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mushroomfadguy

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Hi, wasted about an hour resizing all the pics and posting this on some shoddy website called fungi.org only for some admin to delete it without explaining why. They sound like a bunch of teenagers who get off on what limited power they wield in their bedrooms to pretend to be adults in online forums anyway. Rant over, hey guys hope someone can help me!

If anyone can help with an ID, or at least to narrow it down to the family I'd most appreciate it:

Habitat was mixed juvenile beech / conifer woodland, growing in significant numbers, maybe 100+ specimens around in Oxfordshire, south UK, today, November 12th.

IMG_20201112_121817.thumb.jpg.22ce25c7f3ec3622b977d358724754cf.jpg

 

The gills were incredibly brittle, flaking away like almonds at the slightest touch, leading me to think it was a russula:brittle.thumb.jpg.87d7b02d3dd21f224ad748bce79cd81d.jpg

What surprised me for a russula was that the stems were practically all hollow and flimsy, and a tad wavy, while I was expecting something more solid, straight, and hard to snap like chalk. This could have been due to rot but not sure. No distinctive smell, definitely not "mushroomy", although chewing a tiny bit and holding it on the tongue for a few seconds I had some incredibly mild peppery notes like what you would expect from a russula but it was incredibly mild. Gently tossing a half at a nearby tree it exploded into at least 20 parts.

Some caps of a few juvenile specimens:

11.thumb.jpg.abae83c796f83d827c5bca4ea24077dc.jpg22.thumb.jpg.ed5e08f02a13058a99328a19e258c484.jpg

 

Most were about this sort of size:

44.thumb.jpg.8f100934f683ada12a2ea9fdf6ff40c2.jpg

 

Yet some were much larger, with more wavy and very exaggerated sinuate gills:

55.thumb.jpg.861535974e853c595998ff9c9552b9da.jpg

 

The largest specimen was about 14cm wide:

66.jpg.b5a060ce7ad260bbf6ce60fc616188fd.jpg

 

When they get to that size it seems the stem becomes about as thick as a thumb, but remains wavy and brittle.

 

Thanks!

 

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19 minutes ago, mushroomfadguy said:

Thanks a lot Jeff, yeah I think that's it. Didn't realise there were others which had this same absurdly brittle/exploding character outside the russula family, I guess the stem was the give away I should have made sure it was more solid before jumping to conclusions. 

To me those gills don't look like Russula gills. They are more widely spaced than is typical for Russula and I'm not sure if I've ever seen Russula with the short gills in between gills or such a pronounced notch at the stipe attachment. The look of gills is what steered me towards Tricholoma. Looking at Tricholoma for a few minutes and T. terreum popped right out. Then I saw that you had already worked out the same thing as me, lol.

 

29 minutes ago, mushroomfadguy said:

Thanks a lot Jeff, yeah I think that's it. Didn't realise there were others which had this same absurdly brittle/exploding character outside the russula family, I guess the stem was the give away I should have made sure it was more solid before jumping to conclusions. 

To me those gills don't look like Russula gills. They are more widely spaced than is typical for Russula and I'm not sure if I've ever seen Russula with the short gills in between gills or such a pronounced notch at the stipe attachment. The look of gills is what steered me towards Tricholoma. Looking at Tricholoma for a few minutes and T. terreum popped right out. Then I saw that you had already worked out the same thing as me, lol.

 

apparently a good edible. 

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These are a species of Tricholoma. But I think they are not T. terreum. T. terreum has cap surface with small scales that are generally not radially arranged. Fadguy, your caps have radially arranged streaks of innate fibrils (I think they are innate and not adhered to the surfaces). There are several species of gray-capped Tricholoma that I find here in Pennsylvania USA in the fall. And there are a few other gray Trichs that I haven't found here. Is Oxfordshire in the UK? If so, it's not unlikely that your gray Tricholoma mushrooms represent a species that does not occur here in eastern North America. 

Some of the gray Trciholoma species are sickeners. In particular the bitter ones (and probably also a few other types) should not be collected for the table. The brown Trichs have particularly bad reputations. 

Also, those species of Tricholoma that are consdered to be good edibles come with a warning. It is possible that these type mushrooms contain a toxin that is generally harmless if the mushrooms are well-cooked and consumed in moderation (and not consumed on several consecutive days). Around the year 2000 there were serious poisoning incidents associated with Tricholoma mushrooms in France and Poland. Based upon what happened in these incidents it appears that (at least some species of) Tricholoma mushrooms contain a toxin that affects people as per a very acute tipping point. I still consume a few types... in moderation and well cooked.  

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