E-Flora BC: Electronic Atlas of the Flora of British Columbia

Summary:
Features include 1) a reddish to brown viscid fibrillose cap, 2) a hard, tough stem with dark scabers, and 3) growth with manzanita and madrone. This is one of the species that was formerly known under the name Leccinum aurantiacum. Note that Both(1) describes the staining of the flesh as changing to fuscous with red tones but neither Thiers nor Bessette nor Arora describe red tones.

In CA it is "by far the most common Leccinum in the coastal forests of California where it occurs under manzanita and madrone" (Thiers(13) with Leccinum in italics). It also occurs in OR, (Bessette), and is reported from WA (M. Seidl, pers. comm.) and BC (O. Ceska, pers. comm.).

Cap:
(5)7-20(30)cm, rounded becoming convex to flat or somewhat irregular, margin with flaps of tissue when young; "dark red to reddish brown or at times rusty-brown, rusty-orange, or brown"; viscid when moist, smooth but usually with flattened fibrils, sometimes pitted when old, (Arora), 6-20cm, cushion-shaped to convex, margin incurved at first, with flaps of sterile tissue; dark red to reddish brown, becoming darker reddish brown when old; "typically viscid, often somewhat pitted and uneven, appressed-fibrillose", (Bessette), often shallowly to deeply pitted or reticulate, viscid to subviscid, especially when old, strongly appressed-fibrillose during all stages or occasionally tomentose, never bald, fibrils often more conspicuous toward margin, (Thiers(13))

Flesh:
thick, firm becoming soft; "white, usually bruising smoky-gray to purple-gray or bluish-gray when cut, but often very slowly or only in certain areas", (Arora), white, when exposed slowly turning fuscous without reddish phase, (Bessette), changing to fuscous with red tones when cut (Both), " 2-4cm thick, white when first exposed, slowly and erratically changing to fuscous with no reddish intermediate stage", in stem slowly staining fuscous in apical portion, sometimes turning blue in base, (Thiers(13))

Pores:
"whitish to pale olive, olive-gray or grayish, usually deep dingy olive-buff in age"; not turning blue when bruised but often discoloring brown, (Arora) 1-3 per mm, angular, pale olive-buff becoming darker olive-buff, bruising dark brown; tube layer 1-2.5cm thick, depressed near stem when old, (Bessette), up to 1mm in diameter, angular, colored as tubes, tubes layer 1-2.5cm thick, "adnate to shallowly or deeply depressed", pale olive when young, darkening to olive drab when mature, staining dark brown when bruised, (Thiers(13))

Stem:
8-20cm x 1.5-4cm, equal or widening downwards, tough, fibrous, solid; whitish with pallid scabers that become deep brown to black by maturity, lower part "often bruising (or already stained) bright blue to greenish-blue", (Arora), 9-15cm x 1.6-4cm, widening downwards, sometimes with ventricose base; solid; whitish, with dense whitish scabers that darken to nearly fuscous when old; dry; partial veil and ring absent, (Bessette), 10-16cm x 1.5-3.5cm wide at top, "clavate to ventricose, solid"; ground color whitish, "scales typically pallid when young" darkening to near fuscous when old; "surface dry, conspicuously fibrillose-scaly", (Thiers(13))

Chemical Reactions:
flesh stains pale gray with FeSO4, tubes pale red with KOH then blackening, (Thiers)

Odor:
not distinctive (Bessette), mild (Thiers(13))

Taste:
not distinctive (Bessette), mild (Thiers(13))

Microscopic:
spores 13-19 x 3-5 microns, spindle-shaped to elliptic, smooth, (Arora), spores 13-17 x 4-6 microns, fusoid to subcylindric [almost cylindric], smooth, ochraceous, (Bessette), spores 13-17 x 4-5.5 microns, (var. angustisporum distinguished only by spores that reach only 3-4 microns wide and often average 1-2 microns longer), fusoid to subelliptic to subcylindric, inequilateral, smooth, moderately thick-walled; basidia 4-spored, 27-32 x 6-9 microns, clavate to pyriform; hymenial cystidia often obscure, scattered, 23-32 x 4-6 microns, fusoid to clavate with narrow elongated apices, colorless in KOH; cap cuticle a trichodermium of free tangled hyphal tips, hyphae 8-12 microns wide, some disarticulation of cells, walls smooth to sometimes obscurely rough, pigment globules forming in cap cuticle hyphae when mounted in Melzer''s, terminal cells elongated and often noticeably tapered; clamp connections absent, (Thiers(1))

Spore Deposit:
brown (Arora, Bessette), cinnamon-brown (Thiers(13))