Home / Jelly fungi / TM0047
Yellow lobed fungus on moss
cf. Leotia Genus
Angles captured. Five close frames from several sides, with old nut husks alongside for scale.
Morphology
A single golden-yellow fruitbody about 3 cm across, lobed and convoluted like a small brain or a folded ear, with a short thick stalk-like base. Surface smooth, matte to slightly greasy rather than glistening. Firm-looking rather than obviously gelatinous.
Habitat & substrate
Growing from moss and litter beside several split hickory or beech husks, on the forest floor rather than on obvious wood.
Lookalikes & what rules them out
A terrestrial Tremella is not a real alternative — Tremella species are parasites of wood-inhabiting fungi and sit on wood. A firm, matte, lobed yellow head on the ground among moss and acorns is the jelly-baby profile, Leotia lubrica — an ascomycete that only looks like a jelly.
To confirm this identification
Look for the stalk. Jelly babies are stalked club fungi; a side view decides more than a print would.
Notes
Corrected. The Tremella half of the earlier pair is withdrawn on ecology.
Found at Elm St area, Leominster, MA on Thursday, 6 August 2026 at 11:08. See the full walk for that day's weather and everything else recorded.
Others in this group
Witch's butter on a mossy logTremella mesenterica or Dacrymyces chrysospermus · Nov 27Moderate
Orange jelly fungus on a logDacrymyces or Tremella · Aug 6Moderate–high
Orange jelly fungus, second logDacrymyces or Tremella · Aug 6Moderate–high
Yellow jelly fungusDacrymyces or Tremella · Aug 8Moderate–high