Well friends, my excitement about finding a "wild" chicken of the woods mushroom may have been for naught. I'm posting these photos so that my Steemit friends who know mushrooms better then me can have a better look.
The shelf seems to be thinning out along the edge, and you can see a ruffle beginning to form. It has rained for the last two days, so the bottom is dripping (hopefully resulting in the spores being planted along the rest of the trunk!) It also seems to have a "baby" on the bottom left side. The top feels a bit fuzzy.
As I said in the original post, I am not a mushroom expert and we will not be consuming this specimen until I get an official nod that this sucker won't kill us dead. So here's some more pics, and I'm wide open to suggestions as to the species. We consider this a great learning moment!
We are on the west coast of Central Florida and the growth is on an oak that is dying but not completely gone yet. Hope that helps!
