NEWSLETTER - Shropshire Fungus Group

Shropshire Fungus Group
Sunday 19 th March. Leader Les Hughes.
Dudmaston.
Our spring foray to Dudmaston was quietly
successful, netting us over forty species.
Sarcoscypha austriaca (Scarlet Elf Cup) was a nice
find. These spectacular
cups grow on mossy
logs in late
winter/early spring and
are always a source of
wonder to me. I
worked as a Colour
Chemist in the printing
ink trade and the
colour of this fungus
rivals any of the
modern pigments. This
was found in the
Dingle and close by,
Newsletter
CONTENTS
Foray Reports ............................................................. 1
First Foray - Jan Ariens ................................................. 4
Curious Fungal Facts - Ted Blackwell .............................. 4
Photo Gallery - Mike Middleton...................................... 5
Notes on a dry Season - Les Hughes................................. 6
Notes on Chemicals & Chemical Warfare - Roy Mantle .. 7
Photo Gallery - Clive Garnett .......................................... 8
Something New - Les Hughes ......................................... 9
Photo Gallery - Charlotte Anderson ...................................... 10
Photo Gallery - Charlotte Anderson........................................ 10
Scarlet Elf Cup
Mike Middleton
on a Box bush, was the
rust Puccinia buxi and
I think that this is a
first for Shropshire.
Another fungus that was found and that I always
associate with this time of year is Polyporus
brumalis. It can be found at almost any time of the
year but it is most common in winter/spring. The
name brumalis means pertaining to winter. Another
find was Ischnoderma benzoinum, an unusual
bracket with only 7 other records in Shropshire.
Another find was Trochilia ilicina or Holly Speckle.
This is so common that it must be under nearly every
holly bush and unless it is pointed out, goes
SPRING 2012 NUMBER 11
A Note From Clive and Charlotte.............................................10
Photo Gallery - Roy Mantle......................................................11
The First Shropshire Mycologist - Tom Preece....................... 11
Microscope Day........................................................................14
Rare Finds.................................................................................14
Diary for 2012..........................................................................11
Diary for 2012..........................................................................11
Final Notes................................................................................11
unnoticed.
There are
less than
twenty
records for
the county.
Xylaria
Holly Speckle
longipes
Roy Mantle
(Dead
Moll’s
Fingers) is often overlooked or misidentified as
Xylaria polymorpha (Dead Man’s Fingers). X
longipes is more slender and more flexible than X.
polymorpha.
16 th April. Leader Roy Mantle. Severn Valley
Country Park .Very little needs to be said about this
except that the two of us found a Morel. Everywhere
was devoid of fungi, which is probably why
everyone kept away.
19 th June. Leader Les Hughes. Haughmond Hill.
Haughmond Hill is just outside Shrewsbury and is a
popular place due to its elevation and the fine views
it affords of western Shropshire. June is not known
as a good month for fungi and only a handful of
species were found
including
Hypholoma
fasciculare
(Sulphur Tuft),
Inonotus hispidus
(Shaggy Bracket)
Hypholoma fasciculare
Roy Mantle
and Lacrymaria
1

lacrymabunda (Weeping Widow). I. hispidus is a
wonderful tawny, felty bracket which usually grows
high on ash trees. L. lacrymabunda gets its name
from the fact that the gills are black with a white
edge and when the fungus is fresh small droplets of
moisture form on them like tiny tears.
10 th Sept. Leader Harvey Morgan. Oswestry
Racecourse Common
At this point times were hard for fungi. Many weeks
without rain had left the ground dry and much
searching was needed to find anything, however
Harvey and the gang turned up 22 species. The
Common Earthball is worth noting as earthballs are
often confused with puffballs. The latter, when
mature, form a small hole at the top of the ball
through which the spores are puffed. The inside is
packed with fibres which allow the ball to return to
its original shape each time it is puffed. With
earthballs, on the other hand a number of cracks
form across the top when they are mature. The edges
curl back leaving a cup like structure with the spores
loose in the bottom. Air passing over creates eddies
in the fruitbody which draw the spores out. If you
pull one apart and it looks like the inside the inside
of a vacuum cleaner (especially if
Stropharia semiglobata
Roy Mantle
you have pets) then it is a puffball.
Other species like Stropharia
semiglobata the Dung Roundhead
and Pluteus cervinus the Deer
Fungus were also found. The deer
fungus gets its name, not from the
colour of the cap, but as those of us
with microscopes will know the
cystidia, that are found on the
surface of the gills, have
projections on them like the antlers
of a deer.
8th Oct. Leader Les Hughes. Granville Country
Park
Les did a recce before the event and found nothing
and decided to call it off. We were then well into the
drought.
15th Oct. Leader Mike Kemp. Trawscoed Hall
and Gaer Fawr
This was our first foray “abroad” and we hoped that
the rains in Wales had been better than the showers
in the Midlands.
The first area of the grounds visited was some old
pasture and a range of grassland species were found.
The first was the Ivory Waxcap Hygrocybe virginea
var. virginea followed by Entoloma sericeum the
Silky Pinkgill with its pink sinuate gills.
The woodland provided a species new to me
Clitocybe phaeophthalma named the Chicken Run
Funnel not because of where it grows but how it
smells. The red bleeding Mycena heamatopus the
Burgundydrop Bonnet was found growing on a
fallen branch and also found on fallen wood was
Nectria cinnabarina Coral Spot in both its forms.
