One of the foremost medicinal and culinary mushrooms of China and Taiwan, Tremella fuciformis has the most unusual strategies for cultivation by utilizing the nutrients gained from a common wood-decomposing Ascomycetes fungus, Hypoxylon archeri. Goals of this study are trying to understand factors affecting mycelial growth and fruiting of T. fuciformis. The results revealed that T. fuciformis mycelium was white or beige, slow growth, had upright, inclined up or flat aerial hyphae on the surface of the medium, the mycelium formed gel-like colony on PDA medium. H. archeri mycelium was white, fast growth, had slightly feathery and flat branching hyphae on the PDA medium , old mycelium became pale yellow to light brown and secreted melanin in medium. T. fuciformis mycelium could grow among 23℃-27℃ and 25℃was the most optimum temperature. H. archeri mycelium could grow among 25℃-31℃ and 29℃was the best temperature. It was also found that FPDA was the best medium for both growth of T. fuciformis and H. archeri mycelium among eight media. Test of T. fuciformis confront culture with H. archeri , the result revealed T. fuciformis formed white and dense mycelium mat on PDA medium. Liquid filtrates of T. fuciformis or H. archeri mycelium were added to PDA separately, the growth of mycelium of H. archeri or T. fuciformis was stimulated individually. Although T. fuciformis mycelium growing in sawdust alone was slow and no primordium developed , however, fruiting body of T. fuciformis was successfully produced by mixed culture with H. archeri in sawdust medium due to T. fuciformis could utilize the nutrition decomposed from sawdust by H. archeri. The formation procedures of T. fuciformis fruiting body included (1) secretion of yellow stick material, (2) formation of primordium, (3) development of fruiting body. 25℃ was found the best temperature for mycelium growth of T. fuciformis in sawdust substrate and 23℃ was the best temperature for development of fruiting body. The result revealed that rice bran was the best supplementary nutrient added in sawdust substrate. 24% of high fruiting body yields were increased by adding 30% of rice bran in sawdust compared to those adding 20% of rice bran. The result also indicated that 98.2% of fruiting body yields were increased if 50% sawdust were replaced by corn cob.
