recording some M olida as M heimalis.

Mal

[Chris Yeates]

Hi Mal

I wouldn’t argue with anything you have said above, with one possible exception* – and I did point out that you had been very helpful to me (in those WAB days) of helping sort out my confusion with regard to a collection I had posted there.

The exception* is that your suggestion that “a first authenticated find would be unlikely” . . . . I think this reflects the old-style, less critical, naming of these Mycena spp. – not doing the microscopy, and not keeping vouchers. I can’t believe that species is not here; but I agree, if the Basidiomycota Checklist comes up with such an authouratitive statement as http://www.basidiochecklist.info/DisplayResults.asp?intGBNum=13427” class=”bbcode_url”>http://www.basidiochecklist.info/DisplayResults.asp?intGBNum=13427 one would tend to doubt ones suspected collection of the said species.

Agaricology is not one of my strong suits (if I do, indeed have any such), so perhaps I am being over-cautious in these matters.

best wishes

Chris

[Leif]

Another to consider is M mirata:

http://www.mycena.no/mirata.htm

The above site seems to be having issues at the moment. I thought the photo didn’t look right for M speirea, but I may be proven wrong. Presumably Ken has access to Funga Nordica?

[roy betts]

I agree with Mal, olida is white/cream/yellowish – no brown.

You often get filopes growing on bark on the mossy base of trees which adds to the confusion (although this isn’t filopes).

But you may also wish to consider clavularis and erubescens as well as speirea and hiemalis.

All 5 of these should be separable on type of cheilocystidia alone.

[Author]

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