This little Ink Cap occurs in great numbers on dead tree stumps, decomposing and recycling the rotten wood. The caps start off very small, and then develop to slightly bigger than a thimble. When young they are a beige color, but as they age this turns to grey, then black.

This a cup fungi, that is, they are shaped in the form of a cup. They can be large and fleshy, brown to orange. They are usually bowl-shaped when young but will become flattened and distorted with age. They grow on the ground, in fields, lawns or on roadsides.

Considered edible.

Fruit bodies are 2-6 cm long by 1-3 cm high, slimy, soft, gelatinous, orange to orange-yellow, spatula-shaped at first but becoming lobed or multi-lobed and convoluted. Common and widespread, it fruits on dead conifer logs and stumps.

Considered edible.

Some authors call the mushrooms in Scleroderma "earth balls," to emphasize their differences from the fleshier puffballs. Many Scleroderma species have tough outer rinds, and Scleroderma citrinum has a rind that is scaly and hard. When sliced, the rind stains pinkish. Inside, the spore mass is initially white, but soon begins to turn dark purple to purple-black, from the center outwards.

Poisonous!

This is a wax cap. In its early stages of development it is distinctively green and slimy. But it quickly begins to change colors, turning yellow or orange, and then fading to a sort of dingy straw color. By the end of this transformation, the parrot mushroom has become a nondescript little thing, dirty yellowish and very difficult to identify.

Considered edible, but apparently not appetizing because of its slimy appearance.

Identification of the many species of this mushroom is apparently very difficult.

A delicate species that last less then a day. Found singly or in small groups after rain. This attractive Ink Cap fruits in grass beside roads or pathways, sometimes in lawns or on well-rotted wood.

A small mushroom, with thin white stem. Many species which are difficult to identify.

Wine Cap Stropharia Garden Spawn
The Wine Cap (Stropharia rugoso annulata) is a large mushroom native to many parts of Europe and North America. It has a wonderful meaty texture and tastes like a richer Portabella. Great sauteed, baked, or barbecued. This is a very aggressive mushroom in the garden and landscaped environment.
 

Splash Cups are a common inhabitant of bark or wood mulch. Although less than a centimeter in diameter, Cyathus striatus often grows in huge clusters, thus making them easily visible, even from some distance. The common name "bird's nest fungus" should be obvious to anyone looking at the small mass of "eggs" within the small "nests" or cups of the fruiting bodies. The "eggs" in the nest contain the basidiospores within them. These "eggs" are actually analogous to tiny puffballs  in that they contain the basidiospores inside of them.

I found this one by its smell. I had smelled what I rhought was the rotten carcass of an animal. Then I found this strange shape of something that turned out to be a mushroom. The arms are fused at the top but can come apart. There were many of them frowing in the woodchips. 

The Stinky Squid begins life as an "egg." As this egg absorbs water and expands, the tentacle like fruit body appears. Each tentacle is coated with an olive-green spore mass (gleba) whose odor is quite rank. Rank, that is, to human nostrils. To flies, the odor is irresistible; as the main vectors of spore dispersal, they're attracted to Stinky Squids like flies to, well, feces. Then off flies the fly, unknowingly spreading P. fusiformis spores wherever it lands.

A tropical species, the Stinky Squid was first reported in North America in Pittsburgh in 1915. A few decades later, it appeared in New England

but it is most likely another species

Grows on on the dead wood of hardwoods and, occasionally, conifers.

Inedible

One day I found a strange bright yellow patch of something in my garden, covering the wood chips of an about one square foot. It is not a mushroom or fungi, although it was once placed under the fungi. The English name is Slime Mold, and is presently classified under Amoebozoa. It lives in shady, cool, moist areas, such as decaying leaves and logs. It is a really strange life form. basically the start out as individual large cells of protoplasm, which join together to form one single entity with many nuclei. The end up forming one big cell about a foot big with millions of nuclei in it. AND it also moves around! A couple of inches a day. It eats fungal spores, bacteria, and other microbes, and thus if found primarily on decomposing matter.  But when the food runs out it starts its reproductive cycle and produces spores, and dries up.