aldendirks's Identifications

Conifer Log. Average spore size is 42 x 15 microns. Smooth to slightly roughened with one large and two small oil drops when mature.

Paraphyses clavate, septate, filled with colored granules that are released when you make a squash mount.

The above photos are of immature specimens. Luckily, there was a remnant of an old fruit body further down the log.

Not a clear DNA ITS match.

Found this at 2600 ft elevation in a disturbed forest, Douglas fir/hemlock forest. These were growing everywhere in the CAT tracks.

entire specimen 10cm tall

6cm reddish brown, brain-like head
stipe 55 mm long, bulbous base (30mm wide) and apex (15mm wide), blushing pink on creamy white stipe.
abhymenium same color as stipe
stipe stuffed cottony mater
inrolled margin, attached to stipe in some places

Head turns black in age.
flesh 4mm thick

Microscopy:
smooth, hyline, elliptical spores, with two guttules at each end, 10x23um

Found on a rotting log in soil in a clearing in a Douglas-fir mixed forest. 2600 ft elevation

Dark reddish/black cup fungi
26mm wide
rudimentary stipe, but there are long mycelia hairs, that look like roots coming off the stipe.
flesh brown, 1mm thick
This was rubbery and not brittle or fragile.

No distinct smell
Did not taste.

Microscopy:
I did not find may spores, but the ones I did seemed to be smooth, with gutules, and tapered at both ends. Measured 10x28um

Found just outside a patch of melting snow at 2900 ft elevation. In a mixed Hemlock forest. I found 4 specimens in different ages in the gravel roadside, in soil within about a foot of each other.

40mm wide cup fungi
5 mm thick flesh/creamy white
hymenium: medium relish brown tones
Abhymenium: creamy white/translucent
rudimentary stipe
Was brittle and fragile.

Did not bruise or stain.
Did not taste due to the potential poisonous nature of Gyromitra.
Smell: indistinct

Microscopy:
I think these specimens were still very young. I was not able to see any asci with spores inside. I do think I saw asci, but they just had granules of matter in them. I did find some immature spores, but they had not fully developed (see photos).
I measured the immature spores at 10x23um, they were smooth, and appears to be developing 2 guttules.

This was found in a mixed Douglas fir forest in the soil at 3400ft.

I was not able to find any spores in the microscopy to confirm, but I had found G. melaleucoides at a lower elevation earlier that day.

35mm wide cup
warm brown/ slightly wrinkled hymenium
abhymenium translucent/whitish
rudimentary stipe, 12mm wide
specimen 35mm tall
flesh 3mm thick

brittle/fragile

I found this in an old growth Douglas-fir and hemlock forest at about 2500ft elevation.

73mm wide
hymenium side medium brown color
abymenium: creamy white
very brittle/fragile
flesh white 3mm thick
stipe mostly buried in soil 35mm long/17mm thick and wrinkled

Microscopy:
Spores smooth, elliptical with 2 guttules in each end. 10x14um

Microscopy did not match the other Gyromitra melaleucoides I found a couple miles away, so I do not think it is that. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/75152734

Found at 3000ft elevation in a disturbed forest floor, in the soil.

The stipes had a pink blush to them and the heads were like a reddish-blonde. They were not as deep colored as some of the G. esculenta I have seen in the past.

Microscopy: Spores were smooth elliptical and biguttle, 29x13um