Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Fungi/Archive 8

mycomorphbox typo fix
Hello - an observant IP editor noticed that "umbilicate" was misspelled in the mycomorphbox code. It had two ls, when it should have just one. I fixed the template, but there are undoubtedly instances where an icon isn't showing up correctly because the parameter is given in the article as "umbillicate" - Please keep an eye out for MMBoxes with umbilicate parameters, and fix the typo as needed.

Also, here's a gentle reminder to add either MMBs or  to new mushroom articles or their talk pages. There are a few out there with neither. de Bivort 02:16, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Apparently Wikipedia's search function picks up wikitext, as it located this. Based on search results I think there were only two instances of the misspelling on the English Wikipedia, both of which I've fixed.  Sadly File:Umbillicate_cap_icon.svg is used on many Wikipedias, despite the existence of File:Umbilicate_cap_icon.svg. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 03:21, 5 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, the latter is new. I uploaded it when the typo was discovered. de Bivort 05:48, 5 January 2013 (UTC)

Article improvement drive: Amanita franchetii
On the Bay Area Mushrooms List, there's been some grousing about the Amanita franchetii article, in particular because the taxobox had it listed as edible, when in fact there is dispute over its edibility, and some regional variations may actually be toxic.

More generally, the article is in a very incomplete state, but seems to have become the target of some rhetoric about the poor state of Wikipedia fungal species articles. Sounds like a good reason to target it for improvement and prove the naysayers wrong. Peter G Werner (talk) 06:19, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the heads-up, Peter. I'd like to work on this, but only have access to North American literature (e.g. Jenkins, 1986) and am reluctant to write up a description based on NA material when, according to Tulloss, this is probably a separate undescribed species. I suppose Neville and Poumarat would be a good source, but $172 is expensive for a single book (especially for a genus I'm not especially interested in!) ... I'll see if I can get it through interlibrary loan. Sasata (talk) 07:17, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

what to do about a frequently misidentified batch of fungus images?
The BAMS discussion that Peter brought up in the section above this pointed out a few misidentified in-use images from the same image series. Looking around at other images in the same series, a good number jump out at me as being pretty obviously mis-ID'ed. Additionally, the person on the BAMS list who posted the mis-ID'ed tricholoma, strobilurus, and amanita images that I link below has said that they found ten or so more browsing through ENWP articles, which I'm guessing are from the same sequence.

A lot of the mistakes made are big enough that they make me lose confidence in other identifications made by the same person, even other identifications where I cannot confirm 100% that the identification is wrong. for instance, is not Tricholoma ustaloides. is not Amanita porphyria. Neither of   are of Strobilurus esculentus (and neither look even close to it.)  was for years labelled as Exidia thuretiana when it was not even a fungus. is not Agrocybe praecox. doesn't look quite like Cortinarius violaceus to me. Unless the exposure is really weird, is probably not Hypholoma fasciculare - never seen one with anything approaching a stem that white.

You can view the whole series in question here. What's an appropriate thing to do with this series of images? A lot of them are high quality images, and a lot of them are correctly identified, but there are a ton of mistakes, and an absolutely huge number of in-use images across dozens of Wikimedia projects that may or may not be correctly identified. Given some of the mistakes, I definitely don't think I'd trust, as an example, all of the to species level Cortinarius photos in the series. Bringing this up here before I bring it up on Commons, because Commons doesn't have many (if any) fungus people. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:05, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I've already emailed Jim Lindsey about this in the morning. He replied that he knew the ID was incorrect (according to him, it's Inocybe whitei), but that he doesn't know how to correct it on Wiki Commons. I'm going to write him back with an open invitation to correct all of the mistaken IDs he knows about. Sasata (talk) 22:35, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Mycomorphbox issues
There seem to be several issues with Template:Mycomorphbox. Several people have brought up the fact that the fact that the characteristics in Mycomorphbox are completely inadequate for identifying mushrooms to species or distinguishing many closely related species from each other. Of course, it isn't meant to do that, per WP:NOTGUIDE. However, most people from outside the Wiki community aren't aware of this.

