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Species Information
Summary: Features include tough, thin, circular chestnut brown to blackish cap that becomes depressed, small white to pale buff pores, central to lateral stem that is brown at top and black at base or entirely black, and microscopic characters including generative hyphae without clamp connections. Polyporus badius is the only North American Polyporus without clamp connections, but generative hyphae and their septa can be difficult to find, (Ginns). The online Species Fungorum, accessed February 21, 2012, gives the current name as Royoporus badius (Pers.) A.B. De, Mycotaxon 65: 471 (1997), but by September 3, 2018 had changed to Picipes badius (Pers.) Zmitr. & Kovalenko, International Journal of Medicinal Mushrooms (Redding) 18(1): 35 (2016). MycoBank, accessed the same day in 2018, gave the current name as Polyporus badius. The separation of Royoporus is based on morphology - while Polyporus is apparently not monophyletic, the issue will likely be decided by molecular studies.
Polyporus badius is found in BC, WA, OR, ID, also AB, MB, NT, NB, NF, NS, ON, PQ, SK, AK, AL, AR, AZ, CA, CO, CT, IA, IL, IN, KS, KY, MA, MD, ME, MI, MO, MT, NC, NH, NY, OH, PA, TN, VT, WI, and WV, (Gilbertson), and Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia, (Breitenbach).
Cap: up to 15cm, circular or fan-shaped; "light chestnut brown to dark blackish brown, often darker in center", not zoned; bald, smooth or wrinkled on drying, (Gilbertson), 4-20cm, convex becoming depressed or umbilicate; tan to chestnut-brown to dark reddish brown or often becoming blackish when old; margin usually paler and often lobed, (Arora), "radially striate, pale chestnut brown or dark red brown, almost black when old, azonate, glabrous, smooth or rugose", (Ginns)
Flesh: up to 1.5cm thick, corky, not zoned; pale buff, (Gilbertson), very thin, tough when fresh, rigid when dry; white becoming brownish, (Arora)
Pores: 5-8 per mm, circular to angular, decurrent; white to pale buff; tube layer up to 0.1cm, white when young to slightly darker than flesh, (Gilbertson), 4-7 per mm, adnate to somewhat decurrent; white when fresh, brownish when old; tube layer thin, (Arora)
Stem: up to 5cm thick [sic], lateral to central; brown at top, black at base; bald at top, minutely tomentose at base, (Gilbertson), 1-6cm x 0.3-1.5cm, central to lateral, tough, more or less equal; pallid in upper part and black in lower part, or more often black throughout, (Arora)
Odor: pleasant (Breitenbach), none (Miller)
Taste: mild (Breitenbach)
Microscopic: spores 7.5-9 x 3.3-5 microns, cylindric, smooth, inamyloid, colorless; basidia 4-spored, 20-30 x 7-9 microns, clavate with narrow base; simple-septate at base; cystidia absent, fusoid cystidioles present, 17-19 x 5-7 microns, septate at base, hyphal pegs usually present; hyphae dimitic, generative hyphae of context 3-5 microns wide, thin-walled, simple-septate, inconspicuous in mature specimens, skeletal hyphae of context "thick-walled, aseptate, 2-7 with occasional branching", binding hyphae of context 3-5 microns wide, "thick-walled, aseptate, much branched"; hyphae of trama similar, (Gilbertson), spores 5-9 x 3-4 microns, cylindric to elliptic, smooth, (Arora)
Spore Deposit: white (Arora)
Habitat / Range
annual, single or clustered, on dead wood of hardwoods and conifers, associated with a white rot, (Gilbertson), single or in groups on rotting hardwoods or occasionally conifers, (Arora), on stumps and logs of hardwoods, on ground on buried wood, also reported on conifer wood, (Lincoff(2)), found in summer and fall (Miller)
Similar Species
Polyporus elegans has a paler and often smaller cap, does not have an entirely black stem, and is more common on branches and sticks as opposed to P. badius which often grows on logs and stumps, (Arora). P. elegans can have an entirely black stem, but its cap is not radially striate, pores are 5-7 per mm, and spores measure 7.5-10 x 2.5-3 microns, (Ginns). P. elegans is tan to chestnut brown, and generative hyphae have clamp connections, (Gilbertson). Polyporus varius is intermediate in color between P. badius and Polyporus elegans, "is often strikingly radially streaked with lighter colours", and has relatively large spores, (Ginns). P. varius has a radially streaked cap and is intermediate in color between P. badius and P. elegans, (Arora). P. varius has a cap with radial striations and generative hyphae have clamp connections (Gilbertson). Polyporus melanopus often fruits on the ground, and has generative hyphae with clamp connections, (Gilbertson). P. melanopus is similar in color but pores are larger at 3-4 per mm, and it fruits on the ground, (Ginns).
