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Species Information
Summary: Section Calodontes (Smith), Section Rubromarginatae (Maas Geesteranus). Features include 1) a moist, striate cap that is dark vinaceous brown with a brighter margin, 2) whitish to grayish gills with pale pink to vinaceous edges, 3) a cap-colored stem, and 4) growth on wood. |Maas Geesteranus has cast some doubt on Smith''s identification of this species by finding that three of the collections at random were not Mycena elegantula (one was Mycena renati). Perry(1) also found his M. elegantula specimens contained several taxa. |In addition, Perry and Desjardin have redescribed what was usually being identified as M. elegantula or M. sanguinolenta in California as Mycena californiensis (q.v.) with Mycena elegantula Peck as a synonym. |Mitchel and A.H. Smith comment that there is intergradation between Mycena elegantula and M. purpureofusca - they also described a var. inflata from CO but said by A.H. Smith to occur in the Pacific Northwest and the northern Rockies, with stem color dull vinaceous like the cap margin or more purplish (no ochraceous tint evident) - |Peck did not give the color of the stem but a variant with ochraceous to dull amber stem is also present in CO, (Mitchel). |The description of Maas Geesteranus (from which the second description here is derived) was adapted from Peck''s macroscopic account and complemented by his own observations, while the microscopic details are based on his re-examination of the type.
The holotype is from CA. According to Smith(1) it is found at least in WA, OR, ID, NS, CA, MI, and NY. It is also recorded from BC (Gamiet) and collections from BC by O. Ceska are deposited at the University of British Columbia.
Cap: (0.5)1-2.5(5)cm across, obtusely conic remaining conic or becoming convex-umbonate to bell-shaped; dark vinaceous brown cap center with margin brighter vinaceous brown, fading to near avellaneous or retaining a strong pinkish tint; bald, moist, opaque, but becoming translucent-striate to disc at times before fading, becoming sulcate-striate [grooved] on margin
Flesh: moderately thick and rather firm; pallid grayish to vinaceous
Gills: bluntly adnate or hooked, close to subdistant, 16-22 reaching the stem, 2 tiers of subgills, gills narrow to moderately broad; whitish to grayish with pale pink to dingy vinaceous edges, (Smith), "ascending, broadly adnate, decurrent with a tooth", 17-22 reaching stem; "whitish to pallid, the edge purplish brown"; "dorsally intervenose", (Maas Geesteranus)
Stem: 2-6(8)cm x 0.1-0.3cm, equal, fragile, cartilaginous; color variable but usually tinted like cap, "sometimes nearly white in age, sometimes with a strong pinkish tint"; polished and translucent, base white-strigose, stem bald otherwise, (Smith), 2.5-5.0cm x 0.1cm, hollow; color not recorded, "the base densely covered with long, coarse, flexuous, whitish to brownish fibrils"; smooth, bald, (Maas Geesteranus)
Odor: not distinctive (Smith), not recorded (Maas Geesteranus)
Taste: not distinctive (Smith), not recorded (Maas Geesteranus)
Microscopic spores: spores 8-10(11) x 5-6.5 microns, but when 2-spored 10-12 x 5.5-7 microns, broadly elliptic, smooth, amyloid; basidia 4-spored and 2-spored; pleurocystidia "very rare or absent, similar to cheilocystidia", cheilocystidia scattered to fairly abundant, 40-75 x (5)8-15 microns, smooth or occasionally with two or three finger-like prolongations, clavate to fusoid-ventricose, contents usually pinkish, (Smith), spores 9.0-10.7 x 4.7-5.4 microns, "(possibly somewhat immature), pip-shaped, smooth, amyloid"; basidia 4-spored, 30-40 x 7-9 microns, "slender-clavate", "clamped (but clamps often hard to distinguish)"; cheilocystidia 18-28 x 5-6.5 microns, occurring mixed with basidia (gill edge heterogeneous), "somewhat clavate to almost cylindrical or (more frequently) fairly irregularly shaped, with few, very coarse, and irregularly shaped excrescences", with clamp connections, pleurocystidia not observed; gill trama "weakly brownish vinescent in Melzer''s reagent"; cap cuticle hyphae 1.8-2.7 microns wide, "covered with scattered, obtuse excrescences which may become branched and grow out to coralloid structures"; stem cortical layer hyphae "sparsely diverticulate", (Maas Geesteranus)
Spore deposit: [presumably white]
Habitat / Range
single or gregarious or at times cespitose [in tufts], on decayed conifer wood, spring and fall, (Smith), gregarious to cespitose, growing among fallen leaves under trees, (Maas Geesteranus)
Similar Species
Mycena purpureofusca has dark grayish purple gill edges and the cap color is dark purple to purple-gray to vinaceous lavender, whereas M. elegantula is described by Smith as having rosy to vinaceous brown gill edges and the dominant cap color vinaceous brown.
