Australian Capital Territory
Canberra & Southern Tablelands
New South Wales
Canberra & Southern Tablelands
The fruit bodies of this species are mushrooms. The cap is smooth, fan-shaped to funnel-shaped and up to 30 centimetres in diameter. The cap is dominated by brown to purplish shades, but may be creamy towards the margin. The gills are white and the stem, commonly off-centre or lateral, is white and fairly solid (up to 8 centimetres long, 4 in diameter). The mushrooms usually appear in dense clusters of overlapping caps and grow from dead wood. Often that is obvious, with clusters of caps around a stump, but sometimes the wood is buried and then the mushrooms may appear to be growing on soil.
The mushrooms are luminous. At night or in a dark room you see this: http://www.cpbr.gov.au/fungi/images-captions/omphalotus-nidiformis-0002.html. That photo shows two mushrooms, using only the light that the mushrooms themselves are producing.
Bioluminescence in the ghost fungus Omphalotus nidiformis does not attract potential spore dispersing insects is the title of a paper by several researchers from the University of Adelaide and that paper is freely available at: http://www.imafungus.org/Issue/72/11.pdf.
Omphalotus nidiformis is listed in the following regions:
Canberra & Southern Tablelands | Southern Highlands | South Coast | Greater Sydney | Hunter Region | New South Wales North Coast | Hume | Greater Brisbane
Maps
ANBG Aranda Bushland Bango Nature Reserve Boro Brindabella National Park Genoplesium plumosum target area Genoplesium vernale target area Gibraltar Pines Goulburn Mulwaree Council Mares Forest National Park Mongarlowe River Nadgigomar Nature Reserve Namadgi National Park National Arboretum Forests Nunnock Swamp South East Forest National Park Tallaganda State Forest Tidbinbilla Nature ReservePlaces
Acton, ACT Borough, NSW Bungonia, NSW Captains Flat, NSW Glen Allen, NSW Mongarlowe, NSW Reidsdale, NSW Uriarra Village, ACT Wog Wog, NSW Wombeyan Caves, NSW
