Summary:
{See also Small Agaricus Table} Section Minores. Features include 1) small size, 2) a fibrillose cap that is gray-brown to reddish brown, pinkish brown, purple brown, vinaceous or ochraceous and may bruise yellow or turn yellow when cut, 3) a white to yellowish club-shaped stem, 4) a single cortina-like flaring delicate fleeting ring, 5) almond to anise odor, and 6) a preference for forest habitat. This is what has been commonly known at Agaricus semotus in the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere in North America. Renaming was required because Agaricus semotus in the original sense of Fries is different and reportedly not a true Agaricus at all (Kerrigan(3) reporting Parra, 2005). Malloch''s description may include some other species distinguished here: he says, "This is a variable species in Canada and seems to encompass collections referable to certain N. American species, particularly A. micromegethus Peck, A. diminutivus Peck, and possibly A. auricolor Krieger." (Latin names italicized). Kerrigan(1) on the other hand distinguishes A. diminutivus and A. micromegethus from A. semotus. Note that Isaacs(1) finds cheilocystidia and Kerrigan(1) does not. Breitenbach gives the characteristics of A. semotus as including the presence of marginal cells on the gills (other characters being lilac to wine-red fibrils on cap, somewhat clavate-bulbous stem, and occurrence in forests). A. kerriganii is fairly common at times at least in California and has often been reported in the Pacific Northwest (as A. semotus). The Kerrigan(3) description generally follows the Kerrigan(1) description, but a few minor differences are noted below.

Gills:
free, close, up to 0.4cm broad; at first pallid, then pale brown, finally dark blackish brown, (Kerrigan(1)), free, crowded, rather narrow, 0.4-0.45cm broad, rather narrowly rounded at stem; ''at first grayish-vinaceous, "pale vinaceous drab", R45, darkening to "bistre", R29, at maturity''; edges +/- even and pruinose, (Isaacs), "whitish to pallid at first, then gray or pinkish brown and finally purplish black", (Malloch), thin, (Moser), grayish wine, presumably becoming dark brown; pruinose, (Chariton)

Stem:
5-9cm x 0.4-0.6cm, equal to club-shaped, 0.5-1cm wide in lower part, stuffed-hollow, cavity 0.1-0.2cm wide, "base shallowly rooted in partially decomposed forest litter"; stem "white, becoming yellow and finally orangish when bruised or upon drying"; smooth to finely striate in upper part, at first covered in lower part with thin fibrillose squamules [fine scales], finally bald, (Kerrigan(1)), (3.5)5-9cm x 0.4-0.6cm above, 0.5-1.0cm wide below, (Kerrigan(3)), 5-7.5cm x 0.5-0.7cm, equal in upper part, the base club-shaped to narrowly bulbous, round in cross-section, narrowly fistulose; ''pure white, later cream color, "cartridge-buff", "cream buff", R30, where bruised "honey yellow", R30, ochraceous''; silky-shining at top, downward fibrillose-appressed with occasional furfuraceous patches, (Isaacs), 2.3-6.5cm x 0.15-1cm, bulbous at base, usually fairly slender, hollow or stuffed; white to yellowish, yellowish to orange or reddish when dried; dry, bald above the ring, minutely yellow-fibrillose to white-fibrillose below the ring, often yellowing where handled, usually white-mycelioid to yellow-mycelioid at base, (Malloch), 3-6cm x 0.4-0.8cm, (Moser), 4-6cm x 0.5-0.8cm, cylindric with bulbous base; white, yellowing when bruised, (Hansen), 5-7.5cm x 0.5-0.7cm, (Chariton)

Veil:
veils forming a pendant or pendant-upturned, supramedian, white ring, at first rolled against cap margin, later flaring 0.2-0.3cm, apparently composed primarily of partial veil, universal veil mostly forming fibrillose zones or fine scales on lower stem, (Kerrigan(1)), veil not evidently two-layered, (Kerrigan(3)), ring superior, flaring, then pendant, membranous, narrow, soon appressed to stem and often partially disappearing, single, oblique, creamy, then ochraceous if touched, (Isaacs), ring white or yellowish, delicate and cortina-like, remaining on stem or adhering to cap margin, single, drying whitish to bright yellow, (Malloch), ring thin, narrow, white, (Hansen), single, flaring, evanescent [fleeting] ring, (Chariton)

Odor:
almonds (Kerrigan(1)), anise-like when crushed (Isaacs), almonds (weak in some), (Malloch), quite strongly anise (Courtecuisse), distinctly anise (Chariton)

Taste:
almonds (weak in some), (Malloch), anise-like when crushed (Isaacs), distinctly anise (Chariton), mild (Miller)

Microscopic spores:
spores (3.8)4.7-5.5(6.0) x (3.0)3.3-3.8(4.9) microns, elliptic, dark brown, hilar appendix not prominent, germ pore not evident; basidia 4-spored, 15-21 x 5.5-6.5 microns, clavate to cylindroclavate, sterigmata 2-3 microns long; cheilocystidia not observed and gill edge fertile, (Kerrigan(1)), basidia predominantly 4-spored, (Kerrigan(3)), spores 4.7-5.9 x 3.5-4.1 microns, elliptic to obovate in front and side views, often with one droplet, apiculus obscure, oblique, colorless; basidia 4-spored, 18-24 x 6.5-8 microns, colorless, usually narrowly clavate, sterigmata aculeate, 4-5 microns long; cheilocystidia abundant, 15-30 x 8-15 microns, mostly napiform to spheropedunculate, occasionally clavate, fusoid-ventricose, or saccate, often the pedicel several times septate, gill edge quite sterile, (Isaacs), spores 4.4-5.6 x 3.1-3.9 microns, oval, smooth; basidia 4-spored, 15-26 x 7-8.5 microns, clavate, without basal clamp; pleurocystidia not seen, marginal cells 18-36 x 10-18 microns, vesicular-clavate; cap cuticle of periclinal hyphae 2.5-6.5 microns, in part brownish-pigmented and thick-walled, septa without clamps, (Breitenbach), spores 3.8-6.1 x 2.7-4.1 microns (up to 10.5 x 4.8 on 2-spored basidia), ovate and broadest at base to elliptic in face view, unilaterally flattened-elliptic in side view, with large prominent apiculus, smooth, somewhat dextrinoid and cyanophilous when immature, thick-walled and without germ pore; basidia 4-spored, sometimes with numerous 2-spored basidia, 16-26 x 4-7 microns, clavate; pleurocystidia none, cheilocystidia somewhat vesiculose to nearly cylindric, septate, often branched, with end cells 5.5-24 x 4-12 microns, (Malloch), spores 4-5 x 2.5-3.5 microns, (Moser)

Spore deposit:
dark purple-brown (Miller)

Notes:
Isaacs examined collections from WA and OR (but found cheilocystidia). Kerrigan includes it for CA and confirmed by L.A. Parra to occur in Europe by matching ITS sequences and traditional characters (Kerrigan(3)). Andrew Parker reports that it occurs in ID. There is DNA support for its occurrence in BC (D. Miller, pers. comm.). Malloch gives the distribution in Canada in his sense as Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Quebec. Breitenbach(4) give the distribution as North America, Europe, and North Africa.

EDIBILITY

appears to be an edible species (Malloch), edible (Chariton)

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Agaricus semotus Fr.