Agaricomycetes Doweld, Prosyllabus Tracheophytorum, Tentamen Systematis Plantarum Vascularium (Tracheophyta) (Moscow), LXXVIII (2001)

Index Fungorum number: IF 501297; Facesoffungi number: FoF 14340

The Agaricomycetes contains 16,000 species of identified mushroom-forming species. The variety of fruit body (basidiome) morphology in this group is remarkable: stalked umbrella-shaped mushrooms and brackets produce spores on the surface of gills or teeth, over flat or rippled surfaces, or over the inner surfaces of tubes; other species form branched basidiomes that resemble corals; basidiomes can form as gelatinous cushions or sticky, ear-shaped growths, and Agaricomycetes also produce vast numbers of basidiospores within closed fruit bodies, including puffballs and earth-stars (Figure 1.4). There are Agaricomycetes that develop underground, resembling ascomycete truffles, and others that form packets of spores in egg-like structures (peridioles) that are splashed from the cups of bird’s nest fungi or propelled into the air by species of artillery fungus.

Subclasses