Summary:
Leucocoprinus cepistipes is recognized by its mealy whitish, grooved cap with granular, whitish to brownish scales. Other features include free, crowded gills that are white to dingy, a white stem with an enlarged base and a membranous ring, a white spore deposit, and elliptic, smooth, thick-walled, weakly dextrinoid spores. It more common in eastern North America than in the Pacific Northwest, but some consider Leucocoprinus birnbaumii a variety luteus of Leucocoprinus cepistipes.

Cap:
2-8cm when expanded, oval becoming broadly conic or bell-shaped to nearly flat or umbonate, eventually drooping; "white to pale pinkish (but may be darker when young and yellowish to brownish in age)"; dry, powdery or mealy becoming somewhat scaly or fibrillose-scaly when old, margin clearly striate when mature, (Arora), 2-8cm across, oval, top truncate at first, becoming bell-shaped - expanded, obtuse, finally umbonate; "white over all at first and as the cuticle starts to break, toward maturity the fibrils becoming brownish to fawn or purplish drab over the white flesh, when bruised sometimes becoming straw yellow (color change especially marked in young specimens), no change apparent when cut"; "cuticle at first breaking into fine, white, mealy warts, becoming fibrillose-scaly, long-striate, or striate on margin only, margin subrimose, disc usually smooth but in some old caps it may be covered with fine scales also", (Smith, H.V.), 2-6cm across, umbo and scales reddish gray on whitish background; margin sulcate [grooved], (Hansen, L.), with white to dark brown warts or scales that are minute and granular, (Sieger)

Flesh:
thin; "white, sometimes bruising yellowish", (Arora), thin; white, (Smith, H.V.), soft but "rather sturdy for this genus", (Birkebak)

Gills:
free, crowded; white, (Arora), remote from stem, crowded, narrow, thin; white, becoming dingy; edge even and pruinose, (Smith, H.V.), "free, crowded, frequently forked or with cross-walls or both", in one tier; "white to pale vinaceous brown, sometimes staining yellowish to brown"; edges minutely fringed, (Sieger), free, 44-50 reaching stem, broad, 1 subgill between neighboring gills; white, at times somewhat browning; edges white-floccose, (Breitenbach), narrow (Phillips), free, close, rather broad, (Birkebak)

Stem:
4-14cm x 0.3-0.6cm, slender, equal or swollen in places, with widened base; white, may discolor yellowish when handled; smooth or powdery, (Arora), 4-12cm x 0.3-0.6cm, flexuous [wavy], somewhat fusiform-ventricose [wider in middle] when young, slightly bulbous with a short point when mature; white becoming delicately flesh-tinted, "often turning straw yellow where handled"; smooth or only faintly pruinose, (Smith, H.V.), may discolor brown when rubbed (Breitenbach), 2.5-7.5 x 0.15-0.4cm at top, often gradually widening downward to an often moderately clavate 0.6-0.7cm wide base; bald to "innately fibrillose to slightly tomentose, (especially toward base)", (Birkebak)

Veil:
"white, forming a persistent, superior but easily detachable ring" (Arora), ring "rather large, thick, membranous, white", subpersistent [somewhat persistent], (Smith, H.V.) ring ephemeral [fleeting ], (Hansen, L.), ring "flares like a skirt, with a torn margin, whitish", persists or rarely partial veil adheres to cap margin, (Sieger), ring "avellaneous" to "buffy brown" to "cinnamon" (Birkebak(1) - Ridgway colors)

Odor:
not remarkable (Sieger), mild (Smith, H.V.), mild, fungal, (Birkebak), faintly spicy, reminiscent of garlic, (Breitenbach)

Taste:
not remarkable, (Sieger), mild (Smith, H.V., Breitenbach), bitter (Hansen, L.)

Microscopic spores:
spores 6-10 x 5-8 microns, elliptic, smooth, weakly dextrinoid, thick-walled, with apical germ pore, (Arora), spores (6.5)7-9(10) x 6-7.5(8) microns, broadly elliptic, yellow brown in Melzer''s reagent, with a germ pore, thick-walled, oil droplet prominent; basidia 4-spored, clavate; pleurocystidia none, cheilocystidia 32-45 x 10-17 microns, "fusoid-ventricose, often mucronate and sometimes with a long slender neck"; cap cuticle of irregularly disposed pileocystidia "in a more or less erect position but not forming a palisade", pileocystidia 45-90 x 9-11 microns, "sometimes somewhat swollen at base, walls moderately thickened, ends rounded", (Smith, H.V.), spores 7.7-10.5 x 5.5-7.7 microns, elliptic to slightly amygdaliform [almond-shaped], dextrinoid, metachromatic, thick-walled, with apical germ pore; basidia 4-spored to rarely 2-spored, 22.9-28.3 x 9.7-10.8 microns, surrounded by 4 pseudoparaphyses; pseudoparaphyses 16.4-18.7 x 9.4-10.4 microns, "pyriform to more or less sphaeropedunculate with a very short, broad pedicel, rarely broadly fusiform"; cheilocystidia 30.0-57.5 x 10.0-17.5 microns "clavate to lageniform to rarely fusiform, often with a pedicel of short to moderate length, with obtuse to mucronate apices or with a flexuous, often tapering but sometimes capitulate, rarely forked" 4.5-6.5 microns broad excrescence up to two fifths of cystidium length, thin-walled, hyaline; clamp connections absent, (Birkebak), spores 9-11 x 6-7.5 microns, ovate, thick-walled, with small germ pore, pale brown to dark reddish brown in Melzer''s reagent; pleurocystidia absent, cheilocystidia abundant; cap cuticle "mutually compressed globose cells supporting a trichodermium and fasciculate on the margin", (Sieger), cheilocystidia clavate or lageniform, colorless or with red brown content, (Hansen, L.), clamp connections absent in cap cuticle and basidia (Breitenbach)

Spore deposit:
white (Arora)

Notes:
It has been reported from eastern North America and occasionally western North America, in spring, summer, and fall, (Miller(14)). There is a collection from BC at the University of British Columbia, a collection from ID at the College of Idaho, and collections from WA, LA, MS, and ON at the University of Washington. Collections were examined from WA (Birkebak). It has been found in CA (Desjardin). It also occurs in Europe.

EDIBILITY

some people have adverse reactions (Arora)

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Lepiota cepistipes (Sowerby) Quel. [as cepestipes]