The Polyporales are an order of about 1800 species of fungi in the division Basidiomycota. The order includes some polypores as well as many corticioid fungi and a few agarics. Many species within the order are saprotrophic, most of them wood-rotters. Some genera, such as Ganoderma and Fomes, contain species that attack living tissues and then continue to degrade the wood of their dead hosts. Those of economic importance include several important pathogens of trees and a few species that cause damage by rotting structural timber. Some of the Polyporales are commercially cultivated and marketed for use as food items or in traditional Chinese medicine.
Polypores are a group of fungi that form large fruiting bodies with pores or tubes on the underside. They are a morphological group of basidiomycetes-like gilled mushrooms and hydnoid fungi, and not all polypores are closely related to each other. Polypores are also called bracket fungi or shelf fungi, and they characteristically produce woody, shelf- or bracket-shaped or occasionally circular fruiting bodies that are called conks.
Pinus taeda, commonly known as loblolly pine, is one of several pines native to the Southeastern United States, from East Texas to Florida, and north to southern New Jersey. The wood industry classifies the species as a southern yellow pine. U.S. Forest Service surveys found that loblolly pine is the second-most common species of tree in the United States, after red maple. For its timber, the pine species is regarded as the most commercially important tree in the Southeastern U.S. The common name loblolly is given because the pine species is found mostly in lowlands and swampy areas.
Suillus luteus is a bolete fungus, and the type species of the genus Suillus. A common fungus native all across Eurasia from Ireland to Korea, it has been introduced widely elsewhere, including North and South America, southern Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Commonly referred to as slippery jack or sticky bun in English-speaking countries, its names refer to the brown cap, which is characteristically slimy in wet conditions. The fungus, initially described as Boletus luteus by Carl Linnaeus in 1753, is now classified in a different fungus family as well as genus. Suillus luteus is edible, though not as highly regarded as other bolete mushrooms. It is commonly prepared and eaten in soups, stews or fried dishes. The slime coating, however, may cause indigestion if not removed before eating. It is often sold as a dried mushroom.
Paxillus involutus, also known as the brown roll-rim or the common roll-rim, is a basidiomycete fungus that is widely distributed across the Northern Hemisphere. It has been inadvertently introduced to Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and South America, probably transported in soil with European trees. Various shades of brown in colour, the fruit body grows up to 6 cm high and has a funnel-shaped cap up to 12 cm wide with a distinctive inrolled rim and decurrent gills that may be pore-like close to the stipe. Although it has gills, it is more closely related to the pored boletes than to typical gilled mushrooms. It was first described by Pierre Bulliard in 1785, and was given its current binomial name by Elias Magnus Fries in 1838. Genetic testing suggests that Paxillus involutus may be a species complex rather than a single species.
Ganoderma is a genus of polypore fungi in the family Ganodermataceae that includes about 80 species, many from tropical regions. They have a high genetic diversity and are used in traditional Asian medicines. Ganoderma can be differentiated from other polypores because they have a double-walled basidiospore. They may be called shelf mushrooms or bracket fungi.
Ganoderma orbiforme – most commonly known as G. boninense or just Ganoderma in oil palm pathology – is a species of polypore fungus that is widespread across southeast Asia. It is a plant pathogen that causes basal stem rot, a disease of the African oil palm. The fungus was first described scientifically in 1838 by Elias Magnus Fries from collections made in Guinea. Leif Ryvarden transferred it to the genus Ganoderma in 2000. In addition to its type locality, the fungus has also been collected from the Bonin Islands in the Pacific, and from Venezuela and Puerto Rico.
Phanerochaete is a genus of crust fungi in the family Phanerochaetaceae.
Armillaria ostoyae is a species of fungus (mushroom), pathogenic to trees, in the family Physalacriaceae. In the western United States, it is the most common variant of the group of species under the name Armillaria mellea. A. ostoyae is common on both hardwood and conifer wood in forests west of the Cascade Range in Oregon, United States. It has decurrent gills and the stipe has a ring. The mycelium invades the sapwood and is able to disseminate over great distances under the bark or between trees in the form of black rhizomorphs ("shoestrings"). In most areas of North America, Armillaria ostoyae can be separated from other species by its physical features: cream-brown colors, prominent cap scales, and a well-developed stem ring distinguish it from other Armillaria. Like several other Armillaria, the mycelium of Armillaria ostoyae can display bioluminescence, resulting in foxfire.
