Pycnoporus coccineus sightings - Canberra Nature Map

Scarlet Bracket

Pycnoporus coccineus fruit bodies are orange or reddish-orange and grow from wood, mostly dead wood. Usually, the fruit bodies are shelf-like outgrowths and so have distinct upper and lower surfaces. With age the upper surface may fade or even be bleached to white and you see a mix of bleached and unbleached fruit bodies in this photo: http://www.cpbr.gov.au/fungi/images-captions/pycnoporus-sp-0305.html. However, the underside keeps the orange colour. Viewed from above a fruit body often looks like a section of a circle that has been produced by making a straight cut parallel to, but well away from, the diameter and then gluing that whole flat edge to the wood. The fruit body may extend several centimetres out from the wood and, at the attached edge, may be many centimetres long (and up to a centimetre or so thick). The fruit body has a corky texture and the upper surface is smooth to finely velvety whereas on the underside there are tiny pores, up to 8 per millimetre. In this photo (http://www.cpbr.gov.au/fungi/images-captions/pycnoporus-sp-0116.html) you see a close-up view of an underside of a fruit body.

Pycnoporus sanguineus fruit bodies have the same orange colour but (1) the fruit bodies are thinner, up to about 5 millimetres and (2) have a narrow attachment to the wood, very stem-like in appearance.

Both species are found in many countries, Pycnoporus coccineus at various locations in or bordering the Indian or Pacific Oceans and Pycnoporus sanguineus more widespread but generally in tropical or sub-tropical regions.