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Species Information
Summary: Subgenus Telamonia Section Firmiores, used to be considered Sericeocybe. Cortinarius alboviolaceus is characterized by an overall silvery-violet to lilac-white or bluish white color, a shiny-silky dry cap surface, pale violet to grayish brown gills, a whitish universal sheath on the stem, a mild odor, and typically hardwood habitat. Cortinarius griseoviolaceus is a group member that favours conifers. Liimatainen(11) designated a sequenced neotype for Cortinarius alboviolaceus and, after sequencing the type of Cortinarius griseoviolaceus, listed the latter as falling within C. alboviolaceus sensu lato.
Cortinarius alboviolaceus has been reported from BC by Davidson(1), from WA by O''Dell(1), from CA by Desjardin(6), from MT by Cripps(2), and from ID by Andrew Parker, pers. comm. There are collections from BC labeled as this species at the University of British Columbia. There are collections labeled as this species at the University of Washington from WA, OR, AK, TN, VA, ON, Austria, and Sweden. Some of these are under conifers and could be just similar species, perhaps closely related.
Cap: 2-9cm across, (hemi-)spheric, then normally broadly umbonate to flat-convex; silvery bluish white when young, later ochraceous yellow to grayish-white; slightly innately fibrillose, when young fibrillose from veil remnants, (Brandrud), 3-8cm across, obtusely bell-shaped becoming convex to broadly umbonate to nearly flat; pale violet soon becoming pale silvery violet, lilac white, or even whitish; dry, silky-shining, (Arora)
Flesh: whitish, pale lilac in top of stem, yellowish white towards base of stem and when old, (Brandrud), pallid to pale violet (Arora)
Gills: fairly crowded; pale grayish brown, with a faint bluish violet tinge when young, edge whitish, (Brandrud), "adnate or adnexed or notched, fairly close"; pale violet to purple-gray becoming cinnamon brown, (Arora), crowded to subdistant (Siegel)
Stem: 5-12cm x 0.5-1cm, usually club-shaped with base up to 2cm wide; "pale bluish white as cap (with age turning yellow)"; fibrillose, (Brandrud), 4-12cm x 0.5-1(1.5)cm at top, usually club-shaped or enlarged at base; violet or pale violet in upper part, with whitish silky fibrils overlying pale violet surface in lower part; dry, silky, (Arora)
Veil: whitish, leaving fibrillose remnants on young cap and thin girdles on stem (or sometimes stem peronate), (Brandrud), universal veil white, silky, usually forming thin, soft, silky sheath over lower stem; cortina white, evanescent or leaving hairs at top of stem, (Arora), cortina-like partial veil leaves a zone of whitish to grayish fibrils on stem, often leaving a band of silky fibrils around cap margin, (Siegel)
Odor: indistinct (Brandrud), mild (Arora)
Taste: not distinctive (Phillips)
Microscopic spores: spores 8.5-10 x 6-6.5 microns, elliptic to amygdaliform [almond-shaped], distinctly verrucose, pale; gill edge with small cylindric sterile cells, (Brandrud, European material), spores 7-10 x 4-6 microns, elliptic, minutely rough, (Arora), no pleurocystidia, marginal cells 12-21 x 3-5 microns, cylindric, (Breitenbach)
Spore deposit: rusty brown (Arora)
Habitat / Range
scattered to gregarious or in small clumps in forest humus, associated mainly with hardwoods, (Arora for California), deciduous forests (Brandrud for Europe), often in large numbers under beech and oak (Phillips), under conifers and hardwoods, especially beech and oak, (Bessette), late summer and fall (Miller)
Similar Species
Cortinarius griseoviolaceus has a somewhat viscid stem but may be the same species. It was originally described under conifers. Cortinarius anomalus among other differences has nearly round spores. Cortinarius camphoratus has a penetrating odor. Cortinarius malachius has a cap finely scaly in dry condition. Cortinarius traganus is somewhat similar, but the flesh of C. alboviolaceus is never rusty-brown or tawny, the gills are violet-edged when young, and the odor is mild. Lepista nuda (blewit) can be similar when the veil is gone but the spore color is different. Inocybe pallidicremea is somewhat similar but smaller and more umbonate, with dull brown spores and spermatic odor. Cortinarius occidentalis "has a darker, thinly viscid cap, often streaked with purplish fibrils, and bluish violet flesh that stains purple" (Siegel(2)). See also SIMILAR section of Cortinarius anomalovelatus, Cortinarius alboglobosus, Cortinarius glaucopus, Cortinarius glaucopus group, and Cortinarius porphyropus.