It was suggested that we add something like the following to Mycomorphbox:

"These characteristics alone are generally insufficient for a positive ID to species." "These characteristics are not adequate for a positive ID." "Refer to the main article for specific features to identify this mushroom." "These characteristics are intended for quick comparison only."

I actually think this would be a good idea, but unfortunately, these seem to run afoul of WP:NODISCLAIMERS.

It's a dilemma, but I'm starting to question the value of Mycomorphbox absent any description of what it is or is not meant to do.

Also, while we're on the subject, I've always thought that some of the howEdible options, such as "choice", "edible", and "unpalatable" had possible WP:NPOV and WP:WORLDVIEW issues. Obviously, something that's seriously poisonous is cross-cultural, but in terms of how "choice" an edible mushroom is varies between individuals and between cultures. Some people insist Suillus is quite good, and it is even gathered commercially in some parts of the world. Boletus edulis is not considered a "choice" edible in China, even though it occurs there. Lactarius deliciosus is considered a choice edible in Catalonia, but is considered insipid in California (though it may really be a different species in California). There can even be different interpretations of toxicity, with some cultures preparing otherwise toxic mushrooms as to detoxify them, and they are then considered highly desirable, such as with acrid Russula and Lactarius in parts of Russia, and Amanita muscaria in parts of Japan. Or consider the fact that among North American mushroomers, non-toxic Amanita are highly controversial, with some authorities saying nobody should ever eat any member of this genus, while others (such as myself :-) viewing species like Amanita velosa or Amanita caesarea as among the very best edible species. Peter G Werner (talk) 07:02, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Honestly, I think they've brought up pretty good points. I think we could come up with wording that didn't violate the spirit of nodisclaimers, or even end up saying screw it and putting in something that does violate nodisclaimers on the basis that a disclaimer really is potentially quite important.


 * I have also always thought that the howEdible options present NPOV and worldview issues. I would pretty strongly support just eliminating that parameter since I can't come up with a good way to resolve the issues in an infobox.  In the text of an article we can say "It is widely considered poisonous, but is eaten after proper preparation in parts of the world," or "It has been considered a choice edible for many centuries, but overindulgence has sometimes proven fatal," but stuff like that doesn't really fit in an infobox.  I guess in articles like that we could just not use the parameter in the infobox and describe it in the text only... but even with mushrooms that are more black and white in edibility terms I'm not sure that having edibility as an infobox parameter presents any value at all.  Anyone wanting to know if a mushroom is safe or good to eat should look at a hell of a lot more than just the infobox. Kevin Gorman (talk) 07:21, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * It all comes down to sources - what the template needs perhaps is links to the reliable sources that provide these characters (and the edibility ratings). I don't see much of an issue with NPOV and worldview as I haven't encountered much conflict in these evaluations across sources. And the flexibility of having two parameters means that you can generally cover the full range of character states that are in the sources. de Bivort 07:35, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Echoing Debivort, sources are generally pretty clear on species with a particularly esteemed reputation upon eating. All we do is reflect this. Adding caution templates is useful too. One can only go so far...I can't gelp it if people don't read the description as well as looking at the mycomorphbox. However while I quite like them I would not be heartbroken if we lost 'em. Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:12, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * The howEdible parameter actually measures two characteristics - tastiness and safeness to consume. I think that the tastiness shouldn't be mentioned in the Mycomorphbox on account of its subjectivity. Readers should instead look to the body/sources to see what various authors have noted etc. As for the the safeness to consume, I propose that we classify species either as (or something similar to) certainly safe to consume, or not certainly safe to consume (see text). This way anyone seeking to eat their mushroom (assuming it is not certainly safe to consume), would be made to read a more detailed description of the possible health risks such as data deficiency, controversy, possible ways to detoxify, or of course simply just toxic. If species were to be described as certainly safe to consume I agree that it would be important to note in the Mycomorphbox that the Mycomorphbox characteristics are not adequate for ID. JamesDouch (talk) 10:49, 31 January 2014 (UTC)

Hericiaceae family members?
Hi, I noticed that the taxobox in Hericiaceae (and other lang. versions) contains genus Laxitextum. I'm not a mycologist but by its appearance it hardly seems to belong to the same family as Hericium. Moreover http://www.herbmedit.org/bocconea/5-853.pdf mentions quite different genera. Could someone check this in some reliable source? Thank you. --Tomaxer (talk) 00:59, 24 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Appearances can be deceiving ... I've confirmed the classification with Index Fungorum, MycoBank, and the 10th ed. Dictionary of the Fungi. It appears this classification is based on molecular work published by Miller et al. in 2006 (I've upgraded the Laxitextum article to reflect this). As for the linked paper, that was published in 1997, and much water has flown under the phylogenetic bridge since then! Thanks for your note. Sasata (talk) 03:37, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Could anyone identify this mushroom?

