Specimen #4 Agaric (Gilled) Fungus



Fig. 1 Cluster of Shaggy Mane fungi. The cap appears shaggy
due to the remnants of the universal veil still attached (Kuo, 2008).

Name: Coprinus comatus -Shaggy Mane

Family: Agaricaceae

Collection date: October 5, 2011

Habitat: Growing individually along the side walk in grass and mulch.

Location: Along the side walk that is across from the Hiram Post Office and next to the pizza shop building. Hiram, Ohio



Description: "The cap is about 4-15 cm tall, cylindrical or columnar, expanding somewhat as margin curls up until it is more or less bell-shaped, then deliquescing from the bottom up; surface not viscid, white with brown to pale cinnamon-brown or buff center, soon breaking up into shaggy white to brown scales (universal veil remnants) which often recurve in age; margin striate in age and often tattered. Flesh soft, white. The gills are very crowded. At first white and then pass through pink shades until it finally becomes black and inky" (Arora p. 345, 1986).

Collector: Brooke Warren

Key Used: Arora, D. (1986). Mushrooms Demystified. New York: Ten Speed Press.

Keying Steps:

Key to the Major Groups of Fleshy Fungi

1A. Spores produced on mother cells called basidia; fruiting body variously shaped (see pp. 52-54)... Basidiomycotina, p. 57

Key to the Agaricales


1B. Not as above; spores forcibly discharged, hence a spore print obtainable if spores are being produced; gills exposed at maturity; common and widespread... 2

2B. Spore print some other color (pinkish, salmon, yellow-brown, brown, rusty-orange, rusty- brown, chocolate-brown, purplish, greenish, black, etc.)... 10
10B. Spore print some shade of orange, brown (including cinnamon-brown), green, purple, gray, or black...16
16B. Not as above... 19
19A. Spore print purple-brown to purple-gray, purple-black, smoky-gray, black, chocolate-brown, or deep brown... 20
20B. Not as above; gills free to adnexed, adnate, or occasionally decurrent... 21
21A. Gills and/ or cap auto-digesting (i.e., turning into an inky black mass) at maturity; spore print black... Coprinaceae, P. 341

Key to the Coprinaceae
1A. Mature gills (and often the cap) digesting themselves, i.e., either turning into an inky black fluid or withering away... Coprinus, p. 342

Key to Coprinus
1B. Growing on ground, wood chips, wood, or indoors... 9
9A. Cap cylindrical before expansion and4-25 cm or more tall, usually at least somewhat shaggy, entirely white or with a brown center and / or brownish scales; partial veil present when young, often forming a movable annulus (ring) that may drop off; cosmopolitan.... C. comatus, p. 345

"Their mass rotted off them flake by flake

Til the thick stalk stuck like a murderer;s stake,

Where rags of loose flesh yet tremble on high

Infecting the winds that wander by" (Arora p.342, 1986).

Fig. 2 Deliquescingfrom the bottom up. The Shaggy Mane's way of
releasing its spores into the environment (Kuo, 2008).

Fig. 3 This fungus's fruiting body comes in many different sizes (Kuo, 2008).

Fig. 4 Shows the stem of the Shaggy Mane. As the picture shows it is easily
separable from the cap; hollow (Kuo, 2008).

Fig. 5 Shaggy Mane found in Hiram, Ohio. Looks like an egg sitting in the
 grass when the stem isn't visible.

Links:
http://www.mushroomexpert.com/coprinus_comatus.html
 http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/toms_fungi/may2004.html
http://healing-mushrooms.net/archives/9.html
http://youtu.be/Jth5IMq44Ec

Citations:
Kuo, M. (2008, February). Coprinus comatus: The shaggy mane. Retrieved from the MushroomExpert.Com Web site: http://www.mushroomexpert.com/coprinus_comatus.html