About this fungus
Shiitake is a fungus in the Omphalotaceae family. Its habitat and field characteristics are summarised below.
A firm brown wood-growing mushroom with a rounded cap that flattens with age. The cap often carries pale flecks or develops a cracked pattern, while the crowded gills remain white to cream.
What to check
Confirm a white spore print, pale attached to slightly notched gills, a tough central or slightly off-centre stem and growth from broadleaved wood. Mature shiitake have no ring or volva. Commercial or deliberately inoculated logs provide useful context, but every fruit body still needs checking.
Variation
Caps range from light brown through dark brown to grey-brown. Drying and cultivation conditions can produce conspicuous pale cracks or scales, while moist caps may remain smoother.
Lookalikes
Deadly Galerina, Galerina marginata, can grow on wood and has a rusty-brown spore print rather than white; its ring can disappear with age. Honey fungi and Kuehneromyces species also grow on wood but differ in spore colour, gill colour and veil structures. Wild-looking brown mushrooms should not be assumed to be shiitake from cap shape alone.
Habitat and range
Saprotrophic on dead broadleaved wood and native to East Asia. It is cultivated worldwide on hardwood logs and other commercial substrates, and occasional records outside its native range often reflect cultivation or escape.
Food safety
Choice edible.
Use this profile to learn what to examine and compare, not as proof that a mushroom is safe to eat. Check the whole specimen and every important lookalike before reaching an identification.
Photographs
Keith Weller, USDA Agricultural Research Service / Public DomainSpecies to compare
Similar mushrooms to compare against: