Common Edible Mushrooms

COMMON EDIBLE MUSHROOMS
GENUS Hypomyces
Edible but not recommended: HYPOMYCES LACTI-
FLUORUM
This species is so distinctive
(see Figure 25) that once recognized
it can scarcely be mistaken
for any other. When it first pushes
up through the leaf mold the
entire fruit body is bright orange
and remains so until it begins to
decay, when the color deepens to
orange-red or dark red.
The caps are from 3 to 6 inches
wide, and in general shaped like
shallow funnels with their edges
Figure 25. Hypomyces lactifluorum.
Edible but not
recommended.
curved doivn, but they often are
twisted into curious and tortured
variations of this form. The thick
cap tapers to a thick stem, which
may be as much as 4 or 5 inches long but is often so short as scarcely
to be a stem at all. No gills are present, their place being taken by
thick ridges. The entire cap and stem are covered with tiny pimples,
each with a pinpoint of red in the center. When the cap is
broken open the orange color is seen to be confined to a thin
outer layer, the interior being white and firm.
This monstrosity, for so it is, is the result of a combination of
two different fungi. The main body of the plant, represented by
the white interior, is composed of the tissue of a true gilled mushroom.
The outer, brightly colored layer is a parasitic fungus
closely related to some common molds, and the whole represents
a good example of one fungus causing a disease on another. The
small pimples on the surface are the protruding snouts of innumerable
fruit bodies of the parasite; through these snouts the spores
of the parasite are discharged with some force. So numerous are
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