Summary:
Subgenus Telamonia is the traditional placement of the close genetic relatives of this species, but species in the clade Fulvescentes/Laeti are probably a distinct lineage from Telamonia. Features include 1) slender habit, 2) a hygrophanous, vinaceous red-brown, matte cap, 3) adnexed, medium spaced gills with paler edges, 4) a vinaceous red universal veil forming many thin patches and incomplete girdles on the slender stem, 5) growth under conifers, and 6) microscopic characters including large, oblong-elliptic to very weakly almond-shaped spores. The description is derived from Niskanen(1).

Cap:
1.5-4cm across, conic to hemispheric, becoming low convex with umbo; hygrophanous, red-brown to vinaceous red-brown; matte, "margin grayish white fibrillose", "pellucid-striate up to halfway to the centre when moist"

Flesh:
brown in cap, yellow to brownish yellow in stem

Gills:
adnexed, moderately broad, moderately thick, medium spaced; pale yellowish brown becoming cinnamon brown; edge paler at least when young

Stem:
5-11cm x 0.3-0.7cm at top, 0.4-0.8cm at base, cylindric; "whitish silky-fibrillose, with age and with handling the fibrillosity vanishes" and the stem becomes colored more like the flesh; basal mycelium white

Veil:
universal veil "fairly distinct, vinaceous red, forming many thin patches and incomplete girdles" on stem

Odor:
indistinct

Microscopic spores:
spores 9.0-11.1 x 5.4-6.8 microns, oblong-elliptic to very weakly amygdaloid [almond-shaped], with blunt apex, "fairly finely to moderately, evenly and densely verrucose, somewhat more strongly ornamented at the apex, moderately dextrinoid"; basidia 4-spored, 30-40 x 8-10 microns, clavate, colorless or slightly olivaceous yellow in Melzer''s reagent and in KOH; clamp connections present

Notes:
Collections were examined from BC, WA, Finland, France, Germany, Norway, Slovakia, and Sweden, (Niskanen(1)).

EDIBILITY

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Cortinarius floccopus var. gracilis Bidaud & Fillion