On Mushrooms and Mantis

Mid-summer, and the praying mantis is delicate among the tomato vines, its exoskeleton, shedding as the mantis grows, as green as any young leaf.

  End of summer, and the movements of the mantis have become weighted and ponderous, the exoskeleton toughened and worn, tinged with the colors of autumn, fading to the last brown, inviting autumn leaves to follow suit.

Early autumn rains soften the mushrooms on an old plum tree. The mushrooms resemble edible tree ears (kikurage), but they are not tree ears, and likely not edible, either.  Can anyone identify this mushroom?