Heliocybe | |
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Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | Fungi |
Subkingdom: | Dikarya |
Phylum: | Basidiomycota |
Subphylum: | Agaricomycotina |
Class: | Agaricomycetes |
Order: | Gloeophyllales |
Family: | Gloeophyllaceae |
Genus: | Heliocybe |
Species | |
H. sulcata |
Heliocybe is an agaric genus[1] closely allied to Neolentinus and the bracket fungus, Gloeophyllum, all of which cause brown rot of wood.[2][3] Heliocybe sulcata, the type and sole species, is characterized by thumb-sized, tough, revivable, often dried, mushroom fruitbodies, with a tanned symmetric pileus that is radially cracked into a cartoon sun-like pattern of arranged scales and ridges, distant serrated lamellae, and a scaly central stipe. Microscopically it differs from Neolentinus by the absence of clamp connections. Like Neolentinus, it produces abundant, conspicuous pleurocystidia. Heliocybe sulcata typically fruits on decorticated, sun-dried and cracked wood, such as fence posts and rails, vineyard trellises in Europe, branches in slash areas, and semi-arid areas such on sagebrush or on naio branches in rain shadow areas of Hawaii, or in open pine forests.[4][5][6][7]
Heliocybe derives from the Greek helios (= the sun) and cybe (=head), and means "the sun-head". It was coined in reference to its sun-like pattern on its pileus together with its affinity to sun-baked habitats.
In older classifications, H. sulcata[1] was known as Lentinus sulcatus or Panus fulvidus. However, there is strong phylogenetic evidence for the segregation of a group of brown rot causing fungi at the level of order, including Neolentinus and Heliocybe and Gloeophyllum, from the Polyporales where Lentinus and Panus are classified.[2][3][8][9][10] Heliocybe has also been placed into synonymy with Neolentinus, but anatomically they differ by the absence versus the presence of clamp connections[1] and phylogenetically Heliocybe is distinct, being either a sister group to Neolentinus or to a Neolentinus-Gloeophyllum-clade, or allied to Gloeophyllum odoratum.[2][3][9][10]