Scleroderma verrucosum the Scaly Earthball was
found
pushing its
way up
through the
tarmac
path.
Our picnic
lunch was
taken in the
Scleroderma verrucosum© Roy Mantle
sunshine
back at the
Hall and afterwards we drove to the nearby hill fort
of Gaer Fawr. This means “Great Fort” in welsh. The
area is a steeply wooded hill managed by the
Woodland Trust. Here in the deciduous woodland on
a fallen oak branch were the fruiting bodies of
Bulgaria inquinans Bachelors’ Buttons looking like
Pontefract Cakes strewn along the bark and on a ash
branch was Daldinia concentrica King Alfred’s
Cakes. Mike found and pointed out Eutypa acharii
on some small sycamore branches. It was strikingly
spalted and Mike had made some decorative frames
from this wood. More on this later. On The way back
to the hall we made a brief stop to look into
Guilsfield Churchyard. Here the highlight was a
group of Arched Earthstars .
Geastrun fornicatum ©Shirley Hancock
23 rd Oct. Leader Harvey Morgan Colemere
Country Park
Each year Geoffrey Kibby does an advanced fungus
course at Preston Montford Field Centre and Les
(who was on the course) got Geoffrey to go to
Colemere on the same day. G. Kibby is an
internationally renowned mycologist and editor of
2

“Field Mycology”. Most of us did meet the great
man but only fleetingly. I do have his list for the day.
Harvey found a small bluish Mycena which
Geoffrey confirmed was M. amicta. Apart from this
the finds were not extraordinary, a casualty of
the dry season. What a contrast to our last visit.
6 th Nov. Leader Les Hughes. Dudmaston
At last some rain had fallen and expectations were
reasonably high and a good number of us met in the
car park in the morning. We all crossed the road into
Comer Wood. One of the first finds was Mycena
rosea which caused a certain amount of discussion as
it is very similar to M. pura. Looking at the literature
separating the two is confusing with talk of umbos
and campanulate caps. My own take on this is that if
it is pink it is M. rosea, if there are lilac tints in the
colour then it is M. pura. The microscopical
differences are not significant. Spathularia flavida
turned up here. It is usually found in coniferous
woodland down towards the lake but in recent years
it has been found here in Comer Wood. A keen eyed
member also found Auriscalpium vulgare. This tiny
fungus feeds on Scots Pine cones that have been
pushed down into the soil. On the underside of the
cap are small spines instead of gills making it a most
attractive little fruitbody. The quaint club fungus
Typhula quisquiliaris was also found growing, as it
does, on bracken. In the afternoon Naucoria
escharoides was found growing under Alder down
by the boggy part of the lake. The field beyond was
quite fruitful with lots of the very poisonous
Clitocybe rivulosa. (Clitocybe dealbata is now also
included under this name). Equally abundant was the
Ivory Waxcap Hygrocybe virginea. A small Earthstar
was found under some hawthorth bushes. This was
taken by Harvey and he keyed it out as Geastrum
floriforme. The fruitbody is hygroscopic, at maturity,
and opens when moist and closes when dry. Most
geastrum species open when mature and remain so.It
is closely related to G. corollinum but has larger
spores. As this is such a nationally rare species a
specimen has been sent to RBG Kew for
confirmation.
Geastrum florifirme
Moist and open above
and dry and closed
below
© Roy Mantle
19 th November. Leader Roy Mantle. Colstey and
Red Wood.
These woods back onto Bury Ditches and are
managed by the Shropshire Wildlife Trust for the
colony of Wood White butterflies that live there. The
fungi that live there were very shy but Agaricus
semotus was found early on. It is quite small, has a
faint smell of aniseed and turns yellow with age.
Lyophyllum connatum is a species which is found
often at the grassy edges of paths in mixed
woodland. The ones that we found were in just such
a place. They are recognised by their tufted habit,
pure white colour and unusual rubbery texture. There
were a number of large tufts of this in the herbage at
the side of the path. The broadleaved woodland was
almost devoid of fungi but Stereum rugosum was
found growing on the end of a fallen tree. S. rugosum
grows on broadleaved wood, S sanguinolentum
grows on conifers.
11 th December. Leader Roy Mantle. Brown Clee.
The morning proved to be damp and the afternoon
positively wet and only three of us braved the
weather on the hill. (It has to be said that some were
braver than others). There had been some frosts and
this had wiped out the grassland species with the
exception of some old watery Blewits. In the
protection of the trees it was a different story and
here Blewits in fine condition were found. The
highlights for me were the two Panellus species. P.
serotinus is not uncommon but I have not seen it for
a few years here. It is olive green and usually slimy,
usually about 1½ inches from base to the edge of the
cap, although they can get much larger. It grows on
dead deciduous wood. In contrast I would rate P.
mitis as uncommon, despite what the books say. It is
a small white species which grows on the branches
of dead conifer. The only place that I have seen it is
on the Brown Clee and that was many years ago.
Pannellus species are pleurotoid i.e. similar in form
3

to the Oyster Mushroom but they have a short stem
clearly delineated from the gills.
First Foray Jan Arriens
Vicky came out of the woods bearing an enormous whitish-grey
mushroom.
