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Helicogloea compressa

by Michael Kuo, 21 July 2026

These tiny, drab, gelatinous cylinders appear on the well rotted, wet wood of hardwoods in many parts of North America and Oceania—and, more rarely, in Europe. I'm calling them "jelly fungi," but I'm stretching the limits of the term, since they are more closely related to rusts (for example Gymnosporangium juniperi-virginianae) than to "classic" jelly fungi like Tremella mesenterica.

Thanks to Michelle Lierl for documenting, collecting, and preserving Helicogloea compressa for study; her collection is deposited in The Herbarium of Michael Kuo.

Description:

Ecology: Saprobic; growing gregariously on well rotted, decorticated wood; spring through fall; originally described from Maine (Ellis & Everhart 1897); widely distributed in North America but rare or absent in the Rocky Mountains and the Southwest; widely distributed but rare in Europe; well documented in Oceania. The described and illustrated collections are from Illinois and Indiana.

Fruiting Body: Cylindric to cushion-shaped; 1–2 mm high, 0.5–2 mm wide; surface bald, milky to grayish white or pale tan; moist; gelatinous.

Odor: Not distinctive.

Microscopic Features: Conidia 2.5–3 x 1.5–2.5 µm; subglobose to lacrymoid, ellipsoid, or somewhat irregular; smooth; hyaline in KOH. Conidiophores composed of hyphae 1.5–3 µm; wide, branched and occasionally cross-branched, with cylindric hyphal protrusions developing into conidia-tipped, whorled hyphal structures.

REFERENCES: (J. B. Ellis & B. M. Everhart, 1897) V. Malysheva & K. Põldmaa, 2018. (Ellis & Everhart, 1897; Akulov et al., 2011; Spirin et al. 2018; Hubregtse, 2019; Malysheva et al., 2019; Kalinina et al., 2020.) Herb. Kuo 10260403, 06052601.

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Conidia

Conidiophores

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Kuo, M. (2026, June). Helicogloea compressa. Retrieved from the MushroomExpert.Com Web site: http://www.mushroomexpert.com/helicogloea_compressa.html