Mushroom species

What is a mushroom?

A mushroom is the fruiting body of a fungus, and fungi are neither plants nor animals: they make up a kingdom of their own. Fungi don't photosynthesise. They feed on rotting wood, on organic matter in the soil, or through partnerships with tree roots. Their cell walls are built from chitin, the same material found in insect shells, and genetically they sit closer to animals than to plants.

What you see on the forest floor is only the fruit. The fungus itself is the mycelium, a web of fine threads running through soil or wood. When moisture and temperature are right, the mycelium pushes up a mushroom to release spores, which travel on wind, water or animals to start new colonies. That is why the same patch can produce mushrooms year after year.

Many fungi form root partnerships (mycorrhiza) with trees. Saffron milk caps grow with pine; chanterelles and porcini with oak, beech and pine. The tree a mushroom grows under is one of the most useful clues you have.

How are mushrooms classified?

The three most practical ways to sort mushrooms are edibility, the structure under the cap, and scientific family. The filters on this page use all three.

By edibility we split species into edible, poisonous, deadly, and those with a history of traditional use such as reishi and cordyceps. We make no health claims for that last group; their effects are still being studied.

Sorting by what's under the cap is the method that helps most in the field. It won't name a species, but it narrows down where to look:

• Gilled mushrooms: thin, blade-like gills. Button mushrooms, saffron milk caps, oyster mushrooms and the death cap all belong here, and most serious poisonings involve gilled species.
• Pored mushrooms: a spongy underside, as in porcini (Boletaceae) and bracket fungi such as chicken of the woods and reishi.
• Toothed mushrooms: hanging spines instead of gills, best known from lion's mane.
• Ridged mushrooms: chanterelles have thick, forked false gills running down the stem.
• Morels and false morels: a honeycomb cap on true morels, a brain-like one on false morels. Both appear in spring and are often confused.
• Mushrooms on wood: oyster mushrooms, chicken of the woods, reishi, maitake and the deadly galerina. Growing on a tree does not make a mushroom safe.

Mushroom families on this site

Every species belongs to a genus and every genus to a family. Knowing the family shows which look-alikes are related and where the danger is concentrated:

• Amanitaceae: the death cap, destroying angel and fly agaric, alongside the prized Caesar's mushroom. Look for the sack-like volva at the base and a ring on the stem; this family is for experts only.
• Agaricaceae: button, field and parasol mushrooms. Supermarket white and chestnut mushrooms belong here.
• Russulaceae: saffron milk cap and bloody milk cap. Lactarius species bleed milk when cut, and the colour of that milk is a key clue.
• Pleurotaceae: oyster, king oyster, pink oyster and golden oyster mushrooms, many of them easy to grow at home.
• Boletaceae: porcini, with pores instead of gills.
• Others: Morchellaceae (morel), Discinaceae (false morel), Hydnaceae (chanterelle), Hericiaceae (lion's mane), Polyporaceae (reishi), Cordycipitaceae (cordyceps), Cortinariaceae (fool's webcap), Inocybaceae (deadly fibrecap), Entolomataceae (livid pinkgill), Tricholomataceae (wood blewit).

Edible mushrooms known in Turkey

The best-known wild edibles in Turkey are the saffron milk cap, porcini, morel, chanterelle, Caesar's mushroom, parasol and king oyster. Among cultivated species the button mushroom leads, with oyster mushrooms, shiitake and lion's mane growing in popularity.

Almost every edible has a dangerous double: saffron milk caps with toxic milk caps, morels with false morels, Caesar's mushroom with the fly agaric, field mushrooms with a young death cap. No wild mushroom should be eaten until an expert has identified it with certainty. Our edible mushrooms page lists the features that tell them apart.

Poisonous and deadly mushrooms in Turkey

The death cap (Amanita phalloides) causes most fatal mushroom poisonings in Turkey. The destroying angel, deadly galerina, fool's webcap and deadly fibrecap are also life-threatening, while the fly agaric, livid pinkgill and false morel are poisonous.

With the death cap, symptoms only start around 8 to 12 hours after eating and can be followed by a deceptive recovery. If poisoning is suspected, call 112 right away and contact Turkey's National Poison Information Centre on 114 without waiting for symptoms. Folk tests with silver spoons, onions or vinegar do not detect toxins.

Mushrooms by colour

Colour is the first thing you notice, but it never settles an identification on its own: rain can bleach a cap and age can darken it. Our colour pages narrow the search; gills, stem, ring, volva and smell do the real work.

• Red: the fly agaric's white-spotted red cap, the lacquered red-brown reishi, and the bloody milk cap with its red milk.
• Yellow: chanterelle, chicken of the woods and golden oyster.
• White: button, field and parasol mushrooms, but also the deadly destroying angel. White does not mean safe.
• Orange: saffron milk cap, Caesar's mushroom and the orange clubs of cordyceps.
• Purple: the wood blewit, known around Bolu as mavi cincile.

Turkish mushroom names you'll hear

Turkish mushroom names change from region to region, and one name can cover several species, which is why every species page gives the Latin name too. These are the names you're most likely to come across at a village market:

• Çıntar, çam melkisi and melki: usually the saffron milk cap and related Lactarius species. Four or five Lactarius species are reportedly sold as kanlıca in Turkey.
• Cincile: around Bolu, mavi cincile is the wood blewit, though the name is used for other species too.
• Köygöçüren and evcikkıran: folk names for the death cap, and both hint at how deadly it is.
• Ayı mantarı and porçini: porcini (Boletus edulis).
• Kavak mantarı: oyster mushrooms and other species found on poplar.
• Horozmantarı and sarıkız: the chanterelle.
• Gelin mantarı: a regional name for the poisonous fly agaric.

Cultivated versus wild mushrooms

Cultivated mushrooms come from a known species grown under controlled conditions; wild mushrooms have to be identified from scratch every time. White button, chestnut and portobello mushrooms are all the same species, Agaricus bisporus, the most eaten mushroom in the world.

Oyster, king oyster, shiitake, lion's mane, enoki, nameko and maitake are all grown commercially, and a home grow kit gets you fresh mushrooms without any of the foraging risk.

Wild species like saffron milk caps, morels and porcini are prized for their flavour and season, and they are hard to cultivate. But a single misidentification can be fatal, so go out with someone experienced and leave anything uncertain behind.