The method

Every specimen on this site travels the same path. The point of the site is to show that path in full, including the parts that are still unfinished.

1. Collected

The mushroom is photographed where it grew, with a camera that records the position and the time. Characters that do not survive the trip home — odor, taste, texture, bruising, latex, whether the cap sheds water — are recorded in the field, because a few hours later they are gone.

2. Processed

Images are filed into a specimen folder in a local archive, verified by checksum, and backed up. Microscope images are added as they are made. The photographs themselves are not uploaded here.

3. Posted to iNaturalist

The observation goes to iNaturalist, where a community of identifiers can see it and argue with it. iNaturalist owns community identification; this site does not attempt to repeat it.

4. Sequenced

Where a specimen is dried and kept as a voucher, its ITS region may be sequenced. A sequence is evidence, not an answer.

5. Validated

The sequence is checked against reference data through MycoMap. Where an accession exists, GenBank holds the sequence itself.

6. Named

A current name and a confidence level. Confidence is stated plainly, including when the honest answer is that the specimen still needs an identification. A name without a stated confidence is worth very little.

What this site is not

It is not a character catalog, an identification key, or a forum. It is a provenance record with links to the systems that own each stage.