Lacquered Bracket - Ganoderma lucidum

Young specimens of this large bracket fungus can be beautifully brown  and shiny on their upper surface.The growing edges are somewhat inflated and pale cream in colour. Pores are white and rounded.This is all obscured by copious brown spores in older fruiting bodies. The spores also colour the bark of the tree.

Older specimens have a distinctly grooved surface . They may be 25 cm across at maturity.

It is difficult to separate this fungus from other Ganoderma species. Lacquered bracket is notoriously variable in both appearance and attachment to its host tree.

Bracket fungus top surface  is shiny and smooth as a young fungus. Fruiting bodies are up to 25 cm diameter and  4cm thick. Most have a stem and a broad attachment to the host. Others  are completely sessile. Most are found at the base of oak trees

Pores are white.Brown spores, produced in huge numbers later in the life cycle, obscure  the, now grooved,lacquered surface and the pore colour darkens to brown.

Detailed examination required.  Please add photographs to support your record and state the host on which it was growing if known.

Often found at the base of oak or maple trees. It sometimes grows on stumps of very recently felled oaks.

All year.

Scattered records in Southern and Central England. Also found  in northern Scotland.

Status in Leicestershire and Rutland not known.