Plicatura crispa

Plicatura crispa No English name yet – any suggestions…?

(old scientific names include Merulius crispa, Cantharellus crispus, Trogia crispa, Plicaturopsis crispa and Plicatura faginea)

The fruiting structure of this species is fan shaped and thin, often with a rather lobed appearance. When mature, the tops have lovely tawny orange browns, usually with a pale edge. The fertile underside shows gill like fold or wrinkles which often fork and whilst pale compared with the upper surface, the underside often has a distinctive greenish tinge. Individual fruit bodies rarely reach more than 2cm but they usually grow in dense troops (imbricate meaning ‘like tiles’) and can cover large areas of dead wood. The texture of the damp, fresh fruit body is soft and flexible but not fragile and the spore print is white. When dry, the cap will curl up and be far less noticeable. Once you have your eye in for this species and its habitat, it is quite unmistakeable even in the field.

Plicatura crispa is a saprotrophic or ‘recycler’ fungus, which is breaking down dead wood. Fungi are the only group of organisms that can break down lignin and without them we would be buried under many metres of woody debris. They also lay a vital role in driving the carbon cycle, releasing nutrients that they don’t require back into the habitat.

Fruiting: there are records from every month of the year apart from July but the vast majority of these are from the winter months.