Part 76

Description: Plate 79.

Cap: semiglobate to convex, pale dingy clay-colour or dark tan to dirty brownish, non-striate, rather fleshy and usually sand covered.

Stem: deeply rooting in sand and club-shaped towards the base, similarly coloured to the cap except for the whitish apex.

Gills: adnate, subfuscous or dark dirt-brown.

Flesh: dirty buff and with no distinct smell.

Spore-print: pale snuff-brown with purplish flush.

Spores: long, ovoid, yellowish-grey brown under the microscope with a distinct germ-pore and 10-12 × 7 µm in size.

Marginal cystidia: balloon-shaped, obtuse or somewhat bottle-shaped and hyaline.

Facial cystidia: sparse, similar to the marginal cystidia, voluminous.

General Information: This is a very distinct fungus found amongst stems of Marram grass in sand-dune systems. At first sight it appears as if it is growing in the bare sand, but by careful excavation it usually is found attached to pieces of Marram grass, indeed the hyphae enter the roots of the grass, but apparently do not kill them.

This fungus was first described in the genus Psilocybe (see p. 114) because of its brownish purple spore-print, but the cap-surface is composed of rounded cells and so is related to all the other species of Psathyrella.

Psathyrella flexispora Wallace & P. D. Orton grows in similar habitats amongst Ammophila and other seashore grasses. It is easily recognised by the chocolate, umber or date-brown cap and the peculiar shaped spores, which look as if they have been slightly twisted during their development.

~Stropharia coronilla~ (Fries) Quélet, resembling a little mushroom (i.e. Agaricus) is also found in sand-dune systems and, just as species of Psathyrella, it possesses purplish black spores. However, the cap is ochraceous yellow with a whitish margin formed of veil fragments. The stem is white becoming yellow with age and possesses a narrow, white striate ring. The spores are ellipsoid and measure 8-9 × 4-5 µm and it has filamentous cells in the cap. Unlike P. ammophila it is not confined to sand-dune systems but it is also to be found in pastures and on heaths.

~Conocybe dunensis~ P. D. Orton

Sand-dune brown cone cap.

Cap: width 10-30 mm. Stem: width 2-4 mm; length 40-100 mm.

Description: Plate 80.

Cap: conical then conico-expanded, date-brown, dull sand-colour or dark liver-colour, drying buff or ochraceous, expallent, not or indistinctly striate when moist.

Stem: whitish or pale ochraceous then darker ochraceous or dirty brownish from the base up, lower part whitish and buried in the sand.

Flesh: thin and pale ochraceous.

Gills: adnate, whitish but soon pale honey and finally rusty honey.

Spore-print: rust-brown.

Spores: long, ellipsoid or slightly amygdaliform, golden brown under the microscope with large germ-pore and 12-14 × 7-8 µm in size.

Facial cystidia: absent.

Marginal cystidia: capitate.

General Information: C. dunensis differs from C. tenera in its dull colours (see p. 116) and habitat preferences. Conocybe dunensis, Stropharia coronilla, the two species of Psathyrella are all dull-coloured. However, in the sand-dunes colourful agarics are also found. The most common is Hygrocybe conicoides (P. D. Orton) Orton & Watling; Laccaria maritima (Theodowicz) Moser is indeed an unusual but rewarding find. ‘Lac’ as in Laccaria is a red-brown resinous substrate produced by the lac-insect and resembles the cap colour of many species of the genus, including L. maritima, L. laccata and L. proxima (see p. 86). All these fungi were formerly placed in Clitocybe, but they differ in the warted or spiny spores which at maturity give the rather thick gills the appearance of being heavily talced. L. maritima can be distinguished from all other species of Laccaria by the elongated spores which are minutely spiny and not strongly warted as in L. laccata. Hygrocybe conicoides (P. D. Orton) Orton & Watling has a conical to conico-convex, acutely umbonate cap with wavy-lobed margin; it is scarlet or cherry-red, discolouring blackish with age or on bruising. The gills are at first chrome-yellow then become flushed red and the stem is yellow or greenish lemon becoming streaky blackish after handling. The spores are 10-13 × 4-5 µm in size and slightly French bean-shaped. It can be readily distinguished from close relatives, e.g. H. conica (Fries) Kummer by the gills soon turning reddish, the reddish cap and the narrow spores.

(viii) Subterranean fungi

General notes