“Can you eat it?” I asked.
“Eat it,” she said blankly. “You mean – eat it?”
“Yes: is it edible.”
Vicky shot a glance at her partner Luke. Luke consulted Fred,
who was obviously the Top Man.
“Never been asked that before,” said Fred. “It’s a clouded agaric
– Clitocybe nebularis. I think you can eat it.”
Now Elisabeth and I shot each other a glance. It was our first
foray. All we wanted to find out was whether you could eat the
stuff we kept coming across on walks. Now here were the
experts and they didn't know.
“I think they may upset some people, but otherwise they’re said
to be quite good,” said Alan tentatively.
“Here, take it,” said Vicky kindly. “Try it out at home and let us
know next time what it was like.”
“The point is,” said Fred, “we don't eat mushrooms.”
“You – don’t – eat – mushrooms?” I said, tactfully trying to
disguise a note of incredulity.
“No,” replied Fred, “we identify them. We've identified two
thousand five hundred in Shropshire so far. Some counties
have identified five thousand. We think there may be as many
as 12,500.”
Alan meanwhile was busy inserting minute mushrooms – oops,
fungi – into a clear plastic box with little compartments. Various
small knives, a magnifying glass and dibbers dangled from his
belt. Everyone apart from us – we had come with plastic bags –
was equipped with backpacks. Tumbling out of these came
binoculars, field guides to mushrooms, more weird and
wonderful little boxes and containers, what looked like a
portable microscope, labels, lunchboxes, biscuits and flasks of
coffee. There may also have been some hip flasks, but we
couldn't be sure.
Luke had emerged from a birch grove, bearing some kind of
brown mushroom. Everyone crowded round in excitement. “You
can see it’s a boletus,” Fred helpfully explained to us. “If you
look underneath you will see it has pores, not gills. This one
could be the birch bolete, Leccinum scabrum, but the colour
varies with age and it can be difficult to tell.”
“I think it may be Boletus scaber,” ventured Alan.
“I think that is just a former classification for the same thing,”
said Fred reflectively. “So you see, even the experts can’t
always agree. Anyway, the hymenium is adnate, as you can
see, and it occurs only in mycorrhizal association with birch
trees, which fits.”
“Oh,” said Elisabeth.
Novice two: “Can you eat it?”
CURIOUS FUNGAL FACTS
Gleanings by Ted Blackwell
An Agaric, Squamanita paradoxa, is a parasite on another Agaric, Cystoderma amianthina. It
completely replaces the cap of the Cystoderma but utilises its stipe which appears be unchanged as a
recognisable Cystoderma stipe.
When growing Shii-take mushrooms it seems to be an accepted part of the process to ‘wake up’ the
mushrooms by beating logs already inoculated with the mycelial ‘spawn’. Logs may be banged with a
hammer or dropped on end onto a hard surface, and this shock treatment is said to initiate primordial
formation. It has not been explained why this treatment stimulates Shiitake growth, but the shock
‘trigger’ is said to increase yields and facilitate more consistent fruiting on each log. An alternative
shock treatment is to immerse the logs in very cold water, very much colder than the ambient air
temperature.
The Seventeen-year Cicada, so called because it spends 16¾ years as a pupa buried in soil and only
about three months as an adult insect, is parasitised at the adult stage by a Hyphomycete fungus
Massospora. The fungus invades the abdomen of the living insect and as it develops it begins to
convert the insect’s internal organs to masses of spores. The unfortunate Cicada then begins to sloughoff
successive segments of its abdomen thus ensuring spore dispersal and, with what seems admirable
sang froid, continues to crawl around shedding spores and bits of abdomen, until only the head and
thorax and one or two segments remain.
The cause of a bagpiper’s persistent cough was traced to a yeast-like fungus Cryptococcus neoformans
growing inside the leather bag of the pipes. This fungus is normally found in pigeon droppings.
4

A fungus growth looking like tufts of coarse red hair or old fox pelt can sometimes be found growing
over the surface of damp wood in contact with the ground, and is known in particular on pit-props in
mines. It is known as Ozonium and is a sterile form of mycelium of one of several species of the
Coprinus genus (domesticus, radians or micaceus).
The corn smut of maize Ustilago maydis is eaten by Mexicans. The smut causes a large gall to form on
some part of the plant such as leaves, stems or flowers. Galls are harvested in the early immature
state before the black smut spores have developed, they are soft and when cooked are said to taste
mushroomy. The Mexicans are also reported to eat the newly emerged plasmodium of the largefruiting
Slime Mould, Flowers of Tan (Fuligo septica) which looks like a mass of scrambled eggs. They
call it Caca da luna, the translation of which I leave to you.
.
According to a report in the Daily Telegraph (31 Oct 2010) truffles have sex. It has recently been
discovered that the Black Truffle, Tuber melanosporum, occurs as two different mating strains,
analogous to male and female. Both strains need to come together to form truffles, but often the
strains occur widely apart in nature and this may partly explain why it is difficult to cultivate truffles.
