Summary:
Features include 1) a hygrophanous, ochraceous tawny cap with scattered veil remnants along the margin at first, 2) ochraceous tawny gills that are fringed on the edges, 3) an equal stem that is honey-color on its upper part, and dark brown on its lower part, and fibrillose with grayish pallid veil remnants, 4) usually a superior fibrillose ring, 5) growth on conifer debris, and 6) slightly wrinkled spores on 2-spored basidia. The description is derived from Smith(2) except where noted.

Gills:
adnate with decurrent tooth, close, moderately broad; ochraceous tawny; edges fimbriate [fringed]

Stem:
3-4cm x 0.1-0.25cm, "equal, pliant-cartilaginous, tubular"; pale honey-color in upper part, bister brown in lower part; rather copiously fibrillose with grayish pallid veil remnants, sheathed in lower part at first, but sheath separating into patches when old

Veil:
usually present is a superior fibrillose ring; grayish pallid veil remnants lower stem; scattered veil remnants along cap margin at first

Odor:
indefinite, unpleasant, (Buczacki)

Taste:
indefinite or mealy (Buczacki)

Microscopic spores:
spores 10-13 x 5-7 microns, ovate in face view, inequilateral in side view, slightly rugulose [wrinkled] "smooth suprahilar depression usually rather distinctly delimited", spores tawny ochraceous in KOH; basidia 2-spored; pleurocystidia abundant, 60-90 x 9-15 microns, "fusoid-ventricose with flexuous necks and acute to subacute apices, thin-walled", colorless in KOH; cheilocystidia abundant, 40-60(70) x 8-12 microns, "fusoid-ventricose with flexuous necks and obtuse apices"; clamp connections present

Spore deposit:
red-brown (Buczacki)

Notes:
Smith(2) indicate that it is found in the Pacific Northwest, the Great Lakes region, and Europe including Finland and Italy. There are BC collections at the University of British Columbia, WA collections at the University of Washington as well as an AK collection, and a collection from OR at Oregon State University.

EDIBILITY

poisonous - contains amatoxin (gamma-amanitin) (Besl et al. 1984 in Guilden(2)), but note that this finding of amatoxin is not universally accepted