Ganoderma lucidum - Lacquered Bracket

Taxonomy

Phylum: Basidiomycota

Class: Agaricomycetes

Order: Polyporales

Ganoderma species are notoriously difficult to identify with confidence because of their great variability, and Ganoderma lucidum is no exception. Before it matures and begins releasing clouds of brown spores, which attach themselves to the upper surface of the cap (and the bark of the tree to which it is attached), thereby masking its lacquered appearance, this is one of the most attractive of large bracket fungi. Unfortunately it is not a common bracket in Britain and Ireland.

Occasionally this polypore grows on the flat top of a stump or on the uppermost surface of a felled trunk, in which circumstances it can sometimes form a beautiful rosette rather than a bracket.

The superb specimen shown on the left was photographed in the USA by Doug Holland. In North America this sessile form is by far the most common, although short-stemmed brackets do occur there occasionally. Long-stemmed forms of this remarkable polypore are found most frequently in the tropics.

In oriental medicine, dried and powdered Ganoderna lucidum is highly valued; it is known as the Reishi Mushroom in Japan, Lingzhi in China and Youngzhi in Korea. (These common names also encompass other Ganoderma species and in particular Ganoderma tsugae.) In the far east these fungi have been used for medicinal purposes for at least 2000 years.

Identification Guide

	Description Up to 30cm across; to 4cm thick and usually with a stalk; fan-shaped or kidney-shaped, most often laterally attached but occasionally almost centrally attached when in sessile form, concentrically grooved and zoned orange brown shading to ochre towards the margin and with a whitish growing edge; eventually turning purple-brown and then blackening; the stem and upper cap surface have a varnished gloss, becoming dull and matt when covered in spores. (The picture on the left is shown by courtesy of Farhan Rasheed.)
	Tubes and Pores The tubes are brown; 5 to 20mm deep and 8 to 10mm deep. The small roundish pores (left) are white when the fruiting body is young, turning brown with age or when bruised.
Spore print	Brown.
Odour/taste	Not significant.
	Habitat The Lacquered Bracket is seen mainly at the bases of oak trees (or on the stumps of recently felled oaks) but is occasionally found on other broadleaf trees. The young fruitbody pictured on the right was also on an oak but, unusually for this species, sited up at head height. At this stage soft, the fruitbody hardens through autumn and decays during the following year.
Season	Autumn.
Occurrence	Infrequent.
Similar species	Ganoderma applanatum, the Artist's Fungus, is ochre brown with a much thinner white margin than Ganoderma lucidum.