AGARIC - a gilled mushroom

AMMONIA FUNGI - ecologically grouped fungi characteristic of terrestrial sites rich in ammonia, sometimes associated with corpses, urine, faeces

AMYLOID - for fungal structures, a positive reaction (bluish to black) when treated with iodine such as in Melzer's reagent or Lugol's solution

ANNULUS - an attached to loose ring of cottony or membranous veil tissue left on the stem of a mushroom after expansion of the cap

APHYLLOPHORALES - an order of basidiomycetes generally characterized by a hymenium which does not form lamellae like an agaric

APOTHECIA - a cup-shaped fruitbody of an Ascomycetes

ASCUS (PL. ASCI) - reproductive cell characterizing the ascomycetes where meiosis takes place followed by the internal formation of ascospores

ASCOCARPS - an Ascomycete fruitbody

ASCOSPORES - spores formed in asci

ASCOMYCETES - see Ascomycotina

ASCOMYCOTA - fungi characterized by the formation of asci and ascospores

BASIDIOCARPS - a Basidiomycete fruitbody

BASIDIOLICHENS - a lichen where the fungal partner is a Basidiomycete

BASIDIOMYCETES - see Basidiomycotina

BASIDIOMYCOTA - fungi characterized by the formation of basidia and basidiospores

BASIDIOSPORES - spores formed on basidia usually following meiosis

BIRD'S NEST FUNGI - Nidulariales, an order of Basidiomycetes characterized by fruitbodies resembling miniature bird's nests with "eggs"

BOLETES - Boletales, an order of Basidiomycetes characterized by fleshy, putrescent, pileate fruitbodies having fertile masses tubes under their caps

BROWN ROTS - for wood decaying fungi, species which preferentially digest cellulose in wood leaving a brownish residue primarily consisting of lignin

BRYOPHILOUS - living on or with bryophytes

BRYOPHYTES - mosses, liverworts, leafy liverworts

BUTT - off a tree, the flared out base of the trunk

CANKERS - a distorted, infected woody growth on trees induced by parasites

CARTILAGINOUS - for fungi, tissue, often in a stem, having the consistency of cartilage

CHLAMYDOSPORES - a thick-walled resting asexual fungal spore formed terminally or in hyphal segments

CLAVAROID - club or coral shaped Basidiomycete fruitbodies

CONKS - woody, perennial basidiomycete fruitbodies on trees and often hoof shaped

COPROPHILOUS - living on dung

CORIACEOUS - for fungi, having a consistency of leather

CORTEX - sterile tissue forming the outer layer of a fruitbody

CORTICATED - referring to woody plant substrates having bark in place

CUP FUNGI - Ascomycetes with cup-shaped fruitbodies (apothecia)

CYPHELLACEOUS - Basidiomycetes with cup-shaped fruitbodies

CYPHELLOID - see cyphellaceous

DECORTICATED - referring to woody plant substrates which have had bark removed

DIKARYON - a nuclear state found only in basidiomycetes following fusion of compatible mating strains wherein the compatible nuclei are paired throughout the vegetative mycelium.

DIKARYOTIZE - to form a dikaryon

DISCOMYCETES - cup fungi

DISCOMYCETOLOGISTS - one who studies discomycetes

EARTH STARS - puffballs, mostly in Geastrum, in which the outer peridium splits into radiating triangles

ECTOMYCORRHIZAE -a symbiotic condition between the roots of a vascular plant and a fungus which forms an external sheath around the root tips in addition to a net work a round its cortical cells

FAA SOLUTION - Formalin (13 ml), glacial acetic acid (5 ml), 50% ethyl alcohol (200 ml)

FALSE PUFFBALLS - Scleroderma a genus in the Sclerodermataceae rather than the Lycoperdales, true puffballs

FALSE TRUFFLES - basidiomycetes such as the genus Rhizopogon which resemble truffles

FALSE MORELS - morel like ascomycetes in genera like Gyromitra and not a species in the genus Morchella

