The fall is here in New England. We had some rain from the remnants of Hurricane Ian and the first frost hasn't appeared yet for eastern Massachusetts.
I finally had a little luck with finding some fungi last weekend. The dearth so far this season really brought into contrast just how bountiful the fruiting bodies were last year.
Here are the first time I came across these mushrooms sprouting from a pine cone.
These may be Strobilurus or perhaps Baeospora myosura according to this page on MushroomExpert.com. Both appear to be saprobic fungi that breakdown conifer cones across North America. They can be differentiated by their spore shapes but I don't have a microscope (yet ;D ).
I also found this cool Ganoderma sp. growing like a snake out of the root system of a dead tree. Makes me think it is part of the Ganoderma lucidum complex. What do you think?
Also I was able to find my first Amanita of the year...I haven't gotten out much apparently lol.
Not sure of the species. I took some samples to try my first DNA amplification with my little PCR machine but I screwed up the results. I hope to get that working and I'll make a post on it sometime in the future. Cheers and thanks for looking!