Look closerFungi
Turkey tail fungus on fallen logs through the winter
When: November to March
Overlapping fans banded in brown, buff and cinnamon cover dead hardwood logs through the cold months. They are the visible end of the machinery that turns a fallen tree back into soil, and it does not stop for winter.
Why this time of year
It fruits year round, but winter is when you actually see it: nothing green is competing for your attention and the logs are bare. The decay work carries on under the snow.
How to notice it
- Find a dead hardwood log or stump and look for overlapping fans in dense clusters, each one an inch to three inches across.
- Check the top for sharply banded rings of contrasting color, and for a finely fuzzy surface.
- Now turn one over. This is the test: real turkey tail has a surface of tiny pores, and the common lookalikes are smooth underneath.
- Fresh ones are flexible rather than brittle. Bend an edge gently and let it go.
Try this with kids: Turn one over. Is the underside covered in tiny holes, or is it smooth?
saprobic means it eats dead wood, which is how a fallen log gets taken apart and returned to the soil
Safety
- Handling is fine. Do not eat any wild fungus on the strength of a card, and this one has smooth-undersided lookalikes.
Sources
- mushroomexpert.comTrametes versicolor is saprobic on dead hardwood logs and stumps, occasionally conifers; fruits year round in dense overlapping clusters or rosettes; caps 2-8 cm, finely fuzzy or velvety, strikingly zonate with sharply contrasting concentric color zones; underside is a true pore surface with 3-8 or more tiny pores per mm, distinguishing it from smooth-surfaced crust fungi such as Stereum ostrea; flexible rather than rigid when fresh
In the guide for November, December, January, February, March