Top 20 Most Common Mushrooms in Lecce

The color of green brittlegill (Russula aeruginea) caps is quite unusual for a genus named for its usually-reddish color. They appear in small scattered groups under trees or skirting forest edges. The green brittlegill is particularly associated with birch trees.

The cap can be up to 15 cm (6 in) in diameter, and is white to ivory, or silver-grey in colour. It is covered in raised pyramidal warts, that become less well defined, and less frequent towards the margin. These are remnants of the universal veil which covers the mushroom in its earliest stages. The young buttons are darker, and sometimes shaped like a two tier loaf, with a ring of raised scales around the base. The white to ivory stipe is 8–16 cm (3–6.5 in) high and 2–3 cm (1–1 in) wide, with several rings of upturned scales towards the bulbous base. It is fairly deeply rooted, often laterally below the surface. The ring is thin and fragile, often adhering to the stipe. The gills are cream, but sometimes have a slight green tint. They are largely free of the stipe, but sometimes have a small decurrent tooth. The flesh is white, and is said to have an unpleasant smell.

This large, tough shelf fungus can be found attached to birch, beech, and sycamore trees. It gets its common name, tinder fungus, from the fact that it burns quite slowly and can thus be used effectively for lighting fires. Dried pieces can also be a useful desiccant. A piece of this fungus was found in the possession of Otzi the Iceman, indicating that its usefulness has been known for millenia.

The distinctively-striped turkey tail fungus grows on stumps and logs all over the forests of the northern hemisphere. It is, in fact, probably the most common species you will find. That doesn't mean this mushroom is plain, however; each cap is uniquely patterned. Look for bands of alternating textures as well as color.

Growing wild in the northern hemisphere and introduced to Australia, the saffron milk cap is found in pine forests during autumn. As the name implies, these mushrooms have been harvested for cooking for a long time. They have been known to cause stomach upset in some individuals, however, and carry a risk of being contaminated with heavy metals, so forage with caution.

This clustered, overlapping fungus is found all over the world, and is considered native across both the northern and southern hemispheres. Both its common name, hairy curtain crust, and its scientific name, Stereum hirsutum, aptly describe its most obvious features: it is quite tough (stereum) and the younger fruitbodies are notably hairy (hirsutum).

The weeping bolete features a greasy, sticky cap surface. When young, milky droplets are released through pores on its surface. It appears most commonly beneath Scots pine or other coniferous trees and forms a mutually beneficial relationship with its host.

The fruit bodies start their development underground or buried in leaf debris, linked to a strand of mycelium at the base. As they mature, the exoperidium (the outer tissue layer of the peridium) splits open into 7 to 14 rays which curve backward; this pushes the fruit body above the substrate. Fully opened specimens can reach dimensions of 2–12 cm (0.8–4.7 in) from ray tip to tip. The rays are of unequal size, with tips that often roll back inward. They comprise three distinct layers of tissue. The inner pseudoparenchymatous layer (so named for the resemblance to the tightly packed cells of plant parenchyma) is fleshy and thick when fresh, and initially pale beige but darkening to yellow or brown as it matures, often cracking and peeling off in the process. The exterior mycelial layer, often matted with fine leaf debris or dirt, usually cracks to reveal a middle fibrous layer, which is made of densely packed hyphae 1–2.5 μm wide. The base of the fruit body is concave to vaulted in shape, and often covered with adhering dirt. The roughly spherical spore sac (endoperidium) measures 1–5 cm (0.4–2.0 in) in diameter, and is supported by a cluster of short columns shaped like flattened spheres. It is gray-brown in color, and minutely roughened with small, lightly interconnected warts. There are several to many evenly dispersed mouths, the ostioles, mainly on the upper half of the endoperidium. They are roughly circular with fimbriate edges. The inedible fruit bodies have no distinct taste, although dried specimens develop an odor resembling curry powder or bouillon cubes. Like many earthstars, the fungus uses the force of falling raindrops to help disperse the spores, which are ejected in little bursts when objects (such as rain) strike the outer wall of the spore sac. The gleba is brown to grayish-brown, with a cotton-like texture that, when compressed, allows the endoperidium to flex quickly and create a puff of air that is forced out through the ostioles. This generates a cloud of spores that can then be carried by the wind. There are columellae (sterile structures that start at the base of the gleba and extend through it), which are usually not evident in the mature gleba, but apparent at the base of the spore sac. The columellae are not connected to the ostioles, but rather, terminate within the gleba at some distance from them. The capillitia (sterile strands within the gleba) are long, slender, free, tapering, unbranched, and 2–5 μm thick, with thickened walls. The spores are spherical, nonamyloid, and are ornamented with irregularly shaped flaring protuberances up to 2 μm high. They measure 3.9–4.8 μm in diameter (without ornamentation), and 5.4–7.0 μm including the ornamentation.