CLAVARIACEAE 



477 



Fig. 155. Polyporales, Family Cantharellaceae. Cantharellus floccosus Schw. (Gomphus 

 floccosus (Schw.) Singer). (Courtesy, M. B. Walters.) 



by Maire 1900; Rea, 1922). This family shows close affinities with the 

 following and may be really more closely related to it than to the 

 Thelephoraceae. (Fig. 155.) 



Family Clavariaceae. Spore fruits fleshy or waxy or even gelatinous, 

 rarely leathery; upright, clavate or branched in a coralloid manner; 

 round or flattened; usually covered by the hymenium on all sides over 

 the whole spore fruit or over special more terminal and often enlarged 

 portions. A dozen or more genera and probably over 500 species. Almost 

 all are saprophytic and possibly some form mycorrhizae on tree roots. 

 A few species are parasitic upon plants. Many of the larger fleshy forms 

 are edible. Some of the genera seem to have their origins in the Thele- 

 phoraceae and some are perhaps nearer to the Cantharellaceae, and per- 

 haps some are related to Irpex in the Polyporaceae or to Hericium in the 

 Hydnaceae. In other words, the Clavariaceae probably do not represent 

 a phylogenetic unit. Some are stichobasidial and some chiastobasidial. 

 How great weight this should have upon the division into genera must 



