Velvety Lactarius     Subgenus

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.

Flesh without fibers, fracturing with the same sort of break as a piece of chalk
Spore and gill color limited to white, yellow, or ochre
Mycorrhizal: occuring only on the ground, and only when there are trees nearby
No ring or volva on stalk
All fleshy-stemmed mushrooms whose gills exude a latex when cut go here

Fruiting bodies (especially the gills) exuding a liquid (called a latex) when broken
Stalk (and sometimes even gills) usually concolorous with cap

Diagnosis

• Cap pebbled with minute bumps, giving it a velvety appearance; not scaly or furry
  
• Latex white, or colorless, not changing color (although it may stain the flesh of the mushroom a different color)
  
• Taste usually mild

Comments

Narrow down your identification:

Cap up to 5" across; wrinkled, like paper that has dried after being wet; reddish- to purplish-brown
Stalk light orange
Latex white, abundant, staining fruiting body brown

Cap peachy orange
Gills distant
No staining reactions
In deciduous woods

Cap peachy orange.
Gills subdistant, staining brownish where broken from latex
Usually under hardwoods

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