Home / Polypores & brackets / TM0156
Turkey tail on a fallen branch
Trametes versicolor Species
Angles captured. Five field frames including two of a bracket held up to show the underside, plus three of the dried specimen.
Morphology
Thin, flexible, fan-shaped brackets in overlapping tiers. Upper surface concentrically zoned in bands of grey-green, buff and brown, with a fine velvety texture. Underside white and finely poroid, the pores too small to count by eye. Margin thin and pale.
Habitat & substrate
A fallen hardwood branch, well decayed.
Lookalikes & what rules them out
Concentric zoning, a velvety upper surface, a thin flexible texture and fine white pores together make this one of the few genuinely field-identifiable fungi in the region. The look-alikes are separated on pore size and on whether the upper surface is truly velvety.
To confirm this identification
Nothing. This one is settled.
Notes
The most confident identification on this walk. Collected and dried; the dried specimen is shown alongside.
Found at Coldbrook Rd area, Hubbardston, MA on Friday, 14 August 2026 at 11:21. See the full walk for that day's weather and everything else recorded.
Others in this group
Perennial polypore on an oak trunkGanoderma sp. · Oct 10Moderate
Small zoned bracketTrametes sp. · Jul 31Moderate–high
Cinnabar polypore on oakPycnoporus cinnabarinus · Aug 1High
Orange-gilled bracket on a logTapinella or Phyllotopsis · Aug 6Moderate
Brown cap on a birch logUnidentified · Aug 6Low
Zoned brackets on rockTrametes or Stereum · Aug 6Moderate
Birch polyporeFomitopsis betulina · Aug 6High
Cinnabar polypore on a stickPycnoporus cinnabarinus · Aug 6High