Birch Polypore
(Razor-strop Bracket, or Razor-strop Fungus)
Description
Fruit-body annual, flattened cushion-shaped to bracket-like or fan-shaped, laterally attached. Cap 5-30 x 5-20 cm, 2-5 cm thick. Upper surface smooth, creamy white to ochre-brown or grey-brown, with rolled in margin.
Tubes 4-8 mm long, creamy white. Pores 3-4 per mm, circular to angular, white to creamy white. Flesh corky, soft, white. Smell pleasant.
Occurrence
Common on trunks and thick branches of living and dead Birch (see photograph of brown rot in Chapter 1). Summer to autumn.
Parasitic. (Saprophyte).