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This find from late July was the second time I’ve encountered this beautiful brown-centered orange waxcap. The first time, a few years back, it was only a single mushroom and I didn’t document it thoroughly or identify it. I noticed the similarity in form to finds I had identified as H. marginata, but the color was dramatically different. I was looking for marginate gills (having edges colored differently from the faces or sides), which I have documented in yellow-orange-capped finds—but that characteristic was not apparent. I was thinking that in light of the species name, marginate gills would be reliably present in the species as a whole—but after reading descriptions in two of my books, it seems that marginate gills are only present in one of three varieties, H. marginata var. marginata, and in that variety only if and when the color of the gill faces has faded.
In Mushrooms of the Northeastern United States and Eastern Canada, Timothy Baroni’s main entry for the species is specifically for H. marginata var. marginata. His description reads, “gills brilliant orange, not fading like the cap, or at least edges remaining dark orange.” In Audubon’s new Mushrooms of North America, Jacob Kalichman’s description does not mention marginate gills at all. Both authors describe var. concolor similarly: Timothy Baroni writes that the gills have “the same golden-yellow color as the cap surface,” while Jacob Kalichman describes the gills as “yellowish-orange.” But the two authors describe var. olivacea quite differently. Timothy Baroni writes that it “has a strongly olive-colored cap and shades of olive-green on the stem.” This does not describe my find. But Jacob Kalichman’s description says var. olivacea has “an orangish-brown or olive-brown tint on the middle of the cap and bright orange gills” (ding ding ding!).