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Crikey! That's a whopper! Looking at the stem i'd say it was a birch bolete, either a massively out-sized brown birch bolete or an orange birch bolete. Does the flesh change colour when you cut it? If it goes bluey/grey then its an orange birch bolete, if it doesn't change, its a brown. Edible (but not quite as good as cep), but that one looks a bit past it. Still, if there's one of them then there'll be more! Yum Yum!

When I put my hand under him to take a picture I got brown liquid on me, not tried cutting it though -he's too impressive I can't bring myself to pick him! Haven't seen any others around, will keep an eye out though. How big do birch boletes usually get?

Just realised there is a silver birch rooted about 2 meters away from the mushroom, I'm guessing it is an freakishly large birch bolete then?

Orange Birch Boletes; between 15 and 25 cm across the cap, 15-25cm high and the stem 3-4cm across.
Brown Birch Boletes; between 5 and 10cm across the cap, 8-15cm high, and the stem 2-3cm across.

Brown slimy stuff is a sure sign its past it! Now, be brave and cut a bit off to check for colour changing!

No colour change, I don't think anyway, do they change significantly? I'm going to have a look see if there's any more today. Thanks for the help, by the way!

No bother at all. Orange Birch Bolete flesh should change to a bluey grey when you cut them. If it doesn't change, then its more likey to be a Brown Birch Bolete. I imagine that big one will pretty much be slimy mush by now, but perhaps you'll be able to make a positive i.d. on the next one you find there.

If you are interested in mushroom hunting, you should have a look at this book, i find it invaluable!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Identify-Mu ... 0007259611

Found this growing behind my Peonie, in an oak barrel with a fresh layer of compost.

It won't go to waste if it's edible

Hi all,

Am a newbie to this forum and although a keen mushroom forager we tend only to get chanterelles and amethyst deceivers as they are so easily identifiable and we're unlikely to get them mixed up with some deadly mushrooms.

So, we live in Norwich, UK and go to a wood (deciduous) north of the city - this morning (04/11/12) we wandered round in the rain and picked some other mushrooms as well as our usual 2 types - not to eat, but to have a go at identifying as they were plentiful.

Hoping someone out there can help :)
Any help is gratefully received :) Thank you!

Shelley

Hi there and thanks in advance for any assistance on this. We stumbled across a number of these earlier on. The caps aren't quite as chestnut as most pics of ceps on the internet but the stems certainly look about right. The stem goes right into the cap (with no gap) but there's neither tubes nor gills visible. These ones are probably about 8cm each (cap) and the little nibble I had was very pleasant with no bitterness. The lack of visible tubes would seem to rule out ceps but the flesh is solid, white, and gill-less and we can't figure out what they could be instead - despite looking through every picture in Roger's Mushrooms book.
Any help gratefully received.

Cheers! Doug

If they have no pores they are not ceps. They look a bit like immature king oysters (which I don'tthink grow naturally in the UK). Where did you find them and on what substrate?

Garry

Hi Garry,

Thanks for your assistance.

Definitely no pores and after picking some more, it's apparent they do have gills after all (the first ones we picked the gills just looked like a solid curtain).

We found them in a place called Bentley Priory in Stanmore, a north west London suburb, growing underneath some kind of conifer.

On cooking them they released an awful sickly sweet smell. Needless to say we've not eaten them but they're frozen for possible later use, subject to a positive ID of course!

Some more photos below:




Cheers,
Doug

SummerBloom wrote:Hi all,

Am a newbie to this forum and although a keen mushroom forager we tend only to get chanterelles and amethyst deceivers as they are so easily identifiable and we're unlikely to get them mixed up with some deadly mushrooms.

So, we live in Norwich, UK and go to a wood (deciduous) north of the city - this morning (04/11/12) we wandered round in the rain and picked some other mushrooms as well as our usual 2 types - not to eat, but to have a go at identifying as they were plentiful.

Hoping someone out there can help :)

The top ones (very red) are Cortinarius sanguineus. The bottom ones are Amanita citrina (false death cap).

DougieSpesh wrote: On cooking them they released an awful sickly sweet smell. Needless to say we've not eaten them but they're frozen for possible later use, subject to a positive ID of course!

Oyster mushrooms grow on wood. These were growing on the ground. They are called Clouded Funnel (Clitocybe nebularis). Technically edible, but they smell 'orrible...

Thank you kindly! Have kept them in the freezer in the hope of a response; now need to decide whether to eat them or not... Cheers, Doug

I picked up a mushroom in my backyard.

a. Where you picked the mushroom - on the lawn
b. The dimensions of the mushroom: top 1.5-2 inches and stem 4-5 inches
c. The spore colour: white
d. what the stem is like, does it have a ring, is it bulbous etc: smooth nothing on it
e. gills. - pinkish, direct attach to the stem.
f. overall colour and description: white or creamy, smell like ordinary mushroom in store.

The pictures of the mushroom.

Please help to id it and thank you a lot.

Webb