One of the dozens of kinds of shelf fungi. They're hard to distinguish, but my guess is that this one is Trametes versicolor, called Turkey Tail, in the States.

The fungus book I paid good money for concludes by saying that the best way to identify fungi is to go out with someone who knows what it is.

Not a good thing to see growing or rather attacking a tree.

More of a symptom than a disease, though. Shelf fungi only eat dead wood, so they usually show up on trees that are in trouble from other causes. This one looks like it is helping to clean up a fallen branch.

Commonly known as Bracket fungus in the UK - I think Tug's ID of Trametes versicolour is accurate.

I thought that the bracket aka shelf fungus can attack the heartwood of living trees as a primary infection as well as a secondary one. I will look into this further.

Since the heartwood of the tree is always non-living, yes, but it requires an area of dead sapwood to gain access to the heartwood, and to be able to start their fruiting bodies outside the tree.

Thanks Tug

The fungus is on a dead log I have placed in the soil to get a woodland affect :o)

Well, that's a nice bonus you got with it! :)

Yes! It will look nice when the daff come out & the bluebells that come later :o))

What a great idea. Our red oak had a bracket fungus and for safety reasons we had it taken down. The fungus fascinated me and I would be delighted to find it growing in a log.