The renowned Victorian Shropshire naturalist and mycologist, the Revd. William Houghton (1829-
1895), Rector of Preston-in-the Wield Moors, near Wellington, 1860+, reported that he had offered his
white Persian cat a variety of fungi as food. It had eaten ‘with evident relish’ Hygrocybe pratensis & H.
virginea, Armillaria mellea, Lepista saeva, Marasmius oreades, Collybia butyracea, Comprinus comatus,
Boletus edulis & B. scaber and Hydnum repandum. But it refused ‘some known unwholesome and
poison kinds’ such as Stropharia semiglobata & S. aeruginosus, Amanita muscaria, Boletus luridus and
some Cortinarius. He reports his other cat a ‘common variety’ refused all fungi and seemed to say to
its Persian companion “Hey, Persian lad, I dislike what’s on offer”. (The extract is from: Houghton’s
'Notices of Fungi in Greek and Latin Authors' (1885).
Eating the edible Saffron Milkcap and False Saffon Milkcap (Lactarius deliciosus & L. deterrimus) turns
urine red. This is harmless but the unexpected discovery can cause some temporary alarm to the
uninformed.
Photo Gallery Mike Middleton
These pictures were sent in as a response to my plea for material for the newsletter. A further picture of the
Scarlet Elfcup was also sent in and was used in the March Dudmaston foray report.
Oyster Mushroom
Pleurotus ostreatus
White Coral
Clavulina coralloides
Pleated Inkcap
Parasola plicatilis
5

Notes on a dry season Les Hughes
I’d looked forward to the fungus season this year with great anticipation. I was going to make great strides in
my knowledge and understanding, because I had arranged to attend three separate Field Studies Council courses
at Preston Montford. The first was Identification of Summer Fungi, then a Microscopy for Mycologists course,
and finally Identification of Difficult Fungi Groups. All taught by Geoffrey Kibby, one of the best mycologists
in the country.
Then it stopped raining. This was about the middle of May, as far as I can remember. And it didn’t start again.
Shropshire got dry. Then it got drier. And drier. I walked miles looking for fungi, often without sighting a
single fruit body. By the time of the first course I had walked over thirty miles in ten days, and found absolutely
nothing.
Course members arrived at Preston Montford from all over the country, expecting the sort of crop they were
finding elsewhere. It’s a good season they said. They were to be disappointed. In order to find anything at all
we had to travel to Wales, thirty miles or so, each day. We repeated this process for all three courses I attended,
discovering the delights of Lake Vernwy, Gregynog, Erddig and dried material from Geoffrey’s archives in
the process, but as for Shropshire? Forget it. Even the Field Studies Centre joined in the fun by selling these
postcards.
No, we didn’t find the camels. Although we did come across an alpaca farm one afternoon.
It was the final day of all these activities. We had driven to Lake Vernwy once more to find material, and on
the way home, simply as a way of filling time, and looking for future foray venues, we dropped in at the
Shropshire Wildlife Trust Nature Reserve at Llanymynech
Rocks.
Hearing that there was Helianthemum on the site two of our more
eagle-eyed members disappeared like a flash, while the rest of us
strolled along finding almost nothing, the exception being a green
Entoloma. Fantastic, we thought. Our friends emerged from the
Helianthemum carrying a single small fruit body. A Cortinarius
which no-one recognised. (Does anyone ever recognise
Cortinarius on sight?) It was borne back to the lab, where the best
minds toiled over the keys, and finally Geoffrey pronounced. It
was Cortinarius violaceocinereus. A species never before
recorded in the UK. Here it is.
6

To be fair we did find lots of interesting things during these days (including for example Buchwaldoboletus
lignicola), but this was in SHROPSHIRE! I don’t want to hear anyone telling me that the border with Wales
runs through that quarry, OK? It’s amazing how such a samll thing can make up for so much disappointment.
Yes, I know it doesn’t look much, but it gives me hope for next year’s courses. When I shall be going somewhere
else.
The discussion with Ted about and the
spalted sycamore wood (found at Gaer Fawr – see foray
reports) “sparked” an interest, and led me down a long
and convoluted path. The BBC Four programme “The
Science of Decay” has also prompted me to put down in
writing some things which have interested me for a long
time. Some delving into books and websites has helped
me to “crystallise” my thoughts on these subjects. I was,
by profession, an industrial chemist with a particular
interest in colour.
It all started for me when I learnt about Penicillin. The
antibiotic properties of penicillin were first recognized by
A. Fleming in 1928 when the mould ,
began growing, accidentally, on a Petri dish agar plate on
which a staphylococcal culture was growing. The mould
produced a zone around itself which killed the bacteria by
rupturing their cell walls. This is probably a mechanism
which has evolved to allow moulds and other fungi to
protect their food source from other organisms including
other fungi.
Let’s look specifically at . This produces,
amongst thousands of others, muscimol which to us is a
neurotoxin, i.e. it is poisonous. While these chemicals act
at mammalian neurotransmitter receptors, in the case of
, they are probably defensive chemicals.
Because of their immediate action, muscaria chemicals
would probably persuade potential predators and
competitors such as mammals, insects, soil nematodes,
and other fungi to dine somewhere else. We should resist
the egocentric notion that these chemicals are directed at
us.
Nearly every cell in a human body needs cholesterol for
proper membrane functioning and has the ability to
manufacture it. Humans are also fortunate (and
sometimes unfortunate) enough to be able to obtain
significant amounts of it from their diet. The fungal
equivalent is ergosterol which they can make; however,
they cannot obtain it from their diet so if it is unable to
produce this material it dies. Fungi have found chemical
means to prevent their neighbours from producing
ergosterol thus killing them off and reducing competition.
