Summary:
Subgenus Telamonia Section Uracei. Features of Cortinarius californicus include a hygrophanous, ferruginous red cap, orange-red gills, dull orange to paler stem with remnants of the orange cortina, orange-red mycelium at the stem base, and bright purple to inky purple KOH reaction on all parts. The hygrophanous cap separates this species from numerous brightly colored Dermocybes in which the cap is dry and fibrillose, (Smith(8)). Collections representing this species have enough base pair divergence (2.19% compared with 0.5% for C. hesleri of eastern North America and 0.004% for C. cinnabarinus of Europe) to indicate that the species requires further investigation (Ammirati(16)).

Cap:
3-8.5cm across, "obtusely conic, becoming broadly umbonate", margin decurved [downcurved]; hygrophanous, evenly reddish brown ("Hay's russet") when moist, fading to brown ("cinnamon rufous"); bald, "margin appressed against the stipe and faintly silky at first" (Ammirati(16)), 1.6-8.5cm across, obtusely conic to bell-shaped, umbonate, margin typically decurved [downcurved]; more or less hygrophanous, moderate reddish brown to dark reddish orange or strong brown at first, fading to brownish orange, with the disc often remaining darker; moist to dry, smooth, bald to appressed silky, more or less shiny, (Ammirati(7))

Flesh:
watery, moderately thick on the disk, colored as the surface of both moist and faded caps (Ammirati(16)), moderately thick on disc, watery at first, moist to dry; in cap colored as moist or faded cap, often pale reddish ferruginous; in stem pale moderate orange to rusty red near surface, unchanging, (Ammirati(7))

Gills:
"adnate, becoming slightly adnexed, narrow to moderately broad, subdistant"; brownish orange ("Mars orange") when young, brownish red ("burnt sienna") when old; edges slightly serrulate or fimbriate [fringed], (Ammirati(16)), adnate becoming slightly adnexed, subdistant, narrow to moderately broad (0.5-0.7cm wide), often more or less ventricose [broader in middle]; dark reddish orange to moderate reddish orange or deep orange at first, becoming deep orange or ferruginous brown; edges fimbriate or slightly serrulate [finely toothed] and long retaining original color, (Ammirati(7))

Stem:
8-15(20)cm x 0.5-1.5cm, "equal, sometimes the base slightly enlarged or sometimes narrowed, becoming hollow"; dull orange overall (paler than gills); at first sparsely fibrillose in lower part with orange fibrils "from remains of the cortina"; mycelium orange-red (Ammirati(16)), 5-15(20)cm x 0.5-1.5(2.2)cm, the base often 1-2cm wide, equal or more often the base slightly enlarged to club-shaped, occasionally narrowed below; dull orange, dark reddish orange to moderate reddish orange or moderate orange, "sometimes with orange fibrils from remains of cortina, basal mycelium often orange-red"; dry appressed silky or sparsely fibrillose, somewhat shiny, (Ammirati(7))

Veil:
profuse, fairly persistent, pale moderate orange cortina, (Ammirati(7))

Odor:
not distinctive (Ammirati(16)), not distinctive or slightly fungoid-raphanoid (fungus-like - radish-like), (Ammirati(7))

Taste:
not distinctive (Ammirati(16)), not distinctive or slightly fungoid-raphanoid (fungus-like - radish-like), (Ammirati(7))

Microscopic spores:
spores 7.7-9.6(10.2) x 4.8-5.5(7) microns, elliptic to broadly elliptic or narrowly amygdaloid to amygdaloid, "coarsely verruculose, moderately to strongly dextrinoid" (Ammirati(16)), spores (7.4)8-9.5(11) x (4.8)5-5.8(7.0) microns, elliptic to fusiform [spindle-shaped] in face view, in side view elliptic, at times somewhat fusiform or more or less amygdaliform [almond-shaped], more or less verrucose, ornamentation coarser toward distal end, yellow brown with darker brown ornamentation, [presumably without germ pore]; basidia 4-spored, 24.1-32.9 x 5.8-8.0 microns, elongate-clavate to clavate or broadly clavate, colorless to faintly purple or pinkish, "often containing deep purple to red-purple granules, some containing brownish to yellow-brown pigment"; pleurocystidia absent, cheilocystidia 21.9-38 x 6.6-13.1 microns, more or less cylindric to cylindric-clavate, clavate, broadly clavate or somewhat ventricose, thin-walled, color similar to basidia, usually mixed with basidia but sometimes in groups; clamp connections of the normal or medallion type present throughout the fruiting body, (Ammirati(7))

Spore deposit:
[presumably a shade of brown]

Notes:
The holotype is from Oregon in Lane County at the California-Oregon line. There are collections representing the true Cortinarius californicus A.H. Sm. from southern Vancouver Island (J. Ammirati, pers. comm.) as well as California. Cortinarius californicus complex is found in BC, WA (to the Idaho border), OR, and CA, (Ammirati(16)). Harrower(1) assigned a BC collection sequence 176 to Cortinarius californicus. The holotype is from CA.

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