Summary:
Features include shelf-like or flat growth on conifer wood, thin fruiting bodies, pale tomentose to hairy caps that may be zoned or grooved, a cartilaginous-appearing pinkish to orange pore surface, a gelatinous layer deep to the pores, and microscopic characters including small allantoid spores. "When fresh, the cartilaginous texture and orange to pink mottling on the pore surface are distinctive" (Ginns).
Skeletocutis amorpha has been found in BC, WA, OR, ID, AB, ON, PQ, AR, AZ, CA, CO, MD, ME, MS, MT, NC, NY, OH, PA, SD, TN, TX, VA, WY, and circumglobally, (Gilbertson). It has also been found in Europe and Asia, (Breitenbach).
Cap:
bent outward from flat pore surface to form shelf-like cap, or entirely flat on wood, caps up to 2cm x 4cm x 0.3cm, single or imbricate [shingled], dimidiate [roughly semicircular] to elongate, thin and coriaceous [leathery], often laterally fused; whitish to gray or pale buff, zoned or not zoned; tomentose to appressed-hirsute, smooth to deeply grooved, (Gilbertson), growing flat on wood (easily detached), to shelf-like, the individual small caps bracket-like or conchate, up to 2.5cm along wood and projecting up to 1cm; gray-whitish; weakly zoned, finely tomentose, smooth; cap margin sharp and whitish, (Breitenbach)
Flesh:
up to 0.1cm thick, "consisting of a soft, fibrous upper layer and a firm, cartilaginous lower layer", (Gilbertson), total thickness of fruitbody up to 0.2cm, flesh duplex, upper layer fibrous and whitish, lower layer gelatinous (glassy and brittle when dry) and yellowish, (Breitenbach)
Pores:
6-8 per mm, circular to angular, thin-walled; pinkish buff to reddish orange, surface with a cartilaginous appearance; tube layer up to 0.1cm thick, colored as the lower layer of the flesh and continuous with it, (Gilbertson), 3-4 per mm, rounded angular; "whitish when young, then yellow-pink to orange-pink, salmon-colored"; tube layer up to 0.1cm thick, (Breitenbach)
Taste:
slightly bitter, (Gilbertson), indistinct (Breitenbach)
Microscopic:
spores 3-4.5 x 1.3-1.8 microns, allantoid [curved sausage-shaped], smooth, inamyloid, colorless; basidia 4-spored, 14-16 x 4-5 microns, clavate, with basal clamp; cystidia none; cystidioles present, 12-18.5 microns x 3.5-4.5 microns, fusoid, thin-walled, not incrusted, with basal clamp; hyphae dimitic, generative hyphae of context 2-6 microns wide, colorless, becoming thick-walled, with clamp connections, skeletal hyphae of context 3-6 microns, colorless, thick-walled, nonseptate, with rare branching; hyphae of trama similar, (Gilbertson), spores 3-4 x 1-1.5 microns, cylindric, allantoid, smooth, inamyloid, colorless, (Breitenbach)
Spore Deposit:
white (Buczacki)
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