Tremella olens

Tremella olens
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Fungi
Division:	Basidiomycota
Class:	Tremellomycetes
Order:	Tremellales
Family:	Tremellaceae
Genus:	Tremella
Species:	T. olens
Binomial name
Tremella olens Berk. (1860)

Tremella olens is a species of fungus in the family Tremellaceae. It produces soft, whitish, lobed to frondose, gelatinous basidiocarps (fruit bodies) and is parasitic on other fungi on dead branches of broad-leaved trees. It was originally described from Tasmania.

Taxonomy

Tremella olens was first published in 1860 by British mycologist Miles Joseph Berkeley based on a collection made in Tasmania.[1]

Description

Fruit bodies are soft, gelatinous, whitish, and lobed. Microscopically, the basidia are tremelloid (ellipsoid, with oblique to vertical septa), 4-celled. The basidiospores are ellipsoid, smooth, 7.5 to 8.5 by 5.5 to 6.5 μm.[2]

Similar species

Tremella olens belongs to a complex of similar species that have been differentiated by DNA sequencing and minor microscopic features. Tremella fibulifera and T. subfibulifera were both originally described from Brazil; Tremella neofibulifera and T. lloydiae-candidae were originally described from Japan; Tremella australe, T. cheejenii, T. guangxiensis, and T. latispora were originally described from China.[3]

Tremella fuciformis is a white species also recorded from Australia, but fruit bodies have thin, erect fronds, often crisped at the edges.[4]

Habitat and distribution

Tremella olens is a parasite on lignicolous fungi, but its host species is unknown. It is found on dead, attached or fallen branches of broad-leaved trees.

The species was originally described from Tasmania and has also been reported from Christmas Island.[2] Reports from Venezuela[5] and Jamaica[6] refer to the South American species T. fibulifera or T. subfibulifera. Reports from Cameroon and Sabah belong to the species complex, but which species is uncertain.[2]

References

1. Berkeley MJ (1860). Fungi, in Hooker JD, The Botany of the Antarctic Voyage of H.M. discovery ships Erebus and Terror in the years 1839-1843. Part III. Flora Tasmaniae 2. London: Reeve Brothers. pp. 241–282.
2. Roberts P. (2001). "Heterobasidiomycetes from Korup National Park, Cameroon". Kew Bulletin. 56 (1): 163–187. doi:10.2307/4119434. JSTOR 4119434.
3. Fan L, Alvarenga RL, Gibertoni TB, Wu F, Dai Y (2021). "Four new species in the Tremella fibulifera complex (Tremellales, Basidiomycota)". MycoKeys (82): 33–56. doi:10.3897/mycokeys.82.63241. PMID 34393591.
4. Chen C-J. (1998). Morphological and molecular studies in the genus Tremella. Berlin: J. Cramer. p. 225. ISBN 978-3-443-59076-5.
5. Roberts P (2003). "Heterobasidiomycetes from Rancho Grande, Venezuela". Mycotaxon. 87: 24–41.
6. Roberts P (2006). "Caribbean Heterobasidiomycetes: 2. Jamaica". Mycotaxon. 96: 83–107.