We have also benefitted from this by using and modifying
these chemicals to produce cholesterol regulatory drugs
i.e. statins. Soon everyone on the planet will be taking
these. They are life savers.
These chemicals are designed to ward off other species
with the same food requirements. It is interesting to
speculate that each family and maybe each species must
produce a different cocktail of chemicals in order to exist
in a world of so many diverse and mainly antagonistic
species. Could it be that the synthesis of these chemicals
Notes on Chemicals and Chemical Warfare
Roy Mantle
influences the colour of the fruitbody and whether it is
poisonous or not?
If two fungi are colonising the same piece of wood, then
both will use their chemical weapons on each other. Both
will want to eliminate its competitor and now another
chemical comes into play, melanin. This is a black
pigment found throughout the natural world. The black
plumage of most birds is due to the presence of this
material. In humans it is found in the hair, skin and eyes
mainly as a barrier to certain wavelengths of light, most
notably UV. This is why peoples from hot countries have
dark skin and hair as a response to the high light levels
and many hours of sunlight. This is also why light skinned
people get tanned if they are exposed to too much sun.
Our skins have the ability to produce melanin to act as a
barrier. It is the word barrier which is significant because
not only is melanin a UV barrier it is also a chemical
barrier as well, and the fungi in the wood use this to
provide protection from chemical attack. They deposit
melanin on the junction between them and their
antagonistic neighbour and so they are bounded by a
dense black line. These black lines in the wood are very
decorative and are used in woodturning if the fungal
attack on the wood has not progressed too far. The black
lines are called spalting. When I showed Ted these two
pictures he identified the black fungus as
and explained that the spalting lines were barriers set
up between colonies of the same species to protect them
from their neighbour. This is why there are gaps on the
surface where the two colonies meet and there are
corresponding black lines down in the wood.
Eutypa acharii showing several individuals with
clear spaces between them on the surface and bounded by
black “spalted” lines within the wood
7

E. acharii showing “gnaw” from rodents.
He also explained and i quote “Your second picture is
typical rodent (usually squirrel) gnawing. Incidentally, if
you come across and it appears not to have
perithecia or only in places, this may be due to grazing by
snails which are known also to find it attractive. It has
never occurred to me to look microscopically at such
cases to see if snail radula gnawing marks might be
detected”.
Why are they eaten? This is not known but ,
along with some other Pyenomycetes, has been proven to
have antibacterial properties.
Fungi use chemicals for a variety of other reasons. Some
of their strongest are used to break down wood and this
has an enormous impact upon the environment. When
the world was young, plants and fungi evolved together
with the fungi breaking down the plant remains and all
was well. Some plants began to grow taller and taller in
order to out compete others for the available light. They
evolved lignin in order to give them strength and they
became trees. Fungi did not have the means to break
down this new hard substance and consequently as the
plants died they fell and accumulated in a vast layer on
the ground. This had two major impacts upon the world.
This layer of dead trees would become fossilised and
make the coal measures. The carbon in the plants would
be locked away. This had the effect of increasing the
oxygen in the air from 20% to 30%. Insects breath by
means of small tubes reaching down into the body and
the size of the insect is governed by the amount of
oxygen in the air and so insects became much larger with
dragonflies having a wing span of two and a half feet.
It took about 30 million years for fungi to evolve
substances that would attack lignin and allow them to
break down wood. Interestingly they now also had to find
a way of protecting themselves from their own powerful
secretions, and another chemical was utilised to
strengthen their hyphae against chemical attack. They
used chitin. This is a compound which is used by insects
to make their exoskeletons hard.
Another set of chemicals are used by fungi and they are
“communication” chemicals. These may be looked upon
as the stamp on a letter. They ensure that the message is
delivered but do not say anything about what the
message is or what the recipient will make of it. The smell
of a flower says “come here”, the smell of a skunk says
“go away” but the smell of a stinkhorn says different
things to us than it does to flies. These molecules are not
only transmitted through air but also through water, soil
and even leaf litter. They are used to send messages
within an organism, between organisms of the same
species, and between totally different species. Many we
class as pheromones and are used throughout the natural
world. We live in a world of chemicals but we are woefully
unequipped to appreciate most of them.
References
Mushrooms and Toadstools 1959. J. Ramsbottom
Chemicals and Fungi. Ed Mena. , Boston
Mycological Club, June 2004
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spalting
Edward Blackwell
BBC Four. “the Science of Decay”.
Antibiotic activity of pyrenomycetes under submerged
conditions; Bandre TR et al
Photo Gallery - Clive Garnett
The small object is a
Morel. (see below). The
larger object is the man
himself. Clive is new to us
this season. What a
handsome fellow!
Clive’s caption for this is “slimy”.
It is probably Reticularia
lycoperdon a slime mould.Ed.
Root Fomes
8

Something New - Les Hughes
At the end of October I had just about given up any idea of a fungus season in Shropshire (see Notes form a
Dry Season). Then I got an e-amail from a friend with this photo attached. It had just appeared in his garden
he said. What was it?
The blue is the stain to show up the paraphyses more
clearly.
It’s a Peziza I replied. I’ll come and have a look. I looked.
I took most of it home, and I looked for a Peziza that
matched it. I failed.
