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Species Information
Summary: Also listed in Veined category. This is one of three Polyozellus species occurring in the Pacific Northwest to which the name Polyozellus multiplex has been misapplied. It forms compact clusters of overlapping fan-shaped to spatula-shaped caps that are purplish blue, gray blue or deep blue on the outer (inner) surface (turning violaceous black when old) and arise from a common base in the ground. The outer (lower) surface of the caps forms a network of longitudinal folds that are light to moderate grayish purplish blue. Spores are nearly round to broadly elliptic, nodulose, and colorless, averaging less than 7 microns long. It is "generally not common, but can be abundant locally." "It can be used as a source of natural dyes for fibres such as wool and silk, yielding violet, greens, and blues in a high-pH solution" (Voitk(5)). The description is derived from Voitk(5). It is "generally not common, but can be abundant locally".
Collections were examined from BC, NL, PQ, AK, ME, NM, and OR (where the holotype was found). It is also documented from the Kuril Islands in eastern Asia.
Gills: outer spore bearing surface with "sinuous folds or ridges, frequently forking and anastomosing, and at times forming a reticulate or almost poroid surface, sometimes nearly smooth over large areas" or, more often, smooth near the cap margin; light to moderate grayish purplish blue
Stem: 3-5cm x 0.5-2cm, "often irregularly compound, multiple stipes fused, converging to a common subterranean base, solid"; dark purplish blue; "slightly roughened, upper portion covered with hymenium"
Odor: "nondistinctive or faintly pungent"
Microscopic spores: spores (including nodules) 4.8-7.7 x 3.9-6.7 microns, average 6.1 x 5.3 microns, nearly round to broadly elliptic, with multiple nodules 0.5-1.0 microns high and a prominent apiculus, spore inamyloid, colorless, content homogeneous; basidia 4-spored, 30-70 x 5-10 microns, clavate; cystidia 3-7 microns wide, filiform (thread-like), "straight to irregularly sinuous", irregularly cylindric, "tips even or subclavate, not extending beyond basidia"; clamp connections "in all tissues, but not at all septa"
Spore deposit: white
Habitat / Range
"on soil and conifer duff, often among mosses", under Picea (spruce) most commonly, and Abies (true fir); mainly August through October, "depending in part on latitude and elevation, with earlier fruiting in the north and at higher elevations"
Similar Species
Polyozellus purpureoniger has larger fruitbodies, an upper cap surface that is purple when young and brown when mature, an involute cap margin, lighter flesh, and larger spores (averaging over 7 microns long, whereas those of P. atrolazulinus average under 7 microns long), (Voitk(5)). Polyozellus marymargaretae has larger spores (averaging over 7 microns long), and the color is light blue when young "(with olive-buff streaks and hints of lavender in the cap)" - it lacks both purple and violet colors, (Voitk(5)). Polyozellus multiplex is not known from western North America - it has a purplish black cap surface (blue to dark blue in P. atrolazulinus) and less tendency for the cap to be zonate, but less colorful or older darkened collections of can be difficult to distinguish, (Voitk(5)).
