Tony Hardware's Fungi Finds: MAY 2021 - Uncommon and rare species

May produced another fine collection of uncommon ascomycetes and a Cyphelloid and Basidiomycete. The Cyphelloid was found on old Herecleum stem, common name Bowl Hoodie, so must be quite a recent name looking like a white caped mysterious monk. Cistella grevillei is quite scarce in Gloucs. and was found on Urtica dioica. Cliopilus hobsonii was a nice find attached to a Sycamore twig on the ground looking everything like an ascomycete but seeing the basidia under the 'scope clearly identifies this as a basidiomycete. While taking time out at the now local Slimbridge Wildlife Trust on the Severn, I passed some dead Teasel. The first one I selected had tiny ascos growing at the base which I later found to be a very rare type of Didymella, this being D. caulicola. Not easy to ID as only one other gathered in UK and research text very thin on the ground, inc. 1882 document stating this substrate the only one for this species. Ascospore size was unusually large which also helped. A short trip to a new woodland for me at Hailey Wood, part of the Bathurst Estate which includes part of the amazing Macmillian Way, a footpath that seems to meander through the Cotswolds everywhere. Here I found Lachnellula calycina on Pinus - 1st for Gloucs and only nine other records in UK. Another new area which I felt needed exploring was The Leasowes woodland northeast of Sapperton. A beautiful woodland, with springs and streams, everything you need for fungi at this time of the year. Here I came across a Lachnum species which I thought might be the common L. virgineus but examination proved to be the rarer L. controversum, probably named this way as it is so close to many other species. Take a look at the paraphyses here and see the difference. Under a branch half-submerged and driftwood of probably Fagus or Ash, I found a lovely glassy yellow asco which turned into Phaeohelotium epiphyllum. So another good month in the field and The Cotswolds are providing wonderful locations as good as Cornwall used to be, if not better due the variety of tree and habitat access. Footpaths are everywhere here! In Cornwall you are given a curious eye just using a public footpath and looking slightly odd, (I can't help that - and I'm an amateur mycologist!) on your own with a mushroom in your ear.