I took it to a SFG foray that weekend, and asked everyone
to tell me what it was. We went home, and under the
microscope, we agreed, a Peziza should give an amyline
reaction to Meltzer’s, and it didn’t. A young Peziza
vesiculosa? No-one was convinced.
Under the scope it looked like this
No openings at the tips of the asci. It wasn’t a Peziza.
A week went by. I tried keying it out using Mycokey.
I’d never tried to use the asco keys there before, and it
offered Geopora, a genus I’d never even heard of. I
consulted Ted Blackwell, and got by return, an positive
message, and a key.
The asci are operculate, uniseriate and inamyloid. The
paraphyses are long and thin and twice septate. There
are septate and encrusted hairs on the excipulum. The
spores are smooth and guttulate, with two clear oil cells, and those measured were in the range 21.1 – 28.5 X
11 – 12.5 with a mean of 24.8 X 11.7.
It seemed to fit Gepora foliacea, although the spore size wasn’t perfect. It seemed a possibility. Encouraged
by Ted I dried what little of it I could still find in the oven. I used the fan oven setting, and when I went to
retrieve it the fan had blown it away.
Back to Nigel’s garden to scrape a few remnants, this time dried a bit more carefully, and everything went in
an envelope to Kew. I couldn’t believe it when only eight days later I had an e-mail from Brian Spooner (whom
I thought had retired) confirming the identification.
It’s a first record for Shropshire, and only 20 previous records in the UK. It’s certainly a first for Telford, but
then so is nearly everything.
It’s a great feeling, the first time you find something new and unusual, and get the ID right. Hope it happens
again soon.
Les Hughes
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Photo Gallery - Charlotte Anderson.
Chlorosplenium
aeurinascens also at
Gaer Fawr
On Gaer Fawr (see
foray reports) this
tiny door was set
into the roots of the
tree. This is
Charlotte “knocking
up Bilbo Baggins”
Helella lacunosa
Thanks for the welcome from Clive and Charlotte.
Geoglossum viride above
and oh oh its that guy again
with Cortinarius bolaris on
the right What's he doing in
Charlotte’s pictures?
Pleurotus sp.
Hello All,
2011 was a great year for us in terms of expanding our fungal knowledge.
We are keen enthusiasts and have been studying the world of fungi for around four years now. Our initial
interest was based around culinary uses but we were soon taken over by the fascination and complexity of
the subject.
We met Roy Mantle for the second time in two years at a foray at Fenn's Moss and following a warm
invitation from Roy to come along and join in the fun on more of the Shropshire group forays, we did just
that.
We are based near Chester so we are a little far away to make every event but we enjoyed an early morning
drive to Trawscoed in October where Green Elfcup was one of many highlights of the day. A visit to
Colemere later that month proved more challenging where fungi were very elusive. Finding Dudmaston in
November also threw up a few 'navigational debates' on the journey but once the group were located a
wonderfully productive walk ensued. Auriscalpium Vulgare was a first for us.
Thanks to everyone for their warm welcome and for sharing their extensive knowledge. We look forward to
much more of the same this year.
Clive & Charlotte
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Photo Gallery - Roy Mantle
Due to the dry weather in Shropshire I had to travel to Lake
Vyrnwy to get this picture of Russula delica the Milk White
Brittlegill.
Charlotte carried this twig around Dudmaston for
me to get this picture of Crepidotus cesatii
Some more examples of spalting. On the left is a cut beech trunk showing a wonderful mosaic of spalted zones. Look at the
different colours that the wood has been stained by the fungi. On the right is a bowl turned from spalted beech.
The First Shropshire Mycologist and Lichenologist.
Thomas Salwey (1791 – 1877), Vicar of Oswestry, 1823 to 1871.
