Species Focus - Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria) and Earthstars (Geastrum)

Fungi are a complicated group of species to identify at times and with many look-a-likes it can often take several years to get to grips with even the commoner species. There are, however, some obvious and iconic species that are great for a newcomer to the world of mushrooms and other fungi to go out, find and identify.

The Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria) is such a species, the ultimate ‘fairy tale’ mushroom with a red cap and white spots, this species appears to be having a good fruiting year. If you are out and about in the coming weeks keep an eye out for this beautiful mushroom under Birch, Pine and Spruce as these are some of its more favoured hosts.

There are another group of fungi that I would like you to look for. The Earthstars (Geastrum). These weird and fascinating fungi start like a bulb, but the outer skin unfurls to become ‘legs’ revealing a sac of spores on top. We have a number of species of Earthstar in North Wales and at this time of year it can be fun to seek them out. For now we would be interested in any records of any species of Earthstar and if you are unsure of their identify you can always submit photos on Cofnod and one of the fungi verifiers will help you identify them.

They occur in a variety of habitats depending on the species, but most of the species have been recorded in cemeteries and graveyards across the region. This is the place to look and I have had great success looking under Yew trees in older cemeteries and have found at least 5 species of Earthstar in the last few years.

The Collared Earthstar (Geastrum michelianum, formerly G. triplex) is the commonest, whilst Striated Earthstar (Geastrum striatum) and Crowned Earthstar (Geastrum coronatum) are the next most recorded. You may even find something really unusual like Geastrum britannicum, a species that was only described a few years ago and currently the only records come from a handful of sites around the UK; it was found in NE Wales a few years ago.

Please let us know about any species of fungi you find in North Wales by submitting your finds, with photographs, to the LERC Wales App or the Cofnod ORS. This way it will help us build up our knowledge of one the most important, yet under recorded, branches of the natural world.