Mushrooms of British Columbia PDF
Preview Mushrooms of British Columbia
Royal BC Museum Handbook MUSHROOMS OF BRITISH COLUMBIA ANDY MACKINNON AND KEM LUTHER VICTORIA, CANADA RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 33 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM Also from the Royal BC Museum Food Plants of Coastal First Peoples by Nancy J. Turner Food Plants of Interior First Peoples by Nancy J. Turner Trees and Shrubs of British Columbia by T. Christopher Brayshaw Plant Technology of First Peoples in British Columbia by Nancy J. Turner Saanich Ethnobotany by Nancy J. Turner and Richard J. Hebda RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 22 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM Mushrooms of British Columbia RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 11 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM Mushrooms of British Columbia Text copyright © 2021 by Andy MacKinnon and Kem Luther Published by the Royal BC Museum, 675 Belleville Street, Victoria, British Columbia, V8W 9W2, Canada. The Royal BC Museum is located on the traditional territories of the Lekwungen (Songhees and Xwsepsum Nations). We extend our appreciation for the opportunity to live and learn on this territory. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means without permission in writing from the publisher or a licence from Access Copyright, Toronto, Canada, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. See p. 482 for credits and copyright information for specific elements in the book. Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Title: Mushrooms of British Columbia / Andy MacKinnon and Kem Luther. Names: MacKinnon, A. (Andrew), 1956- author. | Luther, Kem, 1946- author. | Royal British Columbia Museum, publisher. Series: Royal British Columbia Museum handbook. Description: Series statement: Royal BC Museum handbook | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 2021012587X | Canadiana (ebook) 20210126019 | ISBN 9780772679550 (softcover) | ISBN 9780772679567 (EPUB) | ISBN 9780772679574 (Kindle) | ISBN 9780772679581 (PDF) Subjects: LCSH: Mushrooms—British Columbia—Identification. | LCGFT: Field guides. Classification: LCC QK605.7.B8 M33 2021 | DDC 579.609711—dc23 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Printed and bound in Canada by Friesens. C016245 • The decision to consume any foraged mushroom is ultimately the sole responsibility (cid:82)(cid:73)(cid:3)(cid:87)(cid:75)(cid:72)(cid:3)(cid:83)(cid:72)(cid:85)(cid:86)(cid:82)(cid:81)(cid:3)(cid:72)(cid:68)(cid:87)(cid:76)(cid:81)(cid:74)(cid:3)(cid:76)(cid:87)(cid:17)(cid:3)(cid:36)(cid:79)(cid:87)(cid:75)(cid:82)(cid:88)(cid:74)(cid:75)(cid:3)(cid:90)(cid:72)(cid:3)(cid:75)(cid:68)(cid:89)(cid:72)(cid:3)(cid:80)(cid:68)(cid:71)(cid:72)(cid:3)(cid:72)(cid:89)(cid:72)(cid:85)(cid:92)(cid:3)(cid:72)(cid:909)(cid:82)(cid:85)(cid:87)(cid:3)(cid:87)(cid:82)(cid:3)(cid:83)(cid:85)(cid:82)(cid:89)(cid:76)(cid:71)(cid:72)(cid:3)(cid:70)(cid:82)(cid:85)(cid:85)(cid:72)(cid:70)(cid:87)(cid:3) information about edibility, neither the authors nor the Royal BC Museum can accept liability or responsibility for food and health decisions made as a result of relying on information presented on these pages. RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 44 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM Contents Introduction 1 Pink-spored Gilled 221 About This Guide 1 Brown-spored Gilled 228 What Are Mushrooms? 3 Agaricus 229 Mushroom Life Cycles 4 Cortinarius 239 Ecological Roles 6 Inocybe and Similar 253 How to Use This Guide 9 Gymnopilus and Pholiota 261 Species Descriptions 10 Other Big Brown-spored 271 Collecting and Eating Wild Other Little Brown-spored 281 Mushrooms 22 Dark-spored Gilled 288 Other Ways to Enjoy Coprinus and Similar 289 Mushrooms 25 Gomphidius and Similar 295 Other Resources 27 Other Dark-spored 299 References Cited 29 Boletes 317 Toothed 335 Guide to Mushroom Groups 30 Clubs 349 Corals 369 Mushroom Descriptions Polypores 378 Veined 33 Jelly Fungi 411 Gilled 43 Puffballs 421 Pale-spored Gilled 44 Bird’s Nest Fungi 431 Russula 45 Morels and Similar 436 Lactarius 61 Cups 449 Hygrophorus and Similar 77 Truffles 463 Lepiota and Similar 97 Other Fungi 472 Amanita and Similar 105 Clitocybe and Similar 125 Acknowledgements 477 Tricholoma and Similar 145 Glossary 478 Mycena and Similar 173 Credits 482 Marasmius and Similar 185 Index 485 Pleurotus and Similar 207 RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 55 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM “The individual who desires to engage in the study [of wild mushrooms] must boldly face a good deal of scorn. He is laughed at for his strange taste among the better classes, and is actually regarded as a sort of idiot among the lower orders. No fad or hobby is esteemed so contemptible as that of the ‘fungus-hunter’ or ‘toadstool-eater.’” —An Elementary Text-book of British Fungi, 1887 (cid:41)(cid:88)(cid:81)(cid:74)(cid:88)(cid:86)(cid:3)(cid:36)(cid:80)(cid:82)(cid:81)(cid:74)(cid:3)(cid:56)(cid:86)(cid:3)(cid:73)(cid:72)(cid:86)(cid:87)(cid:76)(cid:89)(cid:68)(cid:79)(cid:3)(cid:76)(cid:81)(cid:3)(cid:58)(cid:75)(cid:76)(cid:86)(cid:87)(cid:79)(cid:72)(cid:85)(cid:15)(cid:3)(cid:901)(cid:899)(cid:900)(cid:902)(cid:17)(cid:3)(cid:41)(cid:88)(cid:81)(cid:74)(cid:68)(cid:79)(cid:3)(cid:73)(cid:82)(cid:85)(cid:68)(cid:92)(cid:86)(cid:3) are one of the best ways to learn about mushrooms. Mycological societies, natural history societies, and fungus festivals host numerous forays each year. RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 66 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM Introduction British Columbia is huge and diverse. Its 94.5 million hectares covers an area larger than Washington, Oregon, and California combined. About 40,000 islands dot BC’s 26,000 kilometres of Pacific coastline. Inland, a series of southeast-to-northwest-trending mountain ranges ripple across the province, from the Vancouver Island Ranges and Queen Charlotte Ranges in the west to the Rocky Mountains in the east. The mountains offer a wide array of elevational zones (sea level to alpine) and precipitation zones (wetter on the western, windward side of the mountains, drier on the leeward). All of this physical diversity results in a tremendous variety of ecosystems, from rainforests to near deserts, lush valley bottoms to windswept alpine, southern elements to magnificent boreal forest. There are more types of ecosystems in BC than anywhere else in Canada. Ecological diversity generates species diversity—the more types of ecosystems in an area, the more species we expect to find there. BC biologists find large numbers of species of almost every group of organisms that they study. BC has more species of plants, animals, and—most relevant for this book—fungi than any other region in Canada. A recent inventory (Kroeger and Berch, 2017) of mushroom species recorded in BC counted just over 3,000 species of macrofungi. (Macrofungi are fungi whose fruiting bodies are visible without a microscope.) About This Guide Those who want to know more about BC mushrooms—whether to study them with scientific goals, harvest them for the table, photograph them, or pursue them as a hobby—are not as fortunate as those interested in BC flora and fauna. There are good, up-to-date print guides that focus on BC plants, BC birds, BC mammals, and BC marine life. When asked to recommend a field guide for those beginning the study of BC mushrooms, however, we have had to add qualifications. The only guides that were specific to BC and that covered all of our province were far too dated and hard to find. Print guides that were available were either not comprehensive enough or not specific to BC. (We have provided a brief overview of these other resources at the end of this introduction.) In light of this, we were delighted when the Royal British Columbia Museum agreed to produce a new field guide to BC’s mushrooms. It was appropriate that the museum should take on this task—it had already published, in its widely introduction 1 RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 11 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM respected Handbook series, two previous field guides to the mushrooms of our province. Almost 70 years ago, the museum issued Some Mushrooms and Other Fungi of British Columbia by George Hardy (1952), with illustrations by Frank Beebe, a small guide of about 90 pages containing 50 mushrooms. In 1964, the museum published Guide to Common Mushrooms of British Columbia by Robert Bandoni and Adam Szczawinski. It was larger than the first guide—about 170 pages and about 150 mushrooms. This second guide was revised in 1976 to include some colour photographs. Both guides are long out of print. This new field guide covers considerably more ground than the earlier handbooks—we know a lot more about BC mushrooms than we did 50 years ago. On these pages you will find main entries for 350 species of mushrooms, each with one or more colour photographs. About 850 species are mentioned somewhere in the book. Yet even these numbers represent only a fraction of the BC species of mushrooms. To decide what should be included in the book and what should be left out, we naturally tapped into our own field experience, but we didn’t just rely on our subjective and limited perspectives. We compared records of what had been officially observed in BC and deposited in herbaria. We also collected inventories of mushroom species from different parts of the province, trying to determine which species hikers and foragers would most likely encounter and where they would encounter them. We asked BC mycology specialists from several regions of the province