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Species Information
Summary: Subgenus Sericeocybe. Section Camphorati. Cortinarius camphoratus is characterized by pale bluish lilac colors when young, dry cap and stem, and strong distinctive odor. The description is derived from Brandrud(1) except where noted. C. camphoratus is fairly common in the Pacific Northwest.
There are collections from WA and OR at Oregon State University, and from BC at the Pacific Forestry Centre and the University of British Columbia. Harrower(1) assigned a BC collection sequence 50 to Cortinarius camphoratus.
Cap: 3-10cm across, (hemi-)spheric, then flat-convex, frequently irregular and diffracted at margin; pale bluish-lilac to almost white, then turning yellow to yellowish brown from center; margin fibrillose from scattered veil remnants, (Brandrud), with or without low broad umbo, margin incurved when young; "dry, with a silvery whitish bloom at first, coated with tiny, flattened fibrils", (Bessette)
Flesh: thick; bluish violet when young (at least in upper part), then dark ochraceous yellow from base, (Brandrud), pale lilac to purplish (Bessette)
Gills: crowded; bluish violet when young, soon dark cinnamon brown; edge sometimes white fimbriate (fringed), (Brandrud), attached, subdistant, (Bessette)
Stem: 4-10cm x 1-2.5cm, "normally somewhat clavate, or cylindric"; pale bluish lilac, turning yellowish when old or when damaged, (Brandrud), solid, sheathed from base to ring zone with silky white matted fibrils, (Bessette)
Veil: universal veil "sparse, forming indistinct scales, pale bluish violet when young, later turning yellowish", (Brandrud); white webby cortina, leaving a thin fibrous ring zone (Bessette)
Odor: of raw potatoes (Bessette), powerful, remarkably raunchy odor of rotting meat or vegetables (Arora), strong and unpleasant, as of burnt flesh or burnt horn, (Brandrud for Europe), cold mashed potatoes and goat''s cheese (Courtecuisse for Europe), very strong, unpleasant, nauseous-repulsive, goats, (Buczacki for Britain/Ireland)
Taste: unpleasant (Bessette), mild (Breitenbach)
Microscopic spores: spores 8.5-10.5 x 5-6 microns, amygdaliform [almond-shaped] to elliptic, slightly to distinctly verrucose, gill edge with indistinct, cylindric sterile cells, (Brandrud), spores 8.5-11.5 x 5-6.5 microns, elliptic to amygdaliform, weakly verrucose, ocher-yellow; basidia 4-spored, 32-40 x 8.5-10 microns, clavate, with clamp connection; no pleurocystidia, cheilocystidia not abundant, 30-58 x 8.5-17 microns, fusiform to lageniform; cap cuticle of periclinal hyphae 3-8 microns wide, colorless to light yellow, walls of uppermost hyphae in part gelatinized, septa with clamp connections, (Breitenbach), spores 9.5-10.5 x (5.5)6-6.5 microns, (Ariyawansa)
Spore deposit: rusty brown (Bessette)
Habitat / Range
single, scattered or in groups on ground under conifers and hardwoods, September to October, (Bessette), mainly under spruce and fir in acid, fairly moist forests amongst deep moss, (Brandrud for Europe), late summer to fall (Buczacki)
Similar Species
Cortinarius traganus has a fruity smell and lacks bluish colors in the flesh and gills, (Brandrud). Cortinarius putorius has more purple fruitbodies, the universal veil is white, and the spores are smaller, 8.8-9.5(10) x 5-5.7 microns, (Ariyawansa(1)). See also SIMILAR section of Cortinarius alboviolaceus, Cortinarius brunneotinctus, and Cortinarius malachius.
