Summary:
Subgenus Telamonia traditionally but in the section Laeti which molecular study suggests belongs in a lineage independent of Telamonia. Features include relatively small hygrophanous cap that is deep orange-yellow, drying ocher yellow, broad notched subdistant gills that are rust yellow to rust brown, stem that is light cream ocher with fragments of yellow veil, mild odor and taste, growth under mountain conifers, and microscopic characters.

Cap:
1-2cm across, hemispheric to convex; hygrophanous, dingy red-brown, drying centripetally yellow-brown; when dry, matte and finely fibrillose under a lens, margin not translucent-striate, (Moser(7), 1.5-2.5cm across, conic when young, later bell-shaped with a distinct umbo, margin acute; hygrophanous, deep orange-yellow, drying ocher yellow; smooth, "slightly radially fibrillose when moist", margin faintly striate, (Breitenbach), 1-5(7)cm across, domed, twisted, with umbo; bright reddish brown (margin reddish yellow), drying deep ocher to ocher brown, (Moser(1))

Flesh:
pale watery umber brown when moist, ochraceous buff when dry, (Moser(7)), thin; dark red-brown, (Breitenbach)

Gills:
adnate to emarginate, 0.2cm broad (four times the depth of the cap flesh), close, 30 gills reaching stem, 1-3 subgills between neighboring gills; yellow-brown; edge entire, (Moser(7)), notched and narrowly attached, broad, 26-34 gills reaching stem, 3 subgills between neighboring gills; rust yellow becoming light rust brown; edges smooth, (Breitenbach), "rust-yellow, rust-yellow-brown", (Moser(1))

Stem:
2-4cm x 0.25-0.4cm, "pale yellow-ochre, yellowish, apex pallid, toward the base with ochre-yellowish veil fibrills, base white", (Moser(7)), 6-9cm x 0.3-0.6cm, cylindric, widening slightly toward base, "solid, flexible"; "light cream-ocher with small fragments of the yellow veil sparsely and irregularly scattered over the entire length", (Breitenbach), ocher with similarly colored (and therefore hard to see) veil zones (Moser(1))

Veil:
small fragments of yellow veil sparsely and irregularly scattered over length of stem, (Breitenbach), veil ocher (Moser(1))

Odor:
none (Breitenbach)

Taste:
mild, not distinctive (Breitenbach)

Microscopic spores:
spores 7.6-11.7 x 5.3-6.2 microns, elliptic, "verrucose with distinct but small and dense warts"; basidia 4-spored, 38-42 x 9-9.5 microns, clavate, with basal clamp connection; cheilocystidia none, (Moser(7)), spores 8.2-10.7 x 4.8-6.3 microns, elliptic, weakly verrucose, light reddish yellow; basidia 4-spored, 30-35 x 8-9 microns, cylindric to clavate, with basal clamp connection; no pleurocystidia, marginal cells 11-18 x 4-8 microns, cylindric to clavate; some septa with clamp connections, (Breitenbach), spores 9-11 x 5.3-6(6.5), (Moser(1))

Spore deposit:
rust brown (Breitenbach)

Notes:
Harrower(1) assigned a BC collection sequence 68 to Cortinarius laetus. The sequence is 6 base pairs different from other collections under that name; an OR UNITE sequence is only 3 base pairs different (D. Miller, pers. comm.). So Cortinarius laetus is probably in the Pacific Northwest. Morphological correlation is desirable. The holotype is from Austria. It is also found in Switzerland, (Breitenbach(5)).

EDIBILITY