Summary:
Features include 1) a dry, whitish cap that often discolors greenish yellow-brown, 2) white to yellowish gills, 3) a stem colored similarly to the cap and often narrowing downwards, 4) strong odor of celery, and 5) small, nearly round spores. The description from Breitenbach(3) is entitled "Tricholoma cf. apium J. Schaeff." and the remarks say that the collection differs from those described in the literature primarily by the rarity of 4-spored basidia and also by the larger spores (probably because of the smaller number of 4-spored basidia).

Cap:
4-8cm across, irregularly twisted, margin weakly involute [inrolled]; white, then often discoloring completely yellow-greenish to green-brown; tomentous, (Moser), 5-13cm across, convex to +/- depressed, often irregular and flexuous [wavy]; whitish when young, discoloring yellowish and finally becoming dark olive brown; margin +/- sulcate, velvety matte, smooth or cracked, (Hansen), 4-9cm across, convex becoming expanded and undulating, margin incurved for a long time; whitish when young, later ocher-brownish to olive-brownish, darker toward center, paler at margin; dry, dull, finely tomentose, increasingly areolate [cracked like dried mud], (Breitenbach)

Flesh:
white, (Moser), hard (Hansen), thick in the center; white, dingy white when old, (Breitenbach)

Gills:
white, when old with yellowish gleam, (Moser), whitish to yellowish (Hansen), "arcuate-adnate and sometimes subdecurrent as a small tooth", 100-160 reaching stem, narrow, 5-11 subgills between each pair of neighboring gills; cream-white to yellowish white, (Breitenbach)

Stem:
whitish with fine scales, these yellowing or browning, (Moser), 3-5cm x 1.5-2cm, often short and stout; colored as cap, discoloring somewhat yellow to brown; smooth to fibrillose scaly, (Hansen), 4-6cm x 1-2cm, cylindric to conic, narrowing toward base, solid, firm; whitish; dry, sometimes transversely fibrillose-scaly at top, "increasingly ocher-yellowish to ocher-brownish squamose toward the base", (Breitenbach)

Veil:
[no ring or ring zone]

Odor:
of celery, (Moser), "strong, reminiscent of fennel, celery, or aniseed", (Hansen), strongly like celery or like Lactarius helvus, (Breitenbach), strong, like celery or somewhat curry-like (like Lactarius camphoratus or L. helvus), (Bessette), others say fresh baked bread or similar to Tricholoma murrillianum

Taste:
mild, (Moser, Hansen), mild, somewhat spicy, (Breitenbach), "mild or a bit farinaceous or spicy" (Bessette)

Microscopic spores:
spores 3.5-5 x 3-4 microns, oval to nearly round; "cuticular hyphae uniformly incrusted", (Hansen), spores 2.5-4 microns, (Moser), spores 4.4-6 x 4.1-5.3 microns, nearly round, smooth, iodine-negative, colorless, with droplets; basidia 1-2-3(4)-spored, 22-33 x 5-6.5 microns, narrowly clavate, without basal clamp connection; pleurocystidia and cheilocystidia not seen; cap cuticle of irregular to slightly parallel hyphae 4-12 microns wide, "occasional hyphal ends exserted, sometimes in clusters, brown-pigmented", septa without clamp connections, (Breitenbach)

Spore deposit:
white according to literature (Breitenbach)

Notes:
Tricholoma apium has been found in BC with collections at the Pacific Forestry Center and the University of British Columbia. There is a collection from WA at the University of Washington. Bessette(5) says it has also been reported from MI, and MA.

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