Velvet Shank

Description

The velvet shank, also called the winter mushroom (płomiennica zimowa in Polish), is a small mushroom with a yellow-orange to yellow-brown cap that is smooth and very slimy in wet weather. It is most easily recognised by its dark, blackish-brown stem covered with velvety suede, without a ring, and by the fact that it grows in clusters on wood.

It fruits in late autumn and winter, from October to December, and in mild winters even to March, on stumps and trunks of deciduous trees, most often poplars and willows. It is insensitive to frost and keeps growing after thawing.

It can be confused with poisonous species growing on wood, especially the deadly poisonous funeral bell. The only reliable feature is the white spore print, which you must check. If you are not sure of the species, do not pick or eat it.

Identification features

Cap

Diameter 1–10 cm (descriptions give different ranges); hemispherical when young, flat when older. Colour yellow-orange, orange or yellow-brown, darker in the centre. Surface smooth, very slimy and glossy in wet weather.

Hymenophore (underside of the cap)

Gills first whitish, later ochre-yellow, sparse, rounded at the stem, convex.

Stem

Height 5–10 cm, thickness 3–8 mm, cylindrical, hollow like a tube, central or lateral, often curved. No ring. Yellow-tinted and paler at the top, blackish-brown towards the base, more or less covered with brown suede-like velvet.

Flesh

Elastic, bast-like in the stem, white or cream, thin, does not change colour when cut (according to some descriptions yellow in the cap, brown in the stem). Taste insignificant, smell pleasant, indistinct.

Spore print and spores

Spore print white, non-amyloid. Spores cylindrical, colourless, 6–9 × 4–4.5 µm.

Habitat and distribution

Ecology. Saprotroph on wood (lignotrophic), also a weak parasite of living trees. Grows almost always in clusters on stumps and trunks of deciduous trees, most abundantly on poplars and willows; also often on elms, ashes, beeches and oaks. On conifers very rarely (thuja). It also grows on living trees, even several metres above the ground.

Distribution. The whole northern hemisphere in the temperate zone, also Australia. Very common in Poland; in deciduous and mixed forests, parks, gardens. Insensitive to frost. It is not legally protected in Poland.

Fruiting. From October to December, and in a mild winter even to March; it does not grow in frosts, and fruits further after the frosts end.

What can it be confused with?

• Galerina marginata (funeral bell) — A deadly poisonous species; it has a darker, rusty-brown spore print (the velvet shank has a white one). The velvet shank also has a suede-like, dark stem and a copper-yellow cap, and fruits in late autumn and winter.
• Kuehneromyces mutabilis (sheathed woodtuft) — Has a darker spore print; the white spore print of the velvet shank is the deciding feature.
• Hypholoma fasciculare (sulphur tuft) — Has a darker spore print; poisonous.
• Other species of the genus Flammulina (including F. elastica, F. fennae, F. ononidis, F. populicola, F. rossica) — They differ in substrate (willows, poplars, restharrow), fruiting time, shade of the cap, shape of the stem or microscopic features; details — no data.

Never rely on a single feature. If you are not sure — do not pick it; show the mushroom to a qualified mushroom expert.

Interesting facts

• It is the type species of the genus Flammulina; it was first described by William Curtis in 1782 in England.
• Insensitive to frost and does not rot; fruiting bodies can grow on living trees even several metres above the ground.
• In Chinese medicine known as enoki; until recently it was considered the same species as the cultivated Asian F. filiformis (enokitake), but DNA studies showed that they are two separate species.
• In studies of 400 species of basidiomycetes, a high, stable level of thrombolytic enzymes was found in, among others, the velvet shank.