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

Summary:
Features include small size, a white grooved cap with a tendency to develop pinkish tinges when old, distant interveined gills, a tough downy stem that is white at the top and dark at the base, and fruiting on sticks and branches. Marasmiellus candidus is a common species in the Pacific Northwest. Microscopically it differs from many Marasmiellus species in lacking a true Rameales structure, instead having irregularly cylindric pileocystidia interspersed among interwoven, typically smooth hyphae, (Desjardin(1)). It will likely end up in a different genus. Marasmius candidus var. setulosus Josserand & Smith, described in the southern Appalachians, represents a distinct species with setuliform pileocystidia and other distinguishing features, (Redhead).

Marasmiellus candidus collections were examined from BC, WA, ON, CA, IN, MO, NC, OH, PA, and the Netherlands (Redhead(6)). The range includes also OR, NY, western, eastern, and southern Europe, North Africa, Azores, Georgia (USSR), and Japan, (Redhead(6)). It also occurs in TN (Desjardin(5)).

Cap:
0.6-2.5cm across, convex to flat or with slightly depressed center; "shining white or translucent white, but often stained deep pinkish or reddish" when old; dry, often striate or grooved when mature, (Arora), 0.8-4(5.5)cm across, convex or flat-convex when young, flat or flat-depressed with uplifted margin when old; white overall when young, becoming buff, pale yellowish white, orange-white or grayish orange when old, often discoloring pinkish overall; bald or minutely pruinose, canescent [hoary] when old, dull, typically opaque, disc smooth or rugulose [finely wrinkled], margin even or crenate [scalloped] when young, becoming rugulose, striate, or sulcate [grooved] when old, (Desjardin(1))

Flesh:
very thin, pliant, soft, (Arora); thin; buff, (Desjardin(1))

Gills:
few and decurrent; white like the cap but often pinkish- or reddish-stained in old age, (Arora); "adnate or subdecurrent, distant, moderately broad, rarely forked", typically interveined, 1-3 tiers of subgills; white at first, yellowish white or pale orange-white when old, often staining pale brownish or grayish red in spots or discoloring pinkish overall, (Desjardin(1))

Stem:
0.5-3cm x 0.1-0.2cm, equal or slightly narrowing at either end, often short, often curved, "central or off-center but not lateral, tough"; white or with gray to pinkish gray base, darkening gradually to brownish black from the base upward with aging, (Arora), 0.7-2cm x 0.15-0.4cm, central or off-center, round in cross-section or compressed at top, "narrowing downward to a slightly bulbous base, curved, subinsititious" [somewhat insititious]; top white, base white when young, yellowish brown, grayish brown, dark yellowish brown or black when old; top bald or pruinose, base pubescent [finely downy] or fibrillose, (Desjardin(1))

Odor:
mild (Arora), mildly fungal (Desjardin(1))

Taste:
mildly fungal (Desjardin(1))

Microscopic spores:
spores 10-15 x 3.5-6 microns, "spindle-shaped to elongated tear-shaped, smooth", inamyloid, (Arora); spores 11.4-15(16.2) x 3.6-5.4 microns, "elongate-lacrymoid or subfusiform"; basidia 4-spored, 24-42 x 6-9.6 microns, clavate or spheropedunculate; cheilocystidia scattered, 30-66 x 3.6-6 microns, "cylindric or irregular in outline, obtuse, base slightly inflated", colorless, inamyloid, and thin-walled, pleurocystidia absent, or rare near the gill edge, similar to the cheilocystidia; cap cuticle "of repent, interwoven, smooth or weakly diverticulate hyphae" and scattered pileocystidia, 30-120 x 3-8 microns, "irregularly cylindric or strangulate, obtuse", colorless or pale yellow, inamyloid, and thin-walled; caulocystidia abundant, 30-135 x 3-6 microns, similar to the pileocystidia, (Desjardin(1))

Spore deposit:
white (Arora)