Summary:
Features include 1) a dry smooth cap that is ochraceous to cinnamon to reddish brown, 2) whitish to pale yellow flesh that only rarely turns slightly bluish, 3) small round yellow pores that do not change when injured, 4) a yellowish stem that has tiny yellow scales but no reticulum and may have reddish or reddish brown tinges at the base, 5) growth under birch or other hardwoods, and 6) microscopic characters. Molecular data support segregation from Boletus as Hemileccinum subglabripes Halling. (Halling(6)).

Chemical Reactions:
flesh stains grayish olive-green with application of FeSO4 (Bessette)

Odor:
not distinctive (Bessette)

Taste:
mild to slightly acidic (Bessette)

Microscopic:
spores 11-17 x 3-5 microns, narrowly fusoid [spindle-shaped], smooth, pale brown, (Bessette), spores 11-14 x 3-5 microns, narrowly fusoid, smooth, pale greenish yellow revived in KOH, yellowish in Melzer''s, wall less than 0.2 microns thick with no apical pore seen; basidia 4-spored, 18-26 x 8-10 microns, clavate, colorless to yellowish in KOH; pleurocystidia rare to scattered, 32-54 x 8-15 microns, fusoid-ventricose, smooth, thin-walled, apex acute, contents colorless to yellow revived in KOH, cheilocystidia numerous, 20-32 x 8-12 microns, fusoid to fusoid-ventricose, colorless to yellow in KOH; cap cuticle "a compact trichodermium the elements of which have the distal 2-5 cells inflated to sphaerocyst proportions and some so closely packed together as to produce a cellular layer, the cells (6)10-24 microns in diameter, more or less isodiametric and with yellow walls as revived in KOH or in Melzer''s"; stem cuticle has hymenium present in patches, caulocystidia 35-60 x 10-30 microns, soon colorless in KOH mounts, smooth, thin-walled, (Smith(35)), spores (11)12-14(17) x 3-3.5(5) microns, (Phillips)

Spore Deposit:
olive-brown (Bessette), olive to olive-ochraceous brown (Smith(35))

Notes:
Bessette et al. give the distribution as eastern Canada to FL, west to MN and TX, but it has also been reported from WA, ID, (H. Thiers 1986, pers. comm. to L. Norvell), and Smith(4) cite it as very rare in the Pacific Northwest. The eastern distribution specifically includes NS (Grund). There is a 2006 BC collection by M. Kranabetter at the University of British Columbia (as Boletus subglabripes).

EDIBILITY

yes (Bessette)

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Oligoporus leucospongia (Cooke & Harkn.) Gilb. & Ryvarden
Polyporus leucospongia Cooke & Harkn.