Part 27

Flesh: red-brown, soft in the cap and fibrous in the stem.

Spore-print: pure white.

Spores: medium sized, hyaline under the microscope and spherical, 7-8 µm in diameter and beautifully spiny.

Marginal and facial cystidia: absent.

Habitat & Distribution: Common in troops in woodland, copses, on heaths; in fact it may be found in nearly all possible habitats.

General Information: This is a very common agaric which in the future will probably be split into several distinct species; unfortunately it is as variable as it is common, hence the common name ‘deceiver’; it is often mistaken at first glance for many other species quite unrelated. I have seen even the most experienced mycologist pick up rather unfamiliar specimens of Laccaria laccata in mistake for a species of Lactarius or a species of Collybia, etc. I would hate to say more because I have been ‘deceived’ myself on more than one occasion. L. laccata appears to be a composite species, but because of the difficulty in defining some of the characters the splitting of the species has not as yet been satisfactorily solved. The smell, however, may well give a clue for some specimens smell very strongly of radish whilst others are odourless.

~L. proxima~ (Boudier) Patouillard, differs in having ellipsoid spores; it is larger in stature and is common in wet places.

~L. amethystea~ (Mérat) Murrill, differs in the deep violet or amethyst-colour of the fruit-body and commonly grows in shaded woods.

~L. bicolor~ (Maire) P. D. Orton, which is less frequent, has lilaceous gills and violaceous mycelium at the base of the stem.

Illustrations: Hvass 66; NB 133¹; WD 20².

~Mycena sanguinolenta~ (Fries) Kummer

Small bleeding mycena

Cap: width 10-17 mm. Stem: width 2-4 mm; length 50-80 mm.

Description:

Cap: bell-shaped or conical expanding only slightly with age and so remaining umbonate, reddish-brown, striate to the margin from the darker apex and blotched age with red-brown spots.

Stem: pale reddish brown, very slender, fragile, woolly at the base and exuding a red-brown juice when broken.

Gills: adnate, fairly distant, whitish to flesh-colour with a dark red-brown edge and not noticeably becoming blotched with red-brown.

Flesh: with no distinctive smell, reddish-brown and very thin.

Spore-print: white.

Spores: medium sized, hyaline, ellipsoid to pip-shaped, smooth about 10 µm long (9-10 × 4-5 µm) and becoming bluish grey when mounted in solutions containing iodine.

Marginal cystidia: awl-shaped, pointed at the apex, swollen below and filled with dark red-brown contents.

Facial cystidia: absent.

Habitat & Distribution: Solitary or in small groups on poorly kept lawns, in woods and copses; it is particularly frequent in the beds of needles found in pine woods.

General Information: This fungus is easily recognised by the slender habit, reddish juice exuded when broken and habitat preferences. Mycena haematopus (Fries) Kummer is larger and grows in tufts on wood, but also has a red-brown juice which, however, spots the gills. Another very common species of Mycena is M. galopus (Fries) Kummer which has a greyish or brownish cap and exudes a milk-like juice. The related M. leucogala (Cooke) Saccardo is almost black (see p. 216). These agarics exuding juice when broken have a flesh composed of filaments, a very different flesh-structure to species of Lactarius (see p. 50) and although their spores are amyloid they do not turn blue-black in iodine because of the presence of amyloid crests and warts. There are few additional species of agaric which exude a milk-like liquid, but the majority of these are tropical or subtropical. The second names or epithets for the four species mentioned above all refer to the ‘latex’--sanguinolenta--bleeding, haematopus blood-foot; galopus, milk-foot and leucogala, white milk. For notes on Mycena one is referred to p. 68 describing M. galericulata (Fries) S. F. Gray.

Illustrations: WD 28⁴.

~Collybia maculata~ (Fries) Kummer

Spotted tough-shank

Cap: width 80-130 mm. Stem: width 5-20 mm; length 50-158 mm.