Strobilomyces


Strobilomyces is a genus of boletes. The only well-known European species is the type species S. strobilaceus, known in English as "old man of the woods".
Members of the genus can be distinguished by the following characteristics:
  • the cap and stipe are covered in soft hairy or woolly scales,
  • while most boletes have smooth elongated spores, those of Strobilomyces are roughly spherical and prominently ornamented, and
  • as might be expected from its "dry" fibrous appearance, it is resistant to decay.

    Taxonomy and classification

The genus name comes from the Ancient Greek word Strobilos, meaning "pine cone", a reference to the appearance of S. strobilaceus. The ending "-myces" is a standard suffix meaning "mushroom". In some older classification systems it is assigned to a separate family Strobilomycetaceae, but more recent phylogenetic evidence merges it into the larger family Boletaceae. These results corroborate older DNA analyses by K. Høiland, which suggested that Strobilomyces is only distantly related to more familiar boletes such as Suillus, but was in fact more closely related to the Earth Balls.
Many more species have been discovered in warmer countries. The mycologist E. J. H. Corner described several new species from Malaysia including S. foveatus. According to recent estimates, about 40 species are known.

List of species