 * See http://mushroomatmountpisgah.weebly.com

I would like to upload this photo to Commons, but I want to know what mushroom species it might be. I have a higher-res. version of the photo on my computer. Thanks. Jsayre64  (talk)  19:09, 8 March 2013 (UTC)


 * It is probably an Entoloma species, however there is no pic of the underside so I can't be 100% certain. If the spore print is pink, it is Entoloma.    It would require a microscope to determine which Entoloma species it is.  It's close to Entoloma vernum, but probably not that species.

Alan Rockefeller (Talk - contribs) 22:14, 8 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks for your help. I understand it would be too difficult for anyone to figure out the exact species with just that photo. I'll upload it and describe the mushroom as an Entoloma species. Jsayre64   (talk)  03:39, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

I found another strange mushroom in September. My photo of it is at the same website. Scale is around real-size; what you can see of the stalk is about 3 to 4 in in height. The cap diameter is about the same. Could somebody ID the genus, perhaps? Jsayre64  (talk)  01:39, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Identification of mushrooms in potting soil
I'm trying to identify the following mushrooms:



They seem related to Coprinellus micaceus, but I don't know enough about mushrooms to make any positive identification.

These are growing in the southwestern U.S.A, however the soil could have come from anywhere. They also seem to die very quickly when not watered.

Additionally, if anyone knows additional information, such as if they are potentially poisonous to terrarium creatures such as frogs, and how best to get rid of them (other than reducing humidity), that would be very helpful. Thanks in advance!! WDavis1911 (talk) 18:35, 13 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Other than the slight difference in the color of the caps, it looks like Coprinellus micaceus to me. It looks like they're growing on the pieces of bark and wood in the soil. I don't know much about frog diets, but this species (and others in the genus) are edible (or, at least, non-poisonous) for humans. Reducing the humidity might prevent fruiting, but I'm not sure how your frogs would feel about that. I think you could just let the fungi run their course; they'll stop fruiting once they've extracted the nutrients from the woody debris. If you want a "second opinion" about the ID, try posting the images at Mushroom Observer, there's lot of knowledgeable folks there who'd be happy to give their opinion. Sasata (talk) 20:55, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Parmelia sulcata
The "Parmelia sulcata" page (which I found a link to in "cosmopolitan distribution") has a link labeled "lichen" but links to some specific lichen's page. It should link to the general "lichen" page. Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.30.147.91 (talk) 02:40, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Inter-kingdom homonyms
Seeking comments about how to handle cases where a scientific name is homonymous across different nomenclatural codes. Please go to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Tree of Life for discussion. Plantdrew (talk) 20:59, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Mycorrhizal evolution
Hello fungi experts! You may wish to look at this new proposed article: Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Mycorrhizal evolution. &mdash;Anne Delong (talk) 12:10, 21 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It's gone now. &mdash;Anne Delong (talk) 03:53, 13 March 2014 (UTC)

Reference desk assistance please
Can anybody help please with a query on the Miscellaneous Reference Desk at WP:RD/M? Alansplodge (talk) 20:33, 17 July 2013 (UTC)

Spongipellis unicolor reference difficulties
I am a newby at editing and am still trying to figure out how to add references. I thought I had this one correct but it is coming up as 'invoked but not defined'. Can someone please explain what I am doing wrong? I have tried to use the help page but it didn't make much sense to me. Reefswaggie (talk) 12:46, 19 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I've fixed it; the problem was that the reference name defined in the article text (MushroomExpert.com) didn't match the one given in the reference list ("urlMushroomExpert: Polyporales). Sasata (talk) 17:35, 19 July 2013 (UTC)

Travel Guide Request
Poisonous_plants lacks a section on toxic fungi, It would be appreciated if the experts on this project were able to write a suitable entry.

