View A43-1112-1979-eng.pdf

EDIBLE AND POISONOUS MUSHROOMS OF CANADA
In groups, on the ground or on decayed wood in woods, gardens, green-
houses. Aug.-Sept.
It can be recognized by its bright tawny color and spiny scales. L. friesii
Lasch is similar but with forking lamellae.
LEPIOTA AMERICANA Peck Edible
Figures 126, 127, 128, page 70
PILEUS 1-4 in. or more broad, at first subglobose or ovoid, becoming
conic-expanded, convex, or broadly expanded, with more or less striate
margin, dull reddish brown, breaking up into large scales except on the umbo
and exposing the whitish flesh beneath, flesh thin, white, reddening where
bruised, gradually turning pinkish brown with age, taste mild, lamellae free,
close, moderately broad, narrowing toward the stipe, white, turning red where
bruised, in dried specimens a smoky cocoa-brown color, stipe central, sepa-
rable, 2-5 in. long, often with a decided swelHng at the base or just above the
base, varying above from moderately stout to very slender, stuffed, glabrous,
white, bruising reddish, annulus fairly ample, sometimes disappearing.
spores smooth, white, broadly oval, 7-9 (11) X 5.5-6 (7) m, many shghtly
inequilateral.
SoHtary or in clusters, on the ground in grassy places. Rare. Aug.-Oct.
The tendency of the entire fruiting body to redden where handled or in
age is characteristic. In dried specimens the entire fruiting body is a smoky
cocoa-brown color. Another distinctive character is that the stipe is usually
broader above the base and tapers both up and down.
LEPIOTA BRUNNEA Farlow & Burt Edible
Figure 151, page 91
PILEUS 3-7 in. or more broad, thick, soft, ovoid, expanding to convex,
then plane, brown to smoky brown, cracking (except on disk) into concentric
rings of large, coarse, persistent scales whose outer edges become reflexed.
FLESH beneath cuticle whitish, darkening to smoky color or reddish on expo-
sure to air. LAMELLAE free but not remote from the stipe, broad, crowded, dull
whitish, darkening on drying, stipe stout, central, 2-6 in. or more long, up to
1 in. thick, with a large underground bulb at the base, silky-striate to fibrillose-
striate, smoky brown, paler above the annulus, becoming reddish where
wounded, hollow, easily separable from pileus. annulus large, thick, flaring,
persistent, smoky brown on the lower surface, whitish on the upper surface,
fixed becoming free and movable, spores smooth, white, variable in size and
shape, eUipsoid to subglobose, inequilateral, obhquely apiculate, often trun-
cate, (7.5) 9.5-11 X (4.5) 5.5-7 /z.
Sohtary or in small clusters on the ground in open grassy places, laneways,
etc. Sept.-Oct.
96