Aphyllophorales

Aphyllophorales 

an order of fungi from the class Basidiomycetes which includes around 4,000 species. Aphyl-lophorales have an open (gymnocarpous) hymenophore which is smooth or shaped in spines, folds, or tubules which have grown together with the flesh. Sometimes there are twisting processes and plates. The fruiting bodies of the Aphyllophorales vary from being resupinate to rising over the substrate in the form of bent-back caps, caps with a lateral or central stalk, and hoof-shaped, club-shaped, bush-shaped, and other types of caps. The fungi are annuals or perennials. They may be weblike, waxy, leathery, corklike, woody, or meaty. Saprophytes live on dead wood and in the soil; some are parasitic on trees (many Polyporales of the Stereum purpureum species) and grassy plants (Pellicularia filamentosa and others). The Aphyllophorales include the agents of wood rot and also house fungi, the destroyers of the wooden parts of structures. A few Aphyllophorales are edible (chanterelles, certain hedgehog mushrooms and fungi of the Clavarias genus, and individual Polyporales). In terms of the structure of the hymenophore and the fruiting body, the order is divided into several families: Thelephoraceae, Clavariaceae, Hydnaceae, Polyporaceae, and others.

REFERENCES

Bondartseva, M. A. Obzor poriadka Aphyllophorales Leningradskoi oblasti. Leningrad, 1963. (Dissertation résumé.)
Stepanova-Kartavenko, N. T. Afilloforovye griby Urala. Sverdlovsk, [1967].

I. I. SIDOROVA