Please note Wikivoyage's differing focus though.Sfan00 IMG (talk) 13:17, 5 September 2013 (UTC)

Oomycetes
Does this project cover oomycetes? I see that Oomycetes bears as a Fungi Project banner, but Phytophthora (and the many articles on the species of this genus) do not. Plantdrew (talk) 14:51, 12 September 2013 (UTC)

Interwiki links: Psathyrellacae - Coprinaceae
Hello! Not knowning anything scientifically about fungi, I accidentally discovered that the cross-language interwiki links for Psathyrellaceae and Coprinacea are kept separately, even so, as far as I understand Coprinaceae is basically a former name of Psathyrellaceae (and the one is redirected to the other within English Wikipedia). So I think, the two should be merged, but I am not sure. Would anyone with any knowledge about this do it (or point out if I am mistaken)? Daranios (talk) 21:49, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Course assignment
I'm teaching a mycology course at Univ of Toronto this semester and have assigned a my students a series of fungal articles. Some of these have stubs, others not. Please check out our list of articles and help us out by adding yourself as an article editor if you're interested. Medmyco (talk) 17:35, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Discussion regarding WikiSpecies
There is a discussion currently taking place at WikiProject:Plants (here) regarding the status of WikiSpecies. All comments are welcomed and requested.-- Kev min  § 04:12, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Improving the coverage of Australian fungi
Does anyone else have a copy of A Field Guide to the Fungi of Australia (Young, 2010)? I do, and I've noticed half of species described in this book don't even have corresponding stubs on Wikipedia. Using this book as a primary resource, Wikipedia's (unsurprisingly) virtually non-existant coverage of Australian fungi could improved. There are quite a few articles to create which is why I was wondering if the task could be divided, but if not I'll get around to it sooner or later. JamesDouch (talk) 11:07, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I have Bruce Fuhrer's and Neale Bougher's books, and Young's monograph book on Hygrophoraceae. IDing Aussie fungi is pretty difficult. Have added a few and will get to more one day...Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 11:22, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I created a list of species described in my field guide, for future reference to see which species aren't covered. JamesDouch (talk) 04:06, 28 February 2014 (UTC)
 * cool. will make some stubs. Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 07:45, 28 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I'll also help with stub-making (a guilty pleasure of mine!), thanks for making the list. Beware, however, that several of the listed names are now outdated, so one should check on Index Fungorum or MycoBank to confirm what the current name is. Sasata (talk) 17:48, 28 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I confirmed most of the genera using Index Fungorum, but it'd be still wise to double check each article before creation. Thanks to both of you. JamesDouch (talk) 01:30, 1 March 2014 (UTC)
 * In a related note, there's a newly-described Australian morel. Sasata (talk) 05:29, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * Does this mean that all Morels in Australia are now M. australiana instead of M. elata, or only some? JamesDouch (talk) 08:42, 11 March 2014 (UTC)
 * So far the range only seems to include NSW and Victoria. I'll add more details once I get the full article. Sasata (talk) 08:52, 11 March 2014 (UTC)


 * More info on (South) Australian mushrooms, for future reference: Grgurinovic & Simpson, Fungal Diversity (2001) http://www.fungaldiversity.org/fdp/sfdp/FD_8_97-127.pdf

AfC submission
This looks quite promising, don't you agree? FoCuSandLeArN (talk) 21:21, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Question regarding new user's DYK submission
I'm not that experienced in the area of fungi, so thought I'd post here for some assistance. Rostraureum tropicale has been created by a new user, who has nominated it at DYK; as the reviewer I think it looks great apart from I not sure if it's OK how it seems to chop and change between talking about the genus and then talking about the species. Is this acceptable/commonplace in fungal articles? I'd be very grateful for some help. :) Acather96 (click here to contact me) 16:41, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I cleaned it up a bit. I think it looks ok for DYK. Sasata (talk) 17:43, 23 December 2013 (UTC)
 * That's great, cheers. :) Acather96 (click here to contact me) 22:14, 23 December 2013 (UTC)