Suillus salmonicolor, commonly known as the Slippery Jill, is a fungus in the family Suillaceae of the order Boletales. First described as a member of the genus Boletus in 1874, the species acquired several synonyms, including Suillus pinorigidus and Suillus subluteus, before it was assigned its current binomial name in 1983. It has not been determined with certainty whether S. salmonicolor is distinct from the species S. cothurnatus, described by Rolf Singer in 1945. S. salmonicolor is a mycorrhizal fungus—meaning it forms a symbiotic association with the roots of plants such that both organisms benefit from the exchange of nutrients. This symbiosis occurs with various species of pine, and the fruit bodies of the fungus appear scattered or in groups on the ground near the trees. The fungus is found in North America, Hawaii, Asia, the Caribbean, South Africa, Australia and Central America. It has been introduced to several of those locations via transplanted trees.
Ganoderma curtisii is a wood-decaying polypore whose distribution is primarily in the Southeastern United States. Craig and Levetin claim to have observed it in Oklahoma.
Heterobasidion irregulare is a tree root rotting pathogenic fungus that belongs to the genus Heterobasidion, which includes important pathogens of conifers and other woody plants. It has a wide host and geographic range throughout North America and causes considerable economic damage in pine plantations in the United States. This fungus is also a serious worry in eastern Canada. Heterobasidion irregulare has been introduced to Italy (Lazio)(modifica) where it has been responsible for extensive tree mortality of stone pine. Due to the ecology, disease type, host range/preference, interfertility group, and genetic information, H. irregulare was designated a new species and distinguished from Heterobasidion occidentale.
Robert Lee Gilbertson was a distinguished American mycologist and educator. He was a faculty member at University of Arizona for 26 years until his retirement from teaching in 1995; he was a Professor Emeritus at U of A until his death on October 26, 2011, in Tucson, Arizona. 2011. He held concurrent positions as Plant Pathologist, Agricultural Experiment Station, University of Arizona (1967–95) for a project Research on wood-rotting fungi and other fungi associated with southwestern plants and was collaborator and consultant with Center for Forest Mycology Research, US Forest Service, Forest Products Laboratory, Madison, Wisconsin (1957–1981).
Pholiota nubigena, commonly known as the gastroid pholiota or the bubble gum fungus, is a species of secotioid fungus in the family Strophariaceae. It is found in mountainous areas of the western United States, where it grows on rotting conifer wood, often fir logs. It fruits in spring, often under snow, and early summer toward the end of the snowmelt period in high mountain forests. Fruit bodies appear similar to unopened mushrooms, measuring 1–4 centimetres tall with 1–2.4 cm diameter caps that are whitish to brownish. They have a short but distinct whitish stipe that extend through the internal spore mass (gleba) of the fruit body into the cap. The gleba consists of irregular chambers made of contorted gills that are brownish in color. A whitish, cottony partial veil is present in young specimens, but it often disappears in age and does not leave a ring on the stipe.
Ganoderma sessile is a species of polypore fungus in the Ganodermataceae family. There is taxonomic uncertainty with this fungus since its circumscription in 1902.
Ganoderma megaloma is a species of bracket fungus in the family Ganodermataceae.
Parvixerocomus pseudoaokii is a species of bolete fungus in the family Boletaceae, and the type species of the genus Parvixerocomus. It was described by Chinese mycologists Gang Wu and Zhu L. Yang in 2015. It is found only in southwestern, southeastern and southern China, where it grows in subtropical forests with trees of the family Fagaceae, and in mixed forests with Fagaceae and Chinese red pine. Fruitbodies of the fungus are small, with convex to flattened caps typically measuring 0.8–3 cm (0.3–1.2 in) in diameter. All parts of the bolete stain blue when cut or injured.
Skeletocutis subvulgaris is a species of poroid, white rot fungus in the family Polyporaceae. Found in China, it was described as a new species in 1998 by mycologist Yu-Chen Dai. It was named for its resemblance to Skeletocutis vulgaris. The type collection was made in Hongqi District, Jilin Province, where it was found growing on the rotting wood of Korean pine.
Taiwanofungus is a fungal genus of unknown familial placement in the order Polyporales. The genus contains two species: the type, Taiwanofungus camphoratus, and T. salmoneus. Taiwanofungus was circumscribed by Taiwanese mycologists in 2004. T. camphoratus is a medicinal fungus that is found in Taiwan, where it grows on the endemic tree species Cinnamomum kanehirae. It was first described in 1990 by Mu Zang and Ching-Hua Su as a species of Ganoderma. T. salmoneus, originally placed in Antrodia, was validly added to the genus in 2012.
Ganoderma oregonense is a species of bracket fungus that causes root and butt white rot in conifers in northwestern coastal North America, including California, Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, Yukon, and Alaska. G. oregonense is very similar to Ganoderma tsugae, but G. tsugae is associated with east coast Tsuga (hemlock) rather than west coast conifer. Its been speculated that G. oregonense and G. tsugae might actually be one species, but mycologists just don't know for sure yet.
