Dryad's saddle - story of one fungus encounter

Hola, setero! Today I want to share with you the story of one fungi encounter, that happened back in June 2020. The time flies by so fast!...

Dryad's saddle family hiding at the foot of an old stump.

The wonderful thing about this family is that fungi grew unevenly -- one can see this specie in different phases of its life cycle, which is nice, curious ... and also useful - cause it helps to identify this mushroom well.

While Dryad's Saddle is its common name in English, scientific name is Cerioporus squamosus; it also has a few other different names: Tрутовик чешуйчатый in Russian, Cyfrwy Cennog, Żagwiak Łuskowaty in Polish, Pisztricgomba (HU)... Scaly Polypore (US), and another funny name is also (US): Pheasant's Back. Look at the picture above, and you will get the idea where is this name coming from.

If you see such small pink barrels on a stump or tree trunk -- slightly reminding a pig's snout - keep in mind that you may come back in 1-2 days to forage here a good edible fungi.

On one hand, the fungus must be given time to grow - but on the other hand, you should not let it to overmature; fungus the size of your palm probably is already beyond the ideal: in this case, fungus tissue become stiff, and you will not enjoy chewing it. During cooking, you can apply a simple fork test: if the fork can easily pierce the mushroom, it can proceed onto the pan, but if the fork needs significant efforts to pierce it, then it is better to cut this (old, overmatured) part of the mushroom and throw it into the compost.

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I have very touching memories associated with this set of visuals. This was the first and last time I was able to photograph this certain fungi spot (and actually first time in my life I encountered Dryad saddle fungus, happily not the last one!).

So... on my way back from the food store I stumbled upon this stump at a city lawn, generously awakened to life by nature... I momentary felt in love with it and took a few quick pics with iPhone. Then I run back home and returned with the Canon 350D camera (Canon 5D - my current camera - was unable to use at the moment cause the battery was uncharged), made some pics which I thought I was not 100% happy about, run back home again and returned with 5D this time.
This story happened in the first covid summer, just a few hours before our family moved out of the city to our summer house; I stumbled upon this stump in my own yard. And although I was busy preparing for the move, I equipped myself with macro lens and returned to the fungus twice, taking as much pics as I could.

You might say there is nothing special in this story - and probably will be right ... but here is the end of the story. I expected that if a mycelium sleeps in this stump, then in the future I will see these fungi growing on it more than once. And know what? I was wrong! at the end of the summer, I returned to the city and checked that spot as soon as possible... just to find that the municipal services had uprooted this stump and leveled the ground so that there was not the slightest trace left. I felt sad and disappointed.

My guess is, that most likely it was some official person's fungo-phobia, someone was afraid of these possibly-poisonous-mushrooms-flourishing, what-if-your-dog-suddenly-eats-it-and-die?!. The funny thing is that this fungus is absolutely non toxic! on the contrary, it is edible, and it does not even require pre-treatment, you can simply fry it in a pan with some oil, and be getting good proteins sounding like a meat delicacy.

That first Dryad saddle encounter was, uh... it was like a trigger! - immediately a few days after there happened the second encounter with this fungus - already in the forest. And in the autumn I met it again at the city park (the photo below). All in all, this fungus is not rare at all, vive versa -- it is quite well-spread. I learned to recognize it well among other similar fungi, and put it to my basket - wish you the same!

Part of this photo-set previously was published in this blog.

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_{This header was created by @riverflows}