Lloyd Mycological Writings V4.pdf - MykoWeb

HYMENOCHAETE UNICOLOR (Fig. 780). I found in Cuba
last spring, a Hymenochaete that I did not know from the Southern
United States. I concluded from Berkeley's accounts of Cuban
species, that it must
be Hymenochaete unicolor,
and Miss Wakefield
has since compared
and confirmed
it. It is rarely that
one can determine a
species from the de-
Fig. 780. scriptions, and this was
not so determined. It
was only by a process of elimination of species that it could not be,
that we decided finally what it must be.
Hymenochaete unicolor is the same color (cinnamon brown of
Ridgway) as H. cinnamomea of Europe. The setae are rather dense,
projecting 40 to 60 mic. Spores are 4x6, hyaline, smooth. The
plant is hard and closely adnate to the host. It was common in Cuba,
always grows on a decorticated pole and I have seen them twenty
feet long, completely covered with it. What impressed me most was
the peculiar way in
which the wood was
affected. The fungus
carries a most peculiar
rot (fig. 781.) elongated,
white spots, that
to the eye contrast
Fte- 78istrongly
with the
brown wood. A similar rot called Rebhuhnholz in Germany or "partridge
wood" as translated, is caused in the oak by Stereum frustulosum.
Hartig gave a full account of it, but it is a sad commentary
on the taxonomic knowledge in Germany that Hartig did not know
the name for the common Stereum frustulosum and called it a "new
species," Thelephora perdix. No wonder that the English translator
"did not know it as a British species".
Hymenochaete cinnamomea is found generally on oak and is the
temperate region analogue of Hymenochaete unicolor in tropical
America. It has same color and setae, but is a thick plant, with
longer spores 3 x 6-9, and does not seem to attack the wood in the
same way.
Hymenochaete spreta is same as Hymenochaete cinnamomea as
to color, but has the surface cracked into small areas. It is held by
Burt to be a condition of or synonym for Hymenochaete cinnamomea.
I am not so sure of that. Cooke referred it as a synonym for Hymenochaete
unicolor, but I believe he was wrong on that, for it is a
much thicker species, with several annual layers in some specimens,
and does not affect the wood the same way.
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