Macroscopic characters | shape | Sessile; applanate; rarely ungulate |
size | Up to 30 x 20 x 10-12 cm |
texture | Woody to corky |
pileus | Crusty; dark gray to gray-black; smooth; often brown from spore deposit |
stipe | None |
context | Purplish brown; corky |
pore surface | White on fresh specimens; bruising dark brown when injured; becoming dull buff in age |
pores | Circular; 4-6 per mm |
tube layer(s) | Concolorous with context; separated by a layer of context tissue; up to 13.5 mm thick |
Microscopic characters | hyphal system | Trimitic; skeletal hyphae thick-walled, brown, aseptate; binding hyphae rare, thick-walled, hyaline |
clamp connections | Contextual generative hyphae inconspicuous; thin-walled with clamps |
sterile elements | None |
basidiospores | Ovoid; truncate at the distal end with two walls; connected by inter-wall pillars; brown |
Habitat characters | substrate/host | Dead standing trees; stumps and living trees of numerous genera of hardwoods; common on maples and beech in SE US |
seasonality | Perennial |
type of decay | White mottled rot and butt rot of living trtees; also found on dead standing or fallen hardwoods |
range | Apparently throughout the forest regions of the U.S. and Canada; cosmopolitan species |
Notes | |
References | Gilbertson & Ryvarden, 1986; Grand & Vernia, 2005B; Overholts, 1953 |