Phlebia radiata
What You Should Know
Phlebia radiate is a common species of crust fungus in the family Meruliaceae. It grows as a wrinkled, orange to pinkish waxy crust on the decaying wood of coniferous and deciduous trees, in which it causes a white rot. It is a saprophytic species and causes a white rot in the wood it colonizes, fallen logs and branches of both coniferous and hardwood trees.
The fungus can degrade isolated lignins, lignin-like aromatic compounds, and xenobiotics, and is an efficient producer of bioethanol, CAZymes and lignin-modifying enzymes on solid wood-based substrates. The biotechnological potential of the species is thereby wide and supportive as a reference for studies on other fungal species of the phlebioid clade of Polyporales.
Other names: Wrinkled Crust.
Phlebia radiata Mushroom Identification
Ecology
Saprobic; spreading across logs and stumps of hardwoods or conifers; annual; causing a white rot; spring, summer, fall, and winter; widely distributed in North America.
Fruiting Body
1-10 cm or more across; irregular in outline; up to about 3 mm thick; surface wrinkled, with the wrinkles and folds radiating from a more or less central point; orange to pink (more rarely tan with orangish edges, or purplish); occasionally developing a slightly folded-over, hairy edge.
Spore Print
White.
Microscopic Features
Spores 4-5.5 x 1.5-2 µ; smooth; sausage-shaped; inamyloid. Cystidia cylindric to clavate; up to about 100 x 10 µ. Clamp connections are present.
Similar Species
Include Botryobasidium vagum, Meruliporia incrassata, Piloderma bicolor, and Serpula lacrymans.
Phlebia radiata Taxonomy and Etymology
In 1821, when Elias Magnus Fries described this corticioid species he gave it the binomial scientific name Phlebia radiata - the name by which this crust fungus is still known today.
Synonyms of Phlebia radiata include Auricularia aurantiaca Sowerby, Merulius merismoides Fr., and Phlebia aurantiaca (Sowerby) J. Schröt.
Phlebia, the genus name, comes from the Greek phleps, phleb- meaning or pertaining to veins.
The specific epithet radiata is a reference to the ray-like wrinkles or folds which spread out from the center.
Sources:
Photo 1 - Author: Michel Langeveld (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International)
Photo 2 - Author: Holger Krisp (Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported)
Photo 3 - Author: Michel Langeveld (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International)
Photo 4 - Author: Michel Langeveld (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International)
Photo 5 - Author: Michel Langeveld (Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International)
