2024-12-17

Split gill mushrooms and other woodland treasures

My daily outdoor work in past weeks is the removal of invasive honeysuckle and autumn olives. Ugh, it's everywhere. Then there is eastern red cedar, Juniper virginiana, which is not a cedar at all. While it is native to our region, due to fire suppression it has become somewhat invasive, often taking over disturbed areas that would otherwise be populated by a greater diversity of species. We have patches of thick cedar that I'm thinning out a bit. In some cases the cedars are so densely packed together that many of them have already died due to lack of light. I'm going to cut quite a few of the still surviving smaller trees as they are so close together that they're not healthy and are not allowing the growth of other species in the understory.

The area I've been working on was a campground 40 years ago and I've found various remnants of those days. This little sign was mostly buried at the base of a tree overgrown with honeysuckle.

a small plastic sign with a cartoonish snail on top, below a boxed frame of the words snail trail. The sign is in the woods which are visible in the background

When viewed from the top Split gill mushrooms, Schizophyllum commune might seem a bit plain.

a white half shell shaped fungi grows from a tree

But a photo from below reveals a very different view!

the underside of the fungi reveals a vibrant pattern of gills radiating from a center point. the photo is taken from below and shows a canopy of green trees set against a blue sky

a white half shell shaped fungi grows from a tree

the underside of the fungi reveals a vibrant pattern of gills radiating from a center point. the photo is taken from below and shows a canopy of green trees set against a blue sky

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