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Species Information
Summary: Features include 1) a hygrophanous, viscid, umbonate, peelable, striate cap that is chestnut to ochraceous brown to caramel and bruises strongly blue, 2) a cap margin that is not wavy, 3) sinuate to adnate, close, mottled gills that are brown becoming purplish black with white edges and often bruising dark blue, 4) a silky white stem that becomes brown from the base, 5) basal mycelium that bruises blue, 6) a bitter taste, 7) tufted to gregarious fruiting on deciduous wood chips or in sandy soil with woody debris, and 8) a dark purplish black spore deposit. The description is derived from Stamets(1) except where noted. There is some question whether this is truly distinct from Psilocybe cyanescens.
Psilocybe azurescens has been found along the northern OR coast near Astoria, and it has been reported in BC in nature from a cultured origin. There are collections from BC and ID at the University of British Columbia. Outdoor beds have also been established in CA, NM, OH, WI, VT, and Germany, (Stamets).
Cap: 3-10cm across, conic to convex, flattening with a pronounced persistent low umbo, margin not wavy, but sometimes irregular and eroded at maturity, slightly incurved at first, soon downcurved; hygrophanous, "chestnut to ochraceous brown to caramel", "often becoming pitted with dark blue or bluish black zones", "fading to dingy brown in drying", margin often pale azure blue tinted, cap becoming strongly bruising when damaged; smooth, viscid, separable cap skin, margin translucent-striate
Flesh: at center 0.3-0.6cm; whitish to pallid brown, "rapidly bruising blue, then darkening to deep caerulean blue and eventually indigo-black"
Gills: sinuate to adnate, ascending, close, with 2 tiers of subgills; brown, mottled, stained indigo-black were injured, edges whitish
Stem: 9-20cm x 0.3-0.6cm, hollow when mature, silky white, dingy brown from the base or when old, composed of "twisted, cartilaginous, silky white fibrous tissue", base "thickening downwards, often curved, and characterized by coarse white aerial tufts of mycelium, often with azure tones combining with dense, thick, silky white rhizomorphs that tenaciously attach to wood chips or dead grass, strongly bruising bluish upon disturbance"
Veil: white, cortinate, often leaving a superior fibrillose annular zone
Odor: none to slightly farinaceous
Taste: extremely bitter
Microscopic spores: spores 12-13.5 x 6.5-8 microns, elliptic, [presumably smooth, with germ pore]; basidia 4-spored, pleurocystidia abundant, 23-55 x 9-10 microns, "fusoid-ventricose, tapering to a narrow but short neck, bluntly papillate", cheilocystidia nearly identical, 23-28 x 6.5-8 microns
Spore deposit: dark purplish brown to purplish black
Habitat / Range
cespitose [in tufts] to gregarious on deciduous wood chips or in sandy soil rich in lignicolous debris, along the northern Oregon coast near Astoria, favoring land adjacent to shoreline, strong affection for dune grasses, especially Ammophila maritima, fall and winter (late September to early January)
Similar Species
Psilocybe cyanescens has a cap that is hemispheric when young, soon becoming more or less wavy, the cap rarely umbonate and never acutely umbonate, has a stem (4)6-9(11)cm long that lacks a cortinate zone on the stem, and fruits late September through April. Psilocybe allenii has a cap that is hemispheric when young, convex when mature, only rarely wavy in very mature specimens, and never umbonate, has a stem 4-7(9)cm long that usually has a cortinate zone, and fruits mid-September through January. Compared to these two species, P. azurescens has a cap that is hemispheric when young, convex when mature, never wavy, and when mature broadly to acutely umbonate, has a stem 9-20cm long, usually with a cortinate zone, and fruits late September through April. P. azurescens "is known to occur naturally only in a small geographic area on the coast near the outlet of the Columbia River". (Borovicka). Psilocybe cyanofibrillosa has smaller spores, lacks clavate-mucronate pleurocystidia, and has cheilocystidia with very long necks which are often highly forked, often more than two times, (Borovicka).
