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Species Information
Summary:
Not available
Fruiting body: 1-10cm high, spore-bearing upper part flattened laterally, spatula-like or fan-like, running down opposite sides of stem; "pallid when young becoming pale yellow to yellow, buff, or cinnamon-buff to brownish (or occasionally pale orangish)"; surface at sides "smooth or wrinkled, sometimes lobed or contorted or with a notched apex", (Arora), 1-8cm high, spathulate or rarely compressed-clavate, arising from whitish or pale mycelium; spore-bearing upper part up to 3cm wide, usually much compressed [flattened], rarely flattened - club-shaped, more or less decurrent on opposite sides of the stem; light yellow to cinnamon-buff; smooth, undulate [wavy], rugose [wrinkled], sometimes lobed or contorted, (Mains), fertile head 1/2 to 2/3 the height of the fruitbody (Breitenbach)
Flesh: white, not gelatinous, (Arora)
Stem: (1)2-8cm x 0.2-1cm, variable in shape but often thicker at base, usually hollow; white to yellowish or colored like upper part but usually paler; smooth to finely mealy but not velvety, with white to pale yellow mycelium at base, (Arora), round in cross-section or somewhat compressed [flattened] in upper part; whitish, pale yellow to cinnamon-buff; bald, thinly byssoid or matted-tomentose, (Mains)
Microscopic: spores 30-75(95) x 1.5-3 microns, needle-like, smooth, with 0-several septa, colorless under microscope but often yellow-brown in mass, especially when dry, (Arora), ascospores very variable in size 30-95 x 1.5-2.5 microns, acicular [needle-like], rounded in upper part, gradually narrowing in lower part, "0-several-septate, commonly continuous, the wall with a gelatinous layer swelling to 1.5-3 microns thick; conidia subspherical, ellipsoid or obovoid, 1-2 x 1-1.5 microns, 1-celled, hyaline, produced by the ascophores on sterigmata, sometimes replacing the ascospores and filling the asci"; asci 85-125 x 8-12 microns, clavate; paraphyses filiform [thread-like], simple or branched in lower part, not or irregularly branched in upper part, strongly curved or circinate [twisted round, coiled] or straight in upper part, colorless, (Mains), spores 35-65 x 2-3 microns, narrowly clavate to broadly filiform, colorless, multiseptate with scattered oil droplets, arranged parallel within asci; asci 8-spored, 100-125 x 11.5-14 microns, clavate, inamyloid; paraphyses slender, compound, tips spiraled and bent, (Castellano)
Habitat / Range
"scattered to gregarious or even clustered, sometimes in lines or circles, on humus or rotten wood under conifers (especially pine) or sometimes hardwoods", (Arora), cespitose [in tufts], gregarious, or scattered, sometimes growing in circles, on humus and rotten wood, (Mains)
Similar Species
Spathularia velutipes (Spathulariopsis velutipes), found at least in ON, MI, NC, NH, NY, and TN, differs from S. flavida by having orange mycelium and a dark brown farinaceous stem and by having a well-developed veil that often persists along the margin of the spore-bearing surface or less frequently as patches on it, (Mains). The spore-bearing tissue of S. velutipes is slightly duller in color and stem is brown and velvety, Castellano(2). |Pachycudonia spathulata (=Spathularia spathulata) is known from CA, with reports from OR, AK, YT, ME, MI, TN, and VA on MyCoPortal. It has fruiting bodies that vary from spathulate to capitate (with a head), short spores (18-26 x 2 microns), and asci that are narrowed in lower part, (Mains). It is described and illustrated in Siegel(3). |Neolecta and Mitrula species are somewhat similar, but S. flavida is less brightly colored and has a more consistently flattened head, (Arora).
