Scaly Rustgill

Gymnopilus sapineus

On coniferous snags, stumps, branches. Summer, autumn.

Fruiting bodies medium-sized and larger. Cap grows up to 10 cm across, fibrous, scaly, yellowish-brown. Gills greenish-yellow, broadly adnate. Stem up to 8 cm long and 1 cm thick, yellow near the gills, greyish-brownish below, covered with white mycelial fluff at the base, without a ring. Flesh yellow, very bitter, with an unpleasant smell. Characteristic features: the fungus tastes very bitter when chewed. Grows only on dead pine and spruce wood. Appears in small groups. Very common. Inedible. About 10 species of Gymnopilus grow in Lithuania; because of their bitter taste all are inedible, and some are even mildly poisonous. Honey fungi are not bitter, their caps are more or less scaly, their stems have rings and are fibrous; they do not resemble rustgills.