FIREPLACE FUNGI - fungi commonly and sometimes exclusively found in and around burned ground and vegetation (see pyrophilous fungi)

FLUSH - for fungi, a nearly synchronous crop of many fruitbodies followed by a period of fewer or no fruitbodies

FRUCTIFICATIONS - fruitbodies

FRUITBODIES - macroscopic fleshy or woody reproductive organs formed by fungi in or on which spore are formed by either asci or basidia, rarely by other means

FUNGISTATIC - a chemical which inhibits fungal growth

GASTEROMYCETE - a group of basidiomycetes which form spores internally, usually in membrane bound sacs, and which do not actively discharge basidiospores from the basidia

GILLS - radiating plate-like spore bearing organs on the underside of mushroom caps (lamellae)

GLEBA - fertile, sometimes powdery, sometimes gelatinous spore laden contents of gasteromycete or truffle fruitbodies

HEART ROT - with regard to wood decay, a condition where the heart wood decays ahead of the sapwood

HYMENIUM - an often membrane like layer of either basidia or asci which forms the fertile surfaces on fungal fruitbodies

HYMENOPHORE - either the entire fruitbody or the portion of the fruitbody which bears the hymenium

HYPHAE (SING. HYPHA) - filamentous cells of a fungus thallus

HYPOGEOUS FUNGI - fungi which fruit below ground

IN SITU - in place where naturally occurring

INNER VEIL - fungal tissue which does not cover the entire fruitbody but which does cover the developing hymenium (often the gills), and which tears open leaving remnants on the stem and/or the cap margin as a cortina, annulus, bands, patches, or hanging marginal scales

INOPERCULATE - with regard to ascomycetes, those with thin-walled asci lacking an operculum and which are not double walled, i.e. bitunicate

JELLY FUNGI - basidiomycetes such as Tremellales, Dacrymycetales, and Auriculariales, with gelatinous fruitbodies

LACTESCENT - exuding latex when cut

LAMELLAE - see gills

LAMELLULAE - short gills near the cap margin which do not reach all the way to the stem and which are inserted between full sized gills (lamellae)

LATEX - with regard to fungi, a milky liquid which is exuded and coagulates into rubber when the fruitbody is cut

LIGNICOLOUS - growing on or in wood

MACROFUNGI - fungi which form macroscopically visible fruitbodies usually over one centimetre in height or width

MELZER'S REAGENT - a stain containing iodine which causes amyloid or dextrinoid reactions (chloral hydrate 100 gm, potassium iodide 5 gm, iodine 1.5 gm, distilled water 100 ml)

MICROFUNGI - fungi which do not form fruitbodies or form minute fruitbodies

MONOKARYON - the haploid unpaired nuclear state of fungi which form dikaryons

MORELS - fleshy fruitbodies of the genus Morchella which resemble coarsely pitted cones or sponges on a stalk

MUMMIFIED FRUITS - with regard to fungal parasitism, fruits from a host plant which are infested by a fungus and which dry like a mummy to form a type of false sclerotium

MUSHROOM - a general loosely defined term for fleshy fungal fruitbodies, usually bearing gills

MYCELIUM - the cottony or net-like vegetative thallus of a fungus which consists of many filamentous hyphae

MYCOFLORA - fungal species in a region or habitat (mycota)

MYCOPHAGOUS - that which eats fungi

MYCORRHIZAL - that which forms mycorrhizae

PCR - polymerase chain reaction, a methodology used to produce multiple copies of selected segments of DNA molecules

PERENNIAL FRUITBODIES - fruitbodies which last more than one year and usually increase in size by the addition of layers

PERIDIUM - with regard to fungi, the outer layer of a fruitbody

PETRI PLATES - a glass or plastic sterilized shallow cylindrical dish with an overhanging matching lid used for holding sterilized media for growing microorganisms

