Amanita V3

This is a key to gilled mushrooms, that is, mushrooms having a definite cap with a fertile surface consisting of gills. The fruiting body usually also has a stem, although that may be lateral or absent (usually, then, the mushroom is growing from wood). You can use this key to identify mushrooms that you find.

Fruiting body containing fibers (usually in the stalk)

Fruiting body having a combination of some of the following characteristics:
Stalk growing out of a cup of cottony tissue called a volva (all white-spored mushrooms with a volva go here)
Cap with scattered patches or flakes of the same sort of tissue as the volva (see second picture), easily peeled off
Annulus (skirt-like ring on stalk)

Cap margin distinctly striate in maturity
Either (most commonly) annulus absent and colors brown or grey, or
(rarely) annulus present and colors bright: red, orange or yellow
Volva sack-like in some species, in others clamped tightly to the stem, leaving traces in bands of color on the stalk

Cap usually some shade of brown or gray, occasionally white
Annulus absent, but there may be strangulated zones on the stem
Universal veil material generally not present (or only occasionally) on the cap
Volva sac-like, or clamped tightly to the stem

Cap more than 1 1/2" across at maturity
Basidia mostly four-sterigmate

Here are the characters that distinguish this species from the others in its group. For its more general characters, see higher up on the page.
If there's just a few words or a microscopic feature here, a more thorough description can be found above.

Diagnosis

• Cap up to 4" across; dark brown
  
• Volva clamped tightly to the stalk, leaving a series of colored bands known as "strangulate zones" on the stalk as the stalk grows
  
• Universal veil material light grey at first, quickly darkening; frequently forming patches on the cap

Comments

This Amanita is included in American field guides under three different names: Amanita ceciliae, Amanita inaurata, and Amanita strangulata
According to Rodham E. Tulloss, Amanita ceciliae is a European species which starts out yellowish, and gets much bigger than our V3 (up to 8" across)
Amanita inaurata, and Amanita strangulata (or Amanitopsis strangulata) are synonyms or each other


 

 

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