Mushroom

Mushroom(s) are the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting bodies of fungi typically produced above ground on soil or on their food sources. The standard for the name mushroom is the cultivated white button mushroom, Agaricus bisporus, hence the word mushroom is most often applied to fungi (Basidiomycota, Agaricomycetes) that have a stem (called a stipe), a cap (called a pileus), and gills (each called a lamella/pl. lamellae) on the underside of the cap just as do store-bought white mushrooms. However, mushrooms can also be a wide variety of gilled fungi, with or without stems, and the term is used even more generally to describe both fleshy fruitbodies of some Ascomycota and woody or leathery fruitbodies of some Basidiomycota, depending upon the context of the usage. Usually forms deviating from the standard form have more specific names, such as puffballs, stinkhorn, morels, etc. and gilled mushrooms themselves are often called agarics, in reference to their similarity to Agaricus or placement in the order Agaricales. By extension, mushroom can also designate the entire fungus when in culture or when referring to the whole thallus (called a mycelium) of species forming fruitbodies called mushrooms.