Lentinellus montanus
Mycologia 57: 933. 1965.
Common Name: none
Fruiting body fan to kidney-shaped, sessile to sub-stipitate, if the latter then lateral in attachment; cap 2.5-10.0 cm broad, 2.0-5.0 cm in width, i.e. from margin to disc; cap at first convex with an incurved, wavy margin, in age plane to slightly upturned; surface of margin glabrous, buff to dingy-tan, becoming dark-brown to vinaceous-brown towards the disc, the latter typically matted-tomentose to hirsute; context up to 0.5 cm thick, white, soft; odor indistinct; taste latently acrid.
Gills radiating from the basal attachment point, subdistant, buff-colored in youth, pale-tan in age, edges serrate; lamellulae in five to six series.
Stipe when present, very short, densely velutinate, light-brown.
Spores 5.0-6.5 x 4.0-5.0 µm, broadly elliptical to oval in face and side-view, smooth, thin-walled, verrucose, hilar appendage inconspicuous, amyloid; spore print white.
Solitary or in small groups on downed wood of montane conifers, especially lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta) and red fir (Abies magnifica); fruiting during the spring snow melt; common.
Inedible; unpleasant taste.
This snowbank species resembles the common oyster mushroom, Pleurotus ostreatus, but can be distinguished by serrate gills, a spring fruiting habit on conifer wood, and an acrid taste. Oyster mushrooms, while present in montane regions of California, fruit mostly in the fall on hardwoods. Lentinellus ursinus is a closely related species of coastal forests. It differs in having more closely spaced gills and smaller, globose spores.
Miller Jr., O.K. (1965). Three New Species of Lignicolous agarics in the Tricholomataceae. Mycologia 57(6): 933-945.
Petersen, R.H. & Hughes, K.W. (2004). A preliminary monograph of Lentinellus (Russulales). J. Cramer: Berlin, Germany. 270 p.
