Strong smell of artificial berry/cherry(!?) like those smelly markers @leptonia
Both the cap and the stem are extremely slimy. Its the slimiest stem I have ever seen.
Mild farinaceous odor, similar to cucumber.
Under redwood and tan oak.
CFS-31Jan2009-1 Leptonia sp.
Subgenus Cyanula, Section Caesicaules, Series Caesicaules; near the
subviduense complex.
Collected 31 Jan 2009, Mendocino County, California, USA
Cap: 31.6 mm wide, 13.8 mm high. Appressed-fibrillose, broadly convex, margin slightly inrolled and wavy. Deep midnight blue-black. Small umbo (papillate). Flesh 1.6 mm thick at disc. Dingy-white flesh.
Lamellae: 12-16 mm long, 4.2-7 mm deep. Pallid creamy-tan or flesh-colored, quite blue-gray near the stipe, somewhat marginate along the inner 1/2 of some of the larger lamellae. Approximately equal depths. Mostly straight to slightly wavy.
Stipe: 58.7 mm tall. 3.7 mm thick at apex, 3.6 mm thick at lowest point. Medium blue-gray, quite a bit lighter than cap. Glabrous except for distinct scurfs at apex. Striate at base, with distinct mycelial bulb at base – 7.6 mm thick.
Odor: (After 2 days of storage in a tacklebox) – faintly fragrant-pungent or indistinct.
Spores: (10-13.5) 12.1 μm x 6.9 (5.7-7.7) μm, 5-6 sided, heterodiametric.
Pileipellis: Trichodermium, entangled elements (collapsed ?) periclinal at disc, erect away from disc (this seems the opposite of the usual to me).
Stipitipellis: With tufts of cylindrical-clavate caulocystidia.
Cheilocystidia: Collapsed, not abundant, cylindrical-clavate to subcapitate.
Pleurocystidia: Scattered, cyclindrico-clavate, approximately 25 μm tall.
Clamp connections: Absent in all tissues examined (pilepellis, lamellae, stipe, mycelium at base of stipe)
These species can be eliminated by AT LEAST the indicated characteristic (and usually many others):
parva: different pilepellis and pileus color
yatesii: decurrent lamellae
viridiflavipes: color of stipe base, clustered habit
chalybea: basal mycelium scarce to absent, stipe “perfectly” glabrous, pilepellis a palisade
decolorans f. atropruinosipes: stipe covered in dark squamules
decolorans f. decolorans: glabrous stipe
decolorans f. cystidiosa: lacks pleurocystidia, different pilepellis
The L. subviduense group is close but the varieties differ at least in these characteristics:
var. subviduense: Lamellae most often with a decurrent tooth, rarely pruinose at apex, stipe quite fragile, smaller spores.
var. marginata: Cheilocystidia abundant – originate as elements of pileal margin when young and thus identical to pileocystidia, gills serrulate, strongly marginate, stipe “extremely fragile”.
Specimen at UCSC Gilbert Lab.
[admin – Sat Aug 14 01:56:55 +0000 2010]: Changed location name from ‘Santa Cruz Fungus Fair, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz Co., California, USA’ to ‘Santa Cruz, California, USA’
[admin – Sat Aug 14 01:56:52 +0000 2010]: Changed location name from ‘Santa Cruz Fungus Fair, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz Co., California, USA’ to ‘Santa Cruz, California, USA’
Haven't seen this one so late in the winter, with light pink gills, bulbous base, amaretto smell, under spruce and fir.
Under spruce, smells like Amaretto, and is one of my favorites