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| The families of mushrooms and toadstools represented in Britain and Ireland |
Morphology. The fruit-bodies producing basidia and basidiospores; persistent; compound; sparassidioid (more or less globose, 25–35 cm across and multiply rosetted with pale yellowish tan, flattened and lobed branches); branched (large, much-branched and cauliflower-like, the numerous branches horizontal and much flattened, with inflated context hyhae); large to very large; 25–35 cm across; yellowish-brown, or light brown. The hymenial layer not readily separable from the supporting flesh. The basidia ‘unmodified’. The basidiospores ballistosporic; hyaline to white, or cream (giving a cream spore print); smooth; inamyloid.
The hyphal walls lamellate, with a thin, electron-dense outer layer and a relatively thick, electron-transparent inner layer. The hyphae monomitic. The generative hyphae inflated.
Chemical reactions. The context hyphae negative to ferric chloride.
Ecology. Saprophytic. The fruit-bodies on dead wood.
Representation in Britain and Ireland. 2 species in Britain; Sparassis.
World representation. 7 species; genera 3. Widespread north temperate.
Classification. Basidiomycota; Basidiomycetes; Agaricomycetidae; Polyporales.
Comments. Sparassis crispa edible.
Illustrations. • Sparassis crispa (LH). SPARASSIDACEAE. Sparassis crispa, from Lange & Hora (1965).
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2008 onwards. The families of mushrooms and toadstools represented in Britain and Ireland. Version: 5th August 2019. delta-intkey.com’.