TOM PREECE
The Rev. Thomas Salwey came from a very old Shropshire family, the Salweys of Orelton near Ludlow. The Salweys have been
Lords of the Manor there for over 400 years. A famous Salwey was Secretary to Oliver Cromwell in the Civil Wars (1640-1650). He
was one of the many Richard Salweys! The old family home is at Moor Park, Richards Castle, and Humphrey Salwey farms there
today. He has done much to conserve the ancient hatchments, monuments and inscriptions in St. Bartholomew’s Church there, to
a host of Salweys. About 10 miles away from the Salwey home is “Court of Hill”, between Clee Hill and Burford. This was the home
(first written about in 1202) of the most famous family ever to have lived in Shropshire, the Hills. Originally from Normandy and
probably everywhere chiefly remembered by the life of Rowland Hill, who was Wellington’s “right hand man” at Waterloo 1815. He
lived at Hardwicke, near Hadnall, for the latter years of his life. Anne Maria Hill of “Court of Hill” married Theophilus Richard Salwey
and in 1791 their son Thomas was born. He was to become the Rev. Thomas Salwey, Vicar of Oswestry, and one of Shropshire’s
earliest outstanding field naturalists (Table 1 shows details of Shropshire men and others busy identifying living things in Salweys
life time). Thomas entered St. John’s College Cambridge in 1810. He graduated with a B.A. in 1813, was ordained Deacon in 1815
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and Priest in 1816. He clearly was an outstanding scholar, and was a Fellow of St. John’s College from 1817 – 1828, becoming an
M.A. in 1818 and gaining his B.D. degree 1827. In 1828 he became sinecure Rector of St. Florence in Pembrokeshire (as was
quite common in those days). In 1823, Salwey became Vicar of Oswestry - a post he held for 48 years. If this is difficult to imagine
today, it might help to say that he had been Vicar of Oswestry for 14 years when the eighteen year-old Victoria became Queen in
1837, George IVth preceding her as Sovereign. It was a time of candles, oil-lamps, and horses everywhere. Railways and motor
cars were things of the future. How Thomas Salwey became obsessively interested in fungi, and more especially in lichens, is not
known. One might speculate that, like Charles Darwin of Shrewsbury, he experienced, at Cambridge, the remarkable influence of
Professor J.S. Henshaw, the Professor of Botany there at that time. There were living at the same time as Salwey important
Shropshire mycologists (Table 1). How much he knew about or contacted these men is not known, except in the case of another
clergyman, Rev. W.A. Leighton (Table 1), son of a Shrewsbury Inn-Keeper. Leighton was definitely influenced like Darwin by
Henshaw at Cambridge, and he dedicated his 1840 (flowering plant) Flora of Shropshire to him, describing himself as “his grateful
pupil”. Leighton was, briefly, the Curate of St. Giles Church in Shrewsbury, but devoted the rest of his life firstly to flowering plants,
and later, for many years, to lichens. In 1838 Salwey was sending many named specimens of microscopic fungi to Kew. These
included Puccinia caricina on the rare host Carex elata from Morda Pool near Oswestry. Also, from places “in Oswestry” he sent
P.caricina on nettle. Puccinia adoxae on Town Hall Clock, and Puccinia calcitrapae on Knapweed, as well as other rusts from his
vicarage garden on poplar, birch and roses. The smut fungus on grasses, Ustilago salvei Berkely & Broome, was named in his
honour in 1850. His specimen, collected in 1847, on Cock’s-foot grass at St. Martins Guernsey, is in the Kew herbarium and is the
type specimen of this fungus. It is now called Ustilago striiformis, and is found on many genera of grasses in Britain today. He
produced a list of fungi from around Oswestry (and a long list of lichens) in 1855 in Cathralls History of Oswestry. Identifying the
spores of rust fungi and of lichens necessitates microscopy. The use by naturalists of a microscope in Salweys time was directly
the result of Robert Browns description and illustration of cell nuclei for the first time in 1831. By 1841, the price of a microscope
was “reasonable”. Even before that, in 1834, J.V.M. Dovaston was grumbling away at West Felton, near Oswestry, that “naturalists
here are becoming so damned learned they will not look at flowers; nothing will go down with them, but a minute moss, lichen or
fungus”. Lichens and microscopy took over Salweys life as a naturalist, and between 1823 and 1863 he produced lists of lichens,
not only for the Oswestry area, but also for Wales and Great Britain. He made important lichen collections from Guernsey, the Isle
of Wight, and more specifically, from Barmouth, Harlech and Dolgellau. All his specimens were shared with Rev. W.A. Leighton. He
prepared bound collection of lichen specimens for various museums (as was the custom then). One of these collections is in Bolton
Museum. He corresponded with the eminent lichenologists of this day (long handwritten letters!) These (some of which are at the
British Museum (Natural History) show he was au fait with the lichen literature (English and Foreign). It was his unstinted
contributions to Rev. W.A. Leighton’s two books on lichens which remain significant, and remarkable, for us today. In 1851
Leighton produced a superbly illustrated book of perithecial lichens “The British Species of Angiocarpous lichens Elucidated by
their sporidia” using a number of specimens provided by Salwey. It contains coloured transverse sections of lichen thalli, and
coloured groups of individual spores, prepared “using a large and powerful microscope of the best construction made by Powell &
Leland, Opticians, of London”. A good example from this book would be the first lichen described in it – called by Leighton
Sphaerophorum coralloides. Two types are given – the first from “Shropshire, near Oswestry, Rev. T Salwey” and the second from
“Craigforda, near Oswestry, Rev. T. Salwey”. These two types are now known as Sphaerophorus fragilis and Sphaerophorus
globosus. Further on in the book, a lengthy description of a lichen by Salwey written in 1844 is included verbatim. Salwey was
seldom in Oswestry after 1840 – being in Guernsey, Jersey or the Isle of Wight. He also stayed at places on the Welsh coast,
including Barmouth and Harlech, for prolonged periods. Curates did the work at Oswestry Parish Church from this date until he
retired. In 1871, Leighton produced a hugely significant and popular book – The Lichen Flora of Great Britain, Ireland and the
Channel Islands. The text is replete with detailed references to Salwey’s lichen collections – perhaps some 300 different lichens.
This book sold out quickly, a second edition was printed in Shrewsbury in 1872 and a third edition in 1879. Some of the lichens
therein are from the old Salwey home (see above) at Richards Castle, near Ludlow, so Salwey must have gone there from time to
time. One lichen named after him has (remarkably!) retained its name to the present day. This is Acrocordia salweyi (Leighton ex
Nylander). A.L. Smith. which has large black perithecia, found on soft rocks, mortar and cement, especially in S.E. England.
