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Species Information
Summary: Features include 1) a hygrophanous, pale yellowish brown cap that is convex or slightly depressed and has a striate margin, 2) adnate to slightly depressed, whitish buff gills, 3) a silky stem colored whitish to pale buff, 4) anise odor and taste, and 5) white spore deposit. The whitish to brownish anise Clitocybes are difficult to separate. The online Species Fungorum, accessed October 10, 2012, gives Clitocybe deceptiva H.E. Bigelow as a synonym of this species, but in the Bigelow(5) description of Clitocybe deceptiva as a new species, Bigelow says that Clitocybe deceptiva has a darker cap when moist and a pale pinkish buff spore deposit (white in Clitocybe fragrans (Fr.) P. Kumm.).
Phillips gives the distribution as northeastern and northwestern North America and California. Bigelow(5) examined collections from CA, CO, ON, and QC. Kauffman reports it from OR. Schalkwijk-Barendsen says it is "abundant in the Pacific Northwest", and illustrates it from AB. It is also found in Europe including Switzerland and Asia (Breitenbach). There are collections from BC deposited at the University of British Columbia. It also occurs in WA (M. Beug, pers. comm.), and ID (Andrew Parker, pers. comm.).
Cap: 1.5-4cm, "flattened convex sometimes slightly depressed, with an inrolled margin becoming somewhat wavy in age; hygrophanous, pale yellowish brown when wet, whitish cream when dry, with a darker center"; smooth, finely radially lined at margin, (Phillips), 1.5-4.5cm across, convex at first but soon flat, margin inrolled at first, somewhat arched when old, disc at times shallowly depressed; hygrophanous, "watery whitish to faintly yellowish, disc sometimes darker and pale brownish, faintly colored when wet", fading to white or whitish; bald, sublubricous in wet weather, margin striate when moist, (Bigelow)
Flesh: thin, soft, pliant; whitish to buff, (Phillips), thin on disc, very thin on margin, watery and pliant, soft; dingy pallid, (Bigelow)
Gills: "adnate to slightly decurrent, close, narrow to moderately broad; whitish buff", (Phillips), broadly adnate to short-decurrent, seceding, close to subdistant, narrow to moderately broad, up to 0.6cm broad; whitish to pale pinkish buff, (Bigelow)
Stem: 3-6cm x 0.3-0.6cm, "stuffed then hollow, often curved and slightly enlarged toward the base"; whitish to pale buff; "silky with fine hairs on stem, felty with a few thin rhizoids at the base", (Phillips), 3-6.5cm x 0.2-0.6cm at top, equal or widened slightly in lower part, stuffed but soon hollow, often curved; "whitish and silky from fibrils when fresh, watery pale buff when fibrils appressed"; longitudinally fibrillose-striate, "base tomentose, sometimes with a few slender rhizoids", (Bigelow)
Microscopic spores: spores 6.5-8 x 3.5-4 microns, elliptic, smooth, inamyloid, (Phillips), spores (6)6.5-8.5(10) x 3.5-4.5 microns, elliptic or sometimes elliptic-oblong, smooth, inamyloid, cyanophilic; basidia 4-spored, 23-35 x 5-8 microns; [pleurocystidia and cheilocystidia presumably absent]; clamp connections present
Spore deposit: white (Phillips, Bigelow)
Habitat / Range
scattered, in groups or in clusters under hardwoods, (Phillips), scattered or gregarious, sometimes subcespitose [more or less in tufts], under hardwoods or in mixed woods, late July into September usually, December in California, (Bigelow), and on lawns (Schalkwijk-Barendsen), spring, summer, fall, winter, (Buczacki)
Similar Species
Pale forms of Clitocybe odora are similar in having an anise odor, but C. odora has thicker flesh in the cap and stem, and a pinkish buff spore deposit, (Bigelow). Clitocybe deceptiva is similar in having an anise odor but C. deceptiva has a darker cap when moist and a pale pinkish buff spore deposit, (Bigelow). Clitocybe obsoleta has more distinct coloration and the odor is sweet fragrant without a strong anise component, (Bigelow). Lepista idahoensis has smaller spores (Bigelow).
