Gloeophyllum sepiarium
No, it's not a piece of bacon… it's Gloeophyllum sepiarium, found on a rotting log in the Northwest Territories (Canada).
Credit: Todd Paget
Classification
Kingdom Fungi
Phylum Basidiomycota
Class Basidiomycetes
Order Polyporales
Family Gloeophyllaceae
Genus Gloeophyllum
Agaricus asserculorum Batsch
Agaricus boletiformis Sowerby
Agaricus sepiarius Wulfen
Agaricus undulatus Hoffm.
Daedalea confragosa var. tricolor (Fr.) Domański
(Aphyllophorales), Skórnikowate (Stereaceae)
Daedalea sepiaria (Wulfen) Fr.
Daedalea ungulata Lloyd
Gloeophyllum ungulatum (Lloyd) Imazeki
Lenzites argentina Speg.
Lenzites sepiaria (Wulfen) Fr.
Merulius sepiarius (Wulfen) Schrank
Rusty gilled polypore
Yellow-red gill polypore
Conifer mazegill
Zaunblattling (German)
Fruiting body: up to 7 cm wide and 12 cm long; 0.5-1 cm thick; dark brown, margin orange to yellow or white when growing; fan-shaped; shelf-like; surface smooth to hairy.
Gills: densely and radially arranged, often fused together irregularly to give a maze-like appearance; ochre to brown; 1.5-2 per mm.
Spores: cylindric, 9–12.5 x 3–4.5 µm (a couple of photos of spores are available for viewing at Bioimages)
Spore print: white.
Habit and habitat: solitary or grouped on woods of conifers and hardwoods, causes brown rot. Jun-Nov. Found throughout North America and Europe.
Inedible.
Anti-tumor effects
The culture mycelia and fruit bodies of G. sepiarium showed 80% and 60% inhibition against Sarcoma 180 cancer, respectively, while the fruit bodies showed 60% inhibition against Ehrlich solid cancer (Ohtsuka et al., 1973).
Links
References
Ohtsuka S, Ueno S, Yoshikumi C, Hirose F, Ohmura Y, Wada T, Fujii T, Takahashi E.
Polysaccharides having an anticarcinogenic effect and a method of producing them from species of Basidiomycetes.
UK Patent 1331513, 26 September 1973.
Last modified: 17-Aug-2008
