Yellow Brain

Tremella mesenterica

On rotten deciduous wood (stumps, snags, windfalls, branches). All year round.

Fruiting bodies small, 2-5 (6) cm across, round, irregularly shaped, curly, deeply wrinkled, brain-like lumps. Young ones orange-yellow, fading with age to sulphur-yellow, yellowish, whitish, of jelly-like consistency. Flesh gelatinous, later soft, and when old even deliquescent, flabby. When dried, they revive after rain or after light frosts (down to -10 C) and continue to grow. Grows in forests and parks all year round, even in winter, on felled deciduous trees, especially on aspen and birch branches, snags and windfalls. Inedible, very common.