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Species Information
Summary: Features include 1) resupinate growth on wood, 2) fruitbodies that are ocher-brown to dark brown, membranous, and 0.05-1cm thick, with the margin finely fringed and lighter to whitish in color, 3) spores that are ovoid, smooth, inamyloid, light brown, and thick-walled, and 4) a monomitic hyphal system, the hyphae without clamp connections.
Coniophora puteana has been found in BC, WA, OR, ID, AB, MB, NB, NF, NS, ON, PE, PQ, SK, YT, AK, AR, AZ, CA, CO, DC, IA, IL, MA, ME, MI, MO, MT, NH, NJ, NM, NY, OH, PA, TN, VA, VT, and WV, (Ginns). It is also found in Europe including Switzerland, and Asia, (Breitenbach).
Fruiting body: resupinate, starting as small rounded spots, then forming patches 0.05-0.1cm thick and several centimeters to decimeters across, attached tightly, consistency membranous, fibrous, and soft; cream-colored in center when young, then ocher-brown to dark brown; "smooth to irregularly verrucose-tuberculate"; "lighter to whitish toward the margin, margin finely fringed", (Breitenbach), 4-40cm across, circular to elongate, spreading sheet-like on wood; "brownish, becoming olive-yellow, and yellowish to cottony-white along margin", (surface also described as "yellowish, becoming olive to bronze"); "smooth to uneven, wavy or bumpy", with low, broad, dome-shaped warts and projecting rhizomorphs; flesh 0.03-0.1cm thick, (Lincoff), spore deposit pale buff brown (Buczacki)
Microscopic: SPORES 10-13 x 7-8 microns, ovoid, smooth, light brown, not amyloid or dextrinoid but cyanophilic, thick-walled; BASIDIA 4-spored, 65-80 x 8-10 microns, cylindric-clavate, without basal clamp connection; CYSTIDIA not seen; HYPHAE monomitic 3-10 microns wide, thin-walled to thick-walled, sometimes sparsely encrusted, septa without clamp connections, (Breitenbach), SPORES 10-14 x 6-7 microns, elliptic, smooth, olive-brown, thick-walled, with cyanophilic inner wall, (Lincoff)
Habitat / Range
on dead conifer wood and hardwood, more rarely a wound parasite on living trees, summer to fall, (Breitenbach), on logs, dead stems, causes a brown cubical rot, causes dry rot, destroys boards and timbers in buildings, causes heart rot, less commonly a root rot, in live conifers, hosts include hardwoods and conifers, (Ginns), on coniferous and hardwood logs, also on standing timbers in buildings, especially in cellars and wet areas, causes discoloration and cracking of wood, requires dampness to grow, (Lincoff), all year (Buczacki)
Similar Species
Coniophora arida has practically the same microscopic characters as C. puteana, and the two differ only in the thickness of the fruitbodies, in the nature of the surface, and the dextrinoid or non-dextrinoid spores, (Breitenbach). Coniophora olivacea is thinner, has smaller spores, and has cystidia, (Luther(4)). See also SIMILAR section of Serpula lacrimans.
