Summary:
Subgenus Phlegmacium. Features in the Brandrud(1) description include medium size, a glutinous red-brown cap that is ochraceous yellow toward the margin, pale grayish white young gills, a dry, club-shaped white stem that is girdled to scaly in its lower part from a brown to ochraceous brown veil, growth under conifers, and roughened spores. Brandrud(1), Breitenbach(5), and Hansen, L.(2) all include Cortinarius validus J. Favre and Cortinarius subvalidus R. Henry as synonyms of Cortinarius saginus Fr., but Moser gives all three separately, his concept of C. saginus Fr. having nearly round spores. Kauffman(3) lists only C. saginus Fr.

Gills:
rounded near stem then subdecurrent, crowded, broad, 1-1.2cm or more; pallid but sordid, soon lutescent, ocher-yellow to cinnamon, (Kauffman), crowded; pale grayish white when young, (Brandrud), clay-colored, straw-yellowish, (Moser), narrowly attached, 90-105 reaching stem, 1-3 subgills between neighboring gills, gills narrow; whitish when young, later ocher-brown; edges slightly crenate [scalloped], (Breitenbach)

Stem:
9-13cm x 1-1.2cm, "at first rounded-bulbous, then very elongate", stout, finally subequal [more or less equal] above the disappearing bulb, stuffed; bulb rarely subemarginate [somewhat emarginate]; stem ''dingy-pallid, soon markedly lutescent, streaked with fibrils of copious cortina which is superior'', (Kauffman), 5-10cm x 1.5-2cm, base club-shaped (to 3.5cm wide); whitish; girdled to scaly in lower part from brown to ochraceous brown veil, (Brandrud), 7-12cm x 1-3cm, usually club-shaped; "whitish, matted, later yellowish", (Moser)

Veil:
"usually abundant, brown to ochraceous brown, rendering the lower part of stem distinctly girdled to scaly", (Brandrud)

Odor:
mild (Kauffman), indistinct or yeast-like (Brandrud)

Taste:
mild (Kauffman)

Microscopic spores:
spores 9-11(12) x 5.5-6.5(7) microns, almond-shaped, inequilateral, rough-punctate, ochraceous-rusty under the microscope, (Kauffman), spores 8.5-10.5 x 5-6 microns, more or less elliptic, slightly to distinctly verrucose; gill edge with small, clavate sterile cells, (Brandrud), spores 8-9 x 6-8 microns, rounded, (Moser), no pleurocystidia, marginal cells 15-21 x 6-8 microns, clavate, (Breitenbach)

Spore deposit:
[presumably a shade of brown]

Notes:
Cortinarius saginus Fr. is given by Kauffman(3) for Washington, but Smith says of Cortinarius cliduchus Fr. "Kauffman (1932) apparently describes material of this species under the name C. saginus Fr.". A sequence 41 from the BC study of Harrower(1) was assigned to Cortinarius saginus. Morphological correlation is desirable.

EDIBILITY

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Cortinarius validus J. Favre?