Season
What is fruiting in November
32 of the species on this site fruit in November, and 7 of them are deadly. Seasons here are the ones on each species sheet, and they shift with latitude and with the year: a warm autumn runs late everywhere. Treat a month as a prompt to look, never as confirmation of what you have found.
Out this month and deadly
Brown roll-rim, Deadly dapperling, Deadly galerina, Deadly webcap, Death cap, Destroying angel, Fool's webcap. These are listed first below rather than buried, because the reason to know what is fruiting is at least as much about what to leave as what to take.
Deadly
Brown roll-rim
Paxillus involutus
Inrolled downy margin, decurrent gills that bruise brown, and gills that lift off the cap in a sheet.
brown spore print
Deadly
Deadly dapperling
Lepiota brunneoincarnata
A SMALL scaly parasol. The rule that saves lives here is blunt: leave every small Lepiota alone. The large edible parasols are 10 cm across and upward; the deadly ones are the little ones.
white spore print
Deadly
Deadly galerina
Galerina marginata
A rusty-brown spore print on a small brown mushroom growing from rotten wood. There is no field character that settles this one. Take the print.
brown spore print
Deadly
Deadly webcap
Cortinarius rubellus
A rusty-spored, cobwebby-veiled mushroom in conifer woods. The genus Cortinarius is enormous, poorly known and contains species that destroy kidneys, and it is the genus a careful forager simply leaves alone.
brown spore print
Deadly
Death cap
Amanita phalloides
White gills, a ring, and a membranous sac at the base. All three together, in a mushroom growing from soil near trees, and you should stop.
white spore print
Deadly
Destroying angel
Amanita bisporigera, A. ocreata, A. virosa
Entirely white, with a ring AND a sac at the base. An all-white gilled mushroom with a bag around its foot is the single most dangerous shape in the woods.
white spore print
Deadly
Fool's webcap
Cortinarius orellanus
As with all webcaps: rusty spores and a cobwebby partial veil. Neither tells you which webcap, and that is the problem.
brown spore print
Toxic
Common earthball
Scleroderma citrinum
Thick warty rind and dark marbled interior. A true puffball is thin-skinned and pure white inside, like a marshmallow.
black spore print
Toxic
Common inkcap
Coprinopsis atramentaria
Deliquescing grey cap in a cluster. Edible on its own, and that is the trap.
black spore print
Toxic
Fly agaric
Amanita muscaria
Red cap with removable white warts, and a bulb with concentric bands rather than a sac.
white spore print
Toxic
Ivory funnel
Clitocybe dealbata, C. rivulosa
Small, white, funnel-shaped, decurrent gills, growing in grass. The fairy ring champignon that people pick has widely spaced gills that do NOT run down the stem, and a tough pliable stem.
white spore print
Toxic
Jack-o'-lantern
Omphalotus illudens, O. olearius
True gills and orange flesh, in a tight cluster on wood. A chanterelle has blunt forking ridges, pale flesh, and grows singly from soil.
white spore print
Toxic
Panther cap
Amanita pantherina
Brown cap, white warts, grooved margin, and a collar at the top of the bulb.
white spore print
Toxic
Sulphur tuft
Hypholoma fasciculare
Yellow-green gills. No edible clustered wood mushroom has them.
black spore print
Not worth eating
Chaga
Inonotus obliquus
Black cracked charcoal-like mass on a LIVING BIRCH, rusty orange inside.
brown spore print
Not worth eating
Turkey tail
Trametes versicolor
Fine WHITE PORES on the underside. The many look-alikes have a smooth underside, a maze-like one, or a rusty one.
white spore print
Edible, with conditions
Chicken of the woods
Laetiporus sulphureus, L. cincinnatus
A bright orange-and-yellow bracket on wood, with pores and no gills, soft enough to dent with a thumbnail.
white spore print
Edible, with conditions
Honey mushroom
Armillaria mellea and the Armillaria complex
Dense clusters on hardwood, white spore print, dark hairs at the cap centre.
white spore print
Edible, with conditions
Shaggy mane, lawyer's wig
Coprinus comatus
A tall shaggy white cylinder in disturbed grass. Once it starts to blacken at the edge, it is a mushroom you look at rather than eat.
black spore print
Edible, with conditions
Wood blewit
Lepista nuda
Lilac gills and stem in autumn leaf litter, with a pale pink spore print.
pink spore print
Edible
Enoki, velvet shank
Flammulina velutipes and F. filiformis
The dark velvety stem base, on a sticky orange cap fruiting in midwinter on wood.
white spore print
Edible
Saffron milkcap
Lactarius deliciosus and relatives
Orange milk that turns green. The milk is the test: cut a gill and wait thirty seconds.
white spore print
Edible
Yellowfoot, winter chanterelle
Craterellus tubaeformis
A hollow yellow stem under a small brown funnel with blunt ridges.
white spore print
Choice
Cauliflower mushroom
Sparassis crispa, S. spathulata
A cream mass of flat wavy ribbons at the foot of a conifer. Nothing harmful resembles it.
white spore print
Choice
Chanterelle
Cantharellus cibarius, C. californicus and relatives
Blunt forking ridges rather than blades, pale flesh inside, and growing from soil rather than wood.
white spore print
Choice
Hedgehog mushroom
Hydnum repandum, H. umbilicatum
Teeth instead of gills, on a mushroom growing from soil. Nothing dangerous shares this.
white spore print
Choice
Hen of the woods, maitake
Grifola frondosa
A large rosette of grey fronds with white pores at the base of an oak. Remember the tree: it will fruit again.
white spore print
Choice
King bolete, porcini
Boletus edulis and the edulis group
White unchanging pores and flesh, a barrel stem with a white net, and a brown cap. No blue bruising anywhere.
brown spore print
Choice
Lion's mane
Hericium erinaceus
A white beard of long spines hanging from hardwood. Nothing dangerous resembles it.
white spore print
Choice
Matsutake, pine mushroom
Tricholoma murrillianum, T. magnivelare
The smell, plus a very firm white mushroom with a shaggy ring under conifers.
white spore print
Choice
Meadow mushroom, field mushroom
Agaricus campestris
Pink gills going brown, and no sac at the base. Lift the whole mushroom to check the base; do not cut it.
brown spore print
Choice
Oyster mushroom
Pleurotus ostreatus and relatives
White decurrent gills on a stemless or side-stemmed fan growing from wood.
white spore print
Just starting
Enoki, velvet shank. Not out in October, out now.
Last month for these
Brown roll-rim, Deadly dapperling, Deadly webcap, Destroying angel, Fool's webcap, Common inkcap, Ivory funnel, Jack-o'-lantern, Panther cap, Chicken of the woods, Shaggy mane, lawyer's wig, Saffron milkcap, Cauliflower mushroom, Chanterelle, Hen of the woods, maitake, King bolete, porcini, Lion's mane, Matsutake, pine mushroom, Meadow mushroom, field mushroom. Gone by December.
A month in a table is not an identification. Every edible species on this page has at least one lookalike, several of them serious, and the season overlaps too. Take the spore print.