birch polypore
Fomitopsis betulina latin

Larvae have been recorded feeding on bracket fungus (including Piptoporus betulinus) and dead wood.

Old trees are often killed by the decay fungus Piptoporus betulinus and fallen branches rot rapidly on the forest floor.

Look up and you will find in any stand of birch the Razor-Strop (Piptoporus betulinus), a very prominent bracket fungus.

The larvae feed on Mushrooms, particularly Piptoporus betulinus and Ganoderma applanatum, and dead wood.

But Austrian microbiologists have identified the lumps as the fruit of the birch fungus, Piptoporus betulinus, which is common in alpine and other cold environments.

Its caterpillars feed mainly on fungi, namely birch polypore (Piptoporus betulinus) and turkey tail (Trametes versicolor).

Some species depend on a single tree genus (e.g. Piptoporus betulinus on birch, Perenniporia corticola on dipterocarps).

Reinhold Poder, a microbiologist at the University of Innsbruck who has studied one of the mushrooms, Piptoporus betulinus, said it was of a kind whose antibiotic effects had been recognized for at least 2,000 years.

But as it seems, neither extreme was correct; the caterpillars do eat preferentially fungi - not only the oak mazegill but also others (e.g. birch polypore, Piptoporus betulinus) -, feeding on plant debris and similar materials when their favorite food is not available.

The use of fungi by humans dates back to prehistory; Ötzi the Iceman, a well-preserved mummy of a 5,300-year-old Neolithic man found frozen in the Austrian Alps, carried two species of polypore mushrooms that may have been used as tinder (Fomes fomentarius), or for medicinal purposes (Piptoporus betulinus).