Heliocybe

Taxobox | name = "Heliocybe"
regnum = Fungi
subregnum = Dikarya
phylum = Basidiomycota
subphylum = Agaricomycotina
classis = Agaricomycetes
ordo = Gloeophyllales
familia = Gloeophyllaceae
genus = "Heliocybe"
subdivision_ranks = Species
subdivision = "H. sulcata"

Heliocybe is an agaric genuscite journal | author=Redhead, S.A. & Ginns, J.H.|year=1985| title=A reappraisal of agaric genera associated with brown rots of wood|journal=Trans. mycol. Soc. Japan| volume=26| pages=349–381] closely allied to "Neolentinus" and the bracket fungus, "Gloeophyllum", all of which cause brown rot of woodcite journal | author=Thorn, R.G. et al.|year=2000| title=Phylogenetic analyses and the distribution of nematophagy support monophyletic Pleurotaceae within the polyphyletic pleurotoid-lentinoid fungi|journal=Mycologia| volume=92| pages=241–252| doi=10.2307/3761557] cite journal | author=Hibbett, D.S. & Donoghue, M.J.|year=2001| title=Analysis of character correlations among wood decay mechanisms, mating systems, and substrate ranges in Homobasidiomycetes|journal=Syst. Biol.| volume=50| pages=215–242| doi=10.1080/10635150151125879] . "Heliocybe sulcata", the type and sole species, is characterized by thumb-sized, tough, revivable, often dried, mushroom fruitbodies, with a tanned symmetric pileus that is radially cracked into a cartoon sun-like pattern of arranged scales and ridges, distant serrated lamellae, and a scaly central stipe. Microscopically it differs from "Neolentinus" by the absence of clamp connections. Like "Neolentinus", it produces abundant, conspicuous pleurocystidia. "Heliocybe sulcata" typically fruits on decorticated, sun-dried and cracked wood, such as fence posts and rails, vineyard trellises in Europe, branches in slash areas, and semi-arid areas such on sagebrush or on naio branches in rain shadow areas of Hawaii, or in open pine forests [cite journal | author=Redhead, S.A.|year=1989| title=A biogeographical overview of the Canadian mushroom flora|journal=Canad. J. Bot.| volume=67| pages=3003–3062| doi=10.1139/b89-384] [cite journal | author=Schalkwijk-Barendsen, H.M.E.|year=1991| title=Mushrooms of western Canada] [cite journal | author=Evenson, V.S.|year=1997| title=Mushrooms of Colorado and the southern Rocky Mountains] [cite journal | author=Hemmes, D.E. & Desjardin, D.E.|year=2002| title=An identification guide – mushrooms of Hawai’i] .

In older classifications, "H. sulcata" [http://www.minnesotamushrooms.org/news/2004-02/mush-science.htm] was known as "Lentinus sulcatus" or "Panus fulvidus". However, there is strong phylogenetic evidence for the segregation of a group of brown rot causing fungi at the level of order, including "Neolentinus" and "Heliocybe" and "Gloeophyllum", from the Polyporales where "Lentinus" and "Panus" are classifiedcite journal | author=Hibbett, D.S. & Binder, M.|year=2002| title=Evolution of complex fruiting-body morphologies in homobasidiomycetes|journal=Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B| volume=269| pages=1963–1969| doi=10.1098/rspb.2002.2123] cite journal | author=Binder, M. et al.|year=2005| title=The phylogenetic distribution of resupinate forms across the major clades of mushroom-forming fungi (Homobasidiomycetes)|journal=Syst. Biodivers.| volume=3| pages=113–157| doi=10.1017/S1477200005001623] . "Heliocybe" has also been placed into synonymy with "Neolentinus", but anatomically they differ by the absence versus the presence of clamp connections and phylogenetically "Heliocybe" is distinct, being either a sister group to "Neolentinus" or to a "Neolentinus-Gloeophyllum"-clade, or allied to "Gloeophyllum odoratum".

Etymology

Heliocybe derives from the Greek 'helios' (= the sun) and 'cybe' (=head), and means "the sun-head". It was coined in reference to its sun-like pattern on its pileus together with its affinity to sun-baked habitats.

References