{"id":3375,"date":"2020-07-08T00:15:03","date_gmt":"2020-07-08T07:15:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/pal\/pal-question-1045\/"},"modified":"2024-04-13T09:40:10","modified_gmt":"2024-04-13T16:40:10","slug":"mushroom-identification","status":"publish","type":"pal","link":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/pal\/mushroom-identification\/","title":{"rendered":"Mushroom identification"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>I was in the backyard tidying up after my dog when I noticed a tiny orange mushroom growing out of the moss in the lawn. It is a fragile thing, about an inch long. The cap has a slightly darker indentation on top. Even the stem is orange, and the gills look like the fan-vaulted ceiling of a miniature cathedral and extend a short distance down the stem. I am curious to know what it is.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I confirmed with local mushroom experts that this is <em>Rickenella fibula<\/em>. It is fairly common in the Pacific Northwest, but seldom noticed, so good spotting! The technical description of gills that extend down the stem would be &#8220;decurrent, slightly traveling down the stipe.&#8221; Here is general information about this mushroom from Michael Kuo&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mushroomexpert.com\/rickenella_fibula.html\">Mushroom Expert<\/a> site. He mentions that it may have a mutualistic relationship with moss, and that is discussed further on the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forestfloornarrative.com\/blog\/2017\/9\/22\/fungi-friday-rickenella-fibula-a-glimpse-into-the-origin-of-ectomycorrhizae\">Forest Floor Narrative<\/a> blog:<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Most species that occur with moss are saprobes that share similar niche requirements with the moss. That is, many of these organisms can only exist in a certain range of temperature, moisture, pH, and nutrient content of the substrate. Much of the time, they don&#8217;t directly interact. Moss loving fungi break down dead plant material that may leach and be absorbed into the plant, but these interactions are not considered mycorrhizal. Recent studies indicate that <em>Rickenella fibula<\/em> doesn&#8217;t just coexist with the moss it is found growing with. There is actually a direct interaction going on here.&#8221;<\/p>\n<div class=\"taxonomy-keyword has-text-align-right wp-block-post-terms\"><a href=\"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/keyword\/fungi-and-mushrooms\/\" rel=\"tag\">Fungi and mushrooms<\/a><span class=\"wp-block-post-terms__separator\">, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/keyword\/moss\/\" rel=\"tag\">Moss<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was in the backyard tidying up after my dog when I noticed a tiny orange mushroom growing out of the moss in the lawn. It is a fragile thing, about an inch long. The cap has a slightly darker indentation on top. Even the stem is orange, and the gills look like the fan-vaulted ceiling of a miniature cathedral and extend a short distance down the stem. I am curious to know what it is. &nbsp; I confirmed with&#8230;<\/p>\n<div><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/pal\/mushroom-identification\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Mushroom identification<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","keyword":[331,1046],"class_list":["post-3375","pal","type-pal","status-publish","hentry","keyword-fungi-and-mushrooms","keyword-moss"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pal\/3375"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pal"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/pal"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"keyword","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/hortlib\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/keyword?post=3375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}