Polyporus tuberaster    (Jacq. Ex Pers.) Fr. 

common name(s) : Tuberous Polypore 

New classification: Basidiomycota/Agaricomycotina/Agaricomycetes/Incertae sedis/Polyporales/Polyporaceae  
Former classification: Basidiomycota/Homobasidiomycetes/Aphyllophoromycetideae  

synonyms: Polyporus floccipes, Polyporus forquignonii, Polyporus lentus, Polyporus squamosus-coronatus 
(unconfirmed synonyms: Polyporus forquignoni, Melanopus forquignoni)  

edibility : inedible

photo gallery of  Polyporus tuberaster
photo gallery of  Polyporus tuberaster potential confusions with  Polyporus tuberaster toxicity of Polyporus tuberaster genus Polyporus  

The cap is cream-yellow to ochre-brown or cinnamon, circular or semi-circular, convex then flattened and depressed at the point of attachment to stem. The cap surface is smooth then covered with cinnamon-brown hairy scales with darker tips, more or less concentric. The cap margin is rough, often wavy, acute, fringed and ciliated, hardly inrolled.

The stem is central to lateral, cylindrical, full and tough, pale yellow, with white downy base. It may emerge through the substrate from a deeply buried, black, fist-sized bulb (sclerotium).

The flesh is whitish, soft, elastic and leathery, a bit tough; its taste is mild; the odour is mushroomy;

The tubes are white then ochraceous cream, very short (1-4 mm), deeply decurrent on stem.

The pores are white to ochraceous cream, large, round to polygonal-elongated (0,5 ŕ 2 per mm). The spore print is white.

It grows in damp broad-leaved woods, on dead wood (oak, maple, beech, alder, willows); annually.

The fruiting period takes place from April to November.
Dimensions: width of cap approximately 7 cm (between 2 and 20 cm)
  height of stem approximately 4 cm (between 0.5 and 8 cm)
  thickness of stem (at largest section) approximately 10 mm (between 5 and 15 mm)
  spores : 9,5-16 x 3,5-6 microns, elliptic to cylindrical, smooth, hyalin

Distinctive features : creamy brown cap, depressed when mature, with dark-tipped brown scales and rough margin; large and polygonal white pores; more or less central stem; rubbery flesh; on buried wood (occasionally from deeply buried sclerotium)

Polyporus tuberaster is infrequent and widely present in the forest of Rambouillet, and is occasional, more generally speaking .
here should be the distribution map of Polyporus tuberaster in the forest of Rambouillet
Above : distribution map of Polyporus tuberaster in the forest of Rambouillet



page updated on 14/01/18