Oh well. Lots of these big beautiful boletes this year but many are getting attacked by a white Hypomyces. Sources say spp for the Hypomyces, so nothing more specific, so to speak. Is there perhaps just one in BC? Five pics of varying degrees of attack are attached. Returning to the scene about ten days later, all were much whiter and weaker/collapsed, not counting the one that was already completely white. (It was actually the first one I saw, so it was like ... Whooaa, what is THIS? Then, seeing the others, it came into focus.) I don't have a pic handy for an example of something else I saw on the mirabiles, will try to get one later, of the large purpleish velvety caps with splotches of yellow. The yellow is not quite the colour of the pore area, which is on the lime-greenish side, but it does look like something showing through rather than a colonization. Are the splotches from something eating the thin layer of the purple velvet? They don't look like slug swaths, just small-to-medium round or odd-shaped areas.
Hi there, It is likely the white/yellow Hypomyces chrysospermus. Also, at a recent talk, the speaker mentioned that Hypomyces causes the shrunken cap effect in B. mirablilis: I've not had a chance to track down the source of this info yet, but it is certainly what we see when this species is colonised. cheers, frog
