Species details
Club-foot
Ampulloclitocybe clavipes
Conditional / expert preparation
Photo: Reinhold Möller Ermell · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Photo source · License
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Description
A grey-brown funnel mushroom with a distinctly club-shaped enlarged stem base and pale decurrent gills.
Identification features
The cap changes from convex to depressed. The stem becomes strongly club-shaped toward the base and may be soft or spongy inside; the spore print is white.
Identification checklist
Check especially for the strongly club-shaped stem base, grey-brown cap becoming depressed, and pale gills running down the stem. A white spore print is an additional supporting character.
Detailed features
- Cap
- A grey-brown funnel-like mushroom with a distinctly club-shaped enlarged stem base and pale decurrent gills.
- Hymenophore
- The cap changes from convex to depressed. The stem widens strongly toward the base and may be soft or spongy inside; the spore print is white.
- Flesh
- Whitish, soft and porous to spongy.
- Smell
- Pleasant, sometimes almond- or cinnamon-like.
- Spore print
- White.
Size
- Cap diameter
- 4–6 cm
- Stem height
- 4–8 cm
- Stem diameter
- 0,5–2 cm
Habitat
In coniferous and deciduous woodland, often on acidic soils and in groups; mainly in autumn.
Fruiting period
September, October, November
Ecology
- Trophic mode
- Saprotrophic
- Substrate
- Forest soil, Leaf litter
- Soil
- Acidic
- Notes
- Saprotrophic species. In coniferous and deciduous woodland, often on acidic soils and in groups; mainly in autumn.
How to separate similar species
Tawny funnel has a more even, slimmer stem without a strongly clubbed base. Several other funnel mushrooms are macroscopically similar and some are poisonous, so the enlarged base is only one character.
Similar species
- Common funnel (Infundibulicybe gibba)
- Clitocybe species
Interesting facts
Did you know? The club-shaped swollen stem base is so characteristic that it gives the species its name.