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Species Information
Summary: {See also Amylocystis lapponica, Leptoporus mollis, Postia fragilis Table.} Features include a light buff bracket-like or shelf-like fruitbody with a tomentose to bristly cap that becomes dark reddish brown on bruising or drying, white angular pores that become dark reddish brown when old, growth on conifer wood, and microscopic characters including amyloid hyphae and cystidia. The description is derived from Gilbertson(1).
Amylocystis lapponica has been found in BC, WA, OR, ID, AB, MB, ON, PQ, AK, AZ, CA, CO, MI, MN, MT, NH, NY, UT, VT, and WY, (Gilbertson).
Cap: up to 15cm wide, bracket-like or bent outward from pore surface flat on wood to form shelf-like cap, semicircular, margin rounded to sharp; light buff, becoming dark reddish brown on bruising or drying, margin colored as rest of cap; tomentose to hispid (with bristles), azonate
Flesh: up to 2cm thick, corky; azonate, pale buff, sometimes with a darker layer near the upper surface
Pores: 3-4 per mm, angular; white when fresh, becoming dark reddish brown when old, bruising or drying; tube layer up to 0.4cm thick, slightly darker than the flesh; tube end walls thin, becoming torn
Taste: slightly bitter, anise-like
Microscopic: spores 8-11 x 2.5-3.5 microns, cylindric, smooth, colorless, inamyloid; basidia 4-spored, 20-25 x 7-8 microns, with basal clamp connection; cystidia abundant, 30-45 x 5-9 microns, projecting to 15 microns, fusiform, mostly thick-walled, moderately to strongly amyloid, some incrusted at apex; hyphal system monomitic, generative hyphae 4-10 microns wide, with abundant clamp connections, mostly thick-walled with a narrow and sinuous lumen, colorless in KOH, weakly to strongly amyloid, tramal hyphae similar, 3-4.5 microns wide, amyloid
Habitat / Range
annual; on conifers, forming a brown cubical rot, and functioning as a decomposer of fallen trees, particularly common on spruce logs and its fruiting bodies develop near melting snow early in spring
Similar Species
The characters of this genus are similar to those of Postia with the exception of the amyloid hyphae and cystidia. Postia fragilis (=Oligoporus fragilis) fruitbodies resemble less robust specimens of A. lapponica and also show the reddish-brown color change on bruising, but P. fragilis lacks the capitately incrusted amyloid cystidia of A. lapponica, spore size is smaller, and pore size is slightly smaller, (Gilbertson). A. lapponica has cylindric spores 8-11 x 2.5-3.5 microns, clamp connections, and amyloid metuloids, Leptoporus mollis has allantoid spores 5-6 x 1.5-2 microns, no clamp connections, and no cystidia, and Postia fragilis has allantoid spores 4-5 x 1-1.5 microns, clamp connections, and no cystidia, (Ginns(25)). Sarcoporia polyspora also stains reddish brown, has elliptic to cylindric spores measuring 5-7 x 2.5-4.0 microns, has clamp connections, and lacks cystidia.