to comment on our list and help us find important species that we might have overlooked. The list that came out of this long process is, we believe, a fairly accurate compendium of BC’s most common and more easily identified mushrooms, as well as a sampling of less common but distinctive species. Our next challenge, once we had a tentative species list, was to decide how to arrange them. A strict taxonomic approach seemed out of step with the book’s role as a field guide—closely related mushrooms can look very different, and distantly related mushrooms quite similar. In addition, taxonomic work on the evolutionary history of mushrooms has lagged behind similar research in other fields of biology—there would have been species that had uncertain taxonomic homes. We opted instead for the widely used morphological-group approach, clumping mushrooms by their overall shape. (See the “Guide to Mushroom Groups,” p. 30.) Within each of these groups, we have arranged the mushrooms by similarity rather than by alphabetized names. If you find a specimen in the field and locate something like it in this book, you can flip backward and forward a page or two to see if you can find a better fit. Matching mushrooms with pictures, mycologists will tell you, is not the best way to do field identification. We agree, and for that reason have provided detailed descriptions for the mushrooms covered in this book. However, we have also noticed that most people who are starting to learn mushrooms lean heavily on a visual approach. For that reason, we have sought out the best diagnostic pictures we could find. The works of some 60 photographers are 2 Introduction RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 22 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM found on these pages (see “Credits,” p. 482). Whatever use this book finds in coming years will be due as much to these photos as to the text. We have attempted to minimize use of technical terminology in this guide. Serious students of mushrooms, we realize, will eventually have to acquire a specialized vocabulary. Technical terms open the door to a larger discipline, allowing students to interact with specialists and the scientific literature at the heart of the discipline. Mycology is not unique in this respect—almost any subject we want to master, from law to literature to science, brings with it large numbers of words and concepts that can be unfamiliar to those outside the discipline. But we are also aware that these special vocabularies, as important as they are, can build a high fence around a subject, making it hard for beginners to get started. The terms that we have employed in this guide can be found in the glossary at the back of the book. (See p. 478.) We have also de-emphasized the use of Latin and Greek binomials, referring to the mushrooms in our text by their common rather than their scientific names. To become fluent in the world of BC mushrooms, you will eventually have to learn most of the scientific names, but you don’t have to start with these names. Our goal in this book is practical—helping people identify mushrooms—but we have also tried to capture some of the fun in fungi. On these pages you will discover two dozen diversions that tie the study of mushrooms into a larger historical and social context. We have also tried, in the descriptions and section introductions, to provide counterpoints to the occasionally dull science of mycology by looking at such topics as name derivations and eating. In short, this guide is meant to be both educational and entertaining. We find our curiosity tweaked and our passions provoked by this fascinating and beautiful group of organisms—we hope yours will too. What Are Mushrooms? A fungus (plural: fungi) is an organism in the kingdom Fungi. It is one of the three kingdoms in the domain Eukaryota that houses complex multicellular life. The other two hold the plants (kingdom Plantae) and the animals (kingdom Animalia). The fork in the eukaryote road that led to a separate kingdom Fungi happened perhaps a billion years ago. Most theorists who study early evolutionary pathways believe that plants diverged quite a bit sooner than when fungi separated from animals. Fungi, therefore, are more closely related to animals—including us—than they are to plants. Today scientists believe that there are probably between two and four million species of fungi on earth. The vast majority of them have never been described by mycologists, the scientists who study fungi. Most of these fungi—groups such as yeasts or moulds—are outside the scope of this book. The fungi that produce the fleshy fruiting bodies that we call mushrooms include only a small introduction 3 RRBBCCMM -- MMuusshhrroooommss -- IInntteerriioorr 2200221100551122 JJWW..iinndddd 33 22002211--0055--1122 99::2233 AAMM
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