Types of fungal fruiting bodies (or sporocarps)

Cup fungi

Cup or disk fungi are either flat disks or shallow cups on soil, dung or wood. They vary from less than a millimetre to several centimetres in diameter and appear in colours such as black, white, orange, aqua, brown, and yellow. Some are on short stalks while others are stalkless and the edges and undersides may be smooth or hairy. The introductory page mentioned this Peziza sp. that was growing on a carpet. Other examples are Cheilymenia sp. , Chlorociboria aeruginascens and Scutellinia sp..

There are also what might best be described as "compound" cup fungi, which look like a number of cups stuck together. Two examples are the genera Cyttaria, where each "dimple" in the "golfball" can be thought of as a small cup, and Morchella, where each depression is a cup. Then there's Leotia lubrica, which is really a distorted cup fungus on a short stem. In the TWO MAIN GROUPS SECTION you will see that Cyttaria, Morchella and Leotia are really very similar to the ordinary cup fungi.

Cyttaria gunnii

Leotia lubrica