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Species Information
Summary: Features include 1) white overall color, 2) a moist to dry cap that is yellowish with age, especially at the center, 3) thick flesh at the center of the cap, 4) decurrent, distant, broad, white gills that become tinged yellow, and 5) a dry stem. The online Species Fungorum, accessed on October 6, 2018, gave the current name as Cuphophyllus virgineus (Wulfen) Kovalenko, but MycoBank, accessed on the same day, gave the current name as Hygrocybe virginea (Wulfen) P.D. Orton & Watling.
Collections of Cuphophyllus virgineus were examined from CO, MI, NC, TN, Denmark, and the Netherlands, and it has been reported from Japan, (Hesler(1)). It has been found in CA (Desjardin) and in Switzerland (Breitenbach(3)). There are collections from BC and QC at the University of British Columbia. There are collections for WA, ID, MS, NM, and Sweden at the University of Washington. There are collections from OR at Oregon State University.
Gills: decurrent, subdistant to distant, 0.3-0.5(0.7)cm broad, rather thick, veined; white, finally tinged yellow, (Hesler), "decurrent, widely spaced, broad; white then tinged yellow", (Phillips)
Stem: 3-7cm x 0.3-0.8cm, narrowed in lower part, often widened in upper part, sometimes flexuous [wavy], solid at first, later stuffed; "white, rarely pale pinkish lavender downward"; smooth, bald, sometimes pruinose, (Hesler), 2.5-7cm x 0.3-0.7cm, "solid, sometimes twisted and tapering toward the base; white", (Phillips), smooth, not viscid; white, rarely tinged salmon pink or pinkish lavender in lower half, (Stuntz)
Veil: [presumably absent]
Odor: none or slightly pleasant (Hesler), not distinctive (Phillips)
Taste: mild (Hesler, Phillips)
Microscopic spores: spores 8-10(12) x 5-7 microns, elliptic (more rarely oval), smooth, inamyloid; basidia 4-spored, rarely 2-spored, 38-60 x 5-8 microns; pleurocystidia and cheilocystidia none; gill trama interwoven, hyphae 5-12 microns broad; cap cuticle a cutis "of undifferentiated, repent, non-gelatinous hyphae", 2-3 microns wide; hypodermium not differentiated; cap trama of radially disposed hyphae; clamp connections on the hyphae of the cuticle and gill trama, (Hesler), spores 8-10 x 5-7 microns, elliptic, inamyloid, (Phillips), spores 9-12 x 5.5-7.0 microns, averaging greater than 10 microns but less than 11 microns, (Largent)
Spore deposit: white (Phillips)
Habitat / Range
gregarious "on soil, at times among moss, in deciduous, coniferous, and mixed woods", (Hesler), gregarious on soil or moss in woods (Phillips), in meadows and pastures (Breitenbach for Switzerland), fall to early winter (Bacon), summer to winter (Buczacki)
Similar Species
Cuphophyllus nivea is similar but C. virginea is fleshier and bigger (form like C. pratensis), has a moist to dry cap, dries yellowish, and has larger spores. However, Arnolds 1986 (as quoted in Breitenbach) includes Camarophyllus niveus in Hygrocybe virginea. Cuphophyllus borealis is similar but the cap of C. virginea becomes yellowish at least in the center (C. borealis remains white), the stem is not as slender, and the spores are larger, (Hesler(1)). [Trudell(4) includes H. borealis as well as H. nivea in the H. virginea concept.] Hygrophorus piceae has a white-furfuraceous stem apex and microscopically the gill trama is different (Breitenbach, but note Hesler says the stem of C. virgineus (as Hygrophorus) is sometimes pruinose). Hygrophorus eburneus has a slimy-viscid cap and stem.