Another example of the value of Salwey’s work is revealed in a 2008 paper (in Bull. British Lichen Society, 102) by Ann Allen about
the re-discovery of Lobaria pulmonaria and Teloschistes species in the Channel Islands. The author examined Salwey’s 1847
Guernsey collection in the herbarium of the Natural History Museum. He called it, then, Sticta pulmonaria. Salwey’s 1877 collection
from Sark of Teloschistes chrysopthalmus is also mentioned. Apart from lists of his collections and their locations, Salwey did not
produce papers similar to those we read today. A very good account of his church work during his early years as Vicar of Oswestry
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is given in a recent small book by John Pryce-Jones called An Oswestry Miscellany (2007). Llanforda Press. Salwey produced 2
books as Vicar, Duties of a Christian Magistrate (1835) and Gospel Hymns in 1847. There is a fine stained-glass window dedicated
to him in his Oswestry Church. Probably this Vicar, scholar, mycologist and lichenologist would have been pleased with the Latin
inscription on the brass plaque below his window. Polished for 135 years by Oswestry ladies, some words are illegible today! Even
so, generations must have looked at this window, unaware of his massive contribution to the study of lichens and mycology
generally in Britain. The brass reads: =
“Thomas Salwey S.J.B. (=Sanctae Theologiae Baccalaureus = B.D. today) Hujusce Ecclesiae per annos XLIX vicarii laborum
pastoralium ne – memoria fenestrum – ornaberunt fillii, Ann. Dom. 1876”
(roughly translated, with the help of many friends):=
“Thomas Salwey, B.D. Vicar of this Church for 49 years. This window was embellished by his children 1876”
This may be the only stained glass window devoted to a biologist in Britain. We can gaze at it today, and wonder at his
achievements with his microscope so long ago.
TABLE 1
Shropshire Mycologists 1782 – 1916 and other Naturalists working in the
time of Rev. Thomas Salwey.
J.V.M. Dovaston 1782 – 1854 Naturalist, botanist, tree
nurseryman of West
Felton, Oswestry.
Rev. T. Salwey 1791 – 1877 Born near Ludlow.
Botanist, mycologist and
Lichenologist. Vicar of
Oswestry 1823 – 1871.
[Rev. M.J. Berkeley 1803 – 1899 Founder of British
Mycology!A
Northamptonshire vicar.]
Rev. W.A. Leighton 1805 – 1889 Of Shrewsbury. Flowering
Plant Flora of Shropshire
(1840). In 1871, his
Lichen Flora of Great
Britain became a standard
text.
Charles Darwin 1809 – 1882 Of Shrewsbury – Author
(1859)The Origin of
Species.
[Dr. H.G. Bull 1818 – 1885 Of Hereford Woolhope
Club.Fungal “forays”
began.]
W. Phillips 1822 – 1905 Of Shrewsbury. In 1887
produced British
Discomycetes.
Rev. W. Houghton 1829 – 1895 Vicar of Preston-in-the
Weald Moors, Telford in
Shropshire. Inspired many
other mycologists.
Standard translation of
Greek and Latin writers
about fungi still
unsurpassed.
Rev. J.E. Vize 1831 – 1916 Vicar of Forden (Monts.)
on the Shropshire Border.
Mycology, especially rust
fungi.
Footnote
Two of the places mentioned in this article are where two of our members now live - Tom near Oswestry
and Ted in Orleton. It must be something in the air to breed such doughty micologists. Ed.
13

Microscope Day Saturday 9th June
A micoscope day is being arranged at the Shropshire Hills Discovery Centre.
This will be for some an introduction and others a chance to compare notes and techniques. Due to the
availability of Microscopes, numbers attending will be limited. Booking for this is essential and will be on a
first come first served basis. This is for members who want to push their identifications skills further and have
or are thinking of getting or using a microscope.
The Sandy Stiltball Battarraea
phalloides
Sat 24 th March AGM
Diary for 2012
Sat 21 st April Severn Valley Country Park - Roy Mantle
Sun 6 th May Dudmaston - Les Hughes
Sat 9 th June Microscope Day
Sun 2 nd September Granville CP - Les Hughes
Sat 22 nd September Haughmond Hill - Harvey Morgan
Sat 6 th October Corbet Wood & Grinshill - Harvey Morgan
Sat 13 th October Dudmaston - Les Huges
Sat 3 rd November Earl’ Hill Nature Reserve - Harvey Morgan
Sat 1 st December Whitcliffe Common - Les Hug
A full fixture list with full direction etc. Will be sent in due
Final Notes
Thanks to all those who contributed to this publication especially our new members.
Don’t forget subscription were due in January.
Rare Finds
A new site has been discovered in Shropshire for Batteraea phalloides the Sandy
Stiltball. This is on the Red Data and BAP lists and is a nationally rare species
with only a few records for the British Isles. With over twenty fruiting bodies, in
various stages, this is a major site. This was reported by Jefny and David
Ashcroft. David is a natue photographer a found this whilst cycling around the
Worfield area near Bridgnorth.
Tom has found a fungus growing on moss in his garden This has been confirmed
by Kew as Rimbachia neckerae. This is a small bell or helmet shaped fungus that
only has 9 previous records for the UK. 3 of these records are from Shropshire.
Please visit our website on www.shropshirefungusgroup.org. If there is anything else that you would like to
see there let me or Les know.
The watermark is a microphotograph of the asci of Trichoglossum hirsutum
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