Sebacina incrustans

Description

Sebacina incrustans is the species in the genus Sebacina. It appears to be an ectomycorrhizal fungus associated with trees, orchids and ericoid plants. Fruiting bodies are gelatinous and envelope twigs, leaves, grass blades and other forest debris. Spores print is white. It is in the Sebacinaceae family of the Sebacinales order.

It is engulfs everything in its path (plant stems, leaves, twigs, whatever) covering surfaces with a thin, waxy, whitish crust. It is a jelly fungus, but its consistency is not particularly jelly-like.

Common names: Enveloping Crust.

Mushroom Identification

1. Ecology

   Mycorrhizal with hardwoods; growing in amorphous masses on the ground, engulfing leaves, twigs, plant stems, and so on; summer and fall, or overwinter in warm climates; originally described from Germany; widely distributed in North America from the Great Plains eastward, southward into Mexico, but absent from western North America; also known from Europe, Asia, and Oceania.

2. Fruiting Body

   A thin crust up to 1 mm thick, spreading in patches up to 8 cm across; surface waxy to the touch, whitish to slightly yellowish or pinkish in places, especially with age; under a hand lens appearing finely fimbriate at the edges; flesh cartilaginous.

3. Dried Specimens

   Dull brownish-yellow.

4. Microscopic Features

   Hyphae 2–4 µm wide; smooth; slightly thick-walled; septate; hyaline in KOH; without clamp connections. My collections have been immature, so the remaining microscopic details come from Breitenbach & Kränzlin (1986): Spores 14–18 x 9–10 µm; broadly ellipsoid; smooth; hyaline. Basidia 17–22 x 10–12 µm; 4-sterigmate, with long, fingerlike sterigmata (to 70 µm long); longitudinally septate.

5. Similar Species

   Include Sebacina epigaea, which is whitish-translucent (and, under the microscope, features irregular, star-shaped "resting spores"), and Helvellosebacina concrescens, which is thicker, more globular and lobed, and tends to limit itself to climbing upright plant stems.

Photo sources:

Photo 1 - Author: Jerzy Opioła (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 2 - Author: James Lindsey (CC BY-SA 2.5)

Photo 3 - Author: Jerzy Opioła (CC BY-SA 4.0)