ngail's Identifications

IPL3407.
Collected by Gloria Myhre.
At our 2023 Spring Foray at McCall, Idaho, somebody suggested at the Southern Idaho Mycology Association to look for Hygrophorus caeruleus , so we could run a DNA sequence on it. We were lucky and got some samples. The location was about 20 miles away from Bear Basin, the location of the original H. caeruleus described by O.K. Miller in 1984.
Only found in the Spring, H. caeruleus is relatively common around this area, about 2 or 3 weeks after snow melt. This mushroom is robust, cracked, and foul smelling. Similarly in the Fall, we can find Clitocybe odora var. pacifica , a mushroom with similar colors, smaller, with a pleasant anise odor, and usually we can find it at lower elevations too.
While these two mushrooms can be easily told apart, and they grow in different seasons, we heard that genetically their DNA is really close, so we wanted to look for ourselves.

Voucher IPL2870
On the riparian zone of the Boise river, with Populus tremuloides and willows.
Cap 10 cms., convex later depressed, slightly viscid, yellow-brown to orange, tomentose at first later smooth, margin incurved, later straight. Unchanging with KOH.
Stipe short, narrow at the tip, hard, with small scrobicules. Gills subdecurrent, crowded, cream, highly forked near the stipe. Latex white, scanty, unchanging. Taste acrid.
Spore print white, with a pinkish tint. Spores (7.0-8.2) x (5.3-5.9); ellipsoid, warts .5 mic high, connected 2 or 3 at the time (Voo B1-B2).
Basidia (46-48-9.0), Pleuromacrocystidia (52-62) x (8.0) subfusiform apex acute, Cheilocystidia (24.0 × 4.7).

Voucher IPL2870
On the riparian zone of the Boise river, with Populus tremuloides and willows.
Cap 10 cms., convex later depressed, slightly viscid, yellow-brown to orange, tomentose at first later smooth, margin incurved, later straight. Unchanging with KOH.
Stipe short, narrow at the tip, hard, with small scrobicules. Gills subdecurrent, crowded, cream, highly forked near the stipe. Latex white, scanty, unchanging. Taste acrid.
Spore print white, with a pinkish tint. Spores (7.0-8.2) x (5.3-5.9); ellipsoid, warts .5 mic high, connected 2 or 3 at the time (Voo B1-B2).
Basidia (46-48-9.0), Pleuromacrocystidia (52-62) x (8.0) subfusiform apex acute, Cheilocystidia (24.0 × 4.7).

Voucher IPL2870
On the riparian zone of the Boise river, with Populus tremuloides and willows.
Cap 10 cms., convex later depressed, slightly viscid, yellow-brown to orange, tomentose at first later smooth, margin incurved, later straight. Unchanging with KOH.
Stipe short, narrow at the tip, hard, with small scrobicules. Gills subdecurrent, crowded, cream, highly forked near the stipe. Latex white, scanty, unchanging. Taste acrid.
Spore print white, with a pinkish tint. Spores (7.0-8.2) x (5.3-5.9); ellipsoid, warts .5 mic high, connected 2 or 3 at the time (Voo B1-B2).
Basidia (46-48-9.0), Pleuromacrocystidia (52-62) x (8.0) subfusiform apex acute, Cheilocystidia (24.0 × 4.7).

Voucher IPL2870
On the riparian zone of the Boise river, with Populus tremuloides and willows.
Cap 10 cms., convex later depressed, slightly viscid, yellow-brown to orange, tomentose at first later smooth, margin incurved, later straight. Unchanging with KOH.
Stipe short, narrow at the tip, hard, with small scrobicules. Gills subdecurrent, crowded, cream, highly forked near the stipe. Latex white, scanty, unchanging. Taste acrid.
Spore print white, with a pinkish tint. Spores (7.0-8.2) x (5.3-5.9); ellipsoid, warts .5 mic high, connected 2 or 3 at the time (Voo B1-B2).
Basidia (46-48-9.0), Pleuromacrocystidia (52-62) x (8.0) subfusiform apex acute, Cheilocystidia (24.0 × 4.7).