PILEATE - having a pileus or cap

PILEUS (PL. PILEI) - a cap as in a mushroom cap

PINK-SPORED - with regard to basidiomycetes, species having a pink spore deposit

PLEUROTOID - with regard to mushrooms, species lacking or nearly lacking a` stipe, eccentrically attached, often fan to spathulate shaped, often on wood

POLYPORES - basidiomycetes in the Aphyllophorales, but not the fleshy boletes, which form fruitbodies having many pores on the underside, which are the mouths of fertile tubes

POLYTRICHOID - mosses in the Poltrichaceae, eg. Polytrichum, Atrichum

PRIMARY DECAY FUNGI - the first decay fungi to attack sound wood

PROTEOPHILOUS FUNGI - fungi which colonize protein rich substrates such as animal matter

PSEUDOCOLUMELLA - the extension of a stipe into the gleba of some fungi, especially gasteromycetes, which is still recognizable as stipe tissue

PSEUDORHIZA - the radicating base of certain mushrooms which resembles a root but is actually an ascending organ which gave rise to the fruitbody

PUFFBALLS - a group of gasteromycetes, mainly the genera Lycoperdon, Calvatia, and Bovista, which when dried have thin flexible perdidial walls, and dry powdery spores which are discharged in clouds often by a bellows effect

PYROPHILOUS FUNGI - fungi associated with burned sites (see fireplace fungi)

RADICATING - a mushroom with a pseudorhiza

REVIVABLE - with regard to fungi, fruitbodies which shrink when dried but remain viable and revive when rewetted

RHIZOMORPHS - root-like fungal organs with differentiated cortices and which grow from one food source to another, eg. the "shoe strings" of Armillaria species

SAPROPHYTIC - living on dead matter

SCLEROTIA - a multicellular resting or storage fungal organ, usually with a cortex and not incorporating host tissue

SECONDARY COLONIZERS - fungi which replace primary colonizers

SNOW BANKS - snow drifts at high elevation which melt after most of the ground cover has run off

SPORE PRINT - a powdery deposit of fungal spores which forms an image of the hymenophore, eg. gills or pores, when the living fungus is placed over another surface

SPORES - microscopic reproductive structures, either sexually or asexually produced, and consisting of one to several cells, but not hundreds of cells

SPOROCARPS - fungal fruitbodies

SPOROPHORES - fungal fruitbodies

STALKED PUFFBALLS - a group of puffballs with long stems, eg. Tulostoma, Chlamydopus

STINKHORNS - a group of gasteromycetes, the Phallales, which produce fragile rapidly expanding erect tissues partially coated in slimy, foul smelling, sweet tasting mucilage laden with spores which are dispersed by insects such as flies and beetles which attracted to the fruitbodies

STIPE - the stem on fungal fruitbodies

STIPITATE - have a stipe or stem

STROMATA - a mass, mound or growth of sterile fleshy tissue on or in which are produced many small ascocarps

SUBICULUM - a cottony to membranous sheet of tissue on or in which many small fruitbodies are formed

TRANSLUCENT STRIATE -the radially striate pattern formed by the lamellae on a mushroom cap as viewed through the translucent surface

TROOPS - with regard to fungal fruitings, occurring in masses as many distinct individuals in a compact area, literally looking like "troops" with helmets

TRUFFLES - ,hypogeous ascomycete fruitbodies resembling plant tubers, usually highly aromatic when mature and prized as food by man and animals

TUBES - with regard to fungal fruitbodies, tubular structures lined on the inner surface with basidia

UNIVERSAL VEIL - sterile fungal tissue, often membranous, cottony or granular, which envelops the young fruitbody and is torn open or apart during expansion of the fruitbody. Remnants may form scales on the cap, scales`on the stem or lower annulus surface or a volva.

VOLVA - remnants of a universal veil at the base of a stem which when most highly developed forms a membranous sac, but which may also be fragile, cottony, or granular in nature

VOLVATE - having a volva

WHITE ROT - for wood decaying fungi, species which at first digests lignin in wood fibre creating a paler, whiter patch of decayed wood prior to complete digestion of the cellulose component