North American species of Mycena.

210 NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES OF MYCENA

around the stipe in some; stipe 2-6 (8) cm. long, 1-3 mm. thick, equal,
fragile, cartilaginous, tubular, glabrous except for the white-strigose
base, polished and translucent, variable in color but usually tinted
more or less like the pileus, sometimes nearly white in age, sometimes
with a strong pinkish tint.
Spores 8-10 (11) X 5-6.5 u (four-spored), 10-12 X 5.5-7 1 (twospored), broadly ellipsoid, smooth, amyloid; basidia two- or fourspored; pleurocystidia very rare or absent, similar to cheilocystidia;
cheilocystidia scattered to fairly abundant, 40-75 X (5) 8-15 u,
smooth or occasionally with two or three fingerlike prolongations,
clavate to fusoid-ventricose, contents usually pinkish; gill trama
homogeneous, vinaceous brown in iodine; pileus trama with a welldifferentiated pellicle, the hyphae of which give off short, slender
projections, the projections sometimes forming a turflike covering
over the surface, hypoderm well differentiated, the remainder filamentous, all except the pellicle vinaceous brown in iodine.
Habit, habitat, and distribution.-Usually single or gregarious but
at times cespitose. On decayed conifer wood in the spring and fall;
Nova Scotia, New York, and Michigan in eastern North America and
Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and California in the West. Seldom
found in large quantities. The material collected in Michigan has all
been two-spored; that from the Pacific Coast, four-spored.
Material studied.-Smith, 32-229, 32-234, 32-236, 32-245, 33-102,
33-162, 33-525, 635, 690, 690a, 1323, 1363, 2545, 2580, 3262, 3295,
3528,3606, 6287, 6313, 6389, 7805, 7894, 8065, 8416,8483,8923,9279,
9297, 14850, 15092, 15926, 17065, 17553, 18121, 18132, 18140, 18197.
Atkinson, 24109, 24235. Gruber, 43, Idaho. Morse, January 21,
1934, California. Wehmeyer, 625.
Observations.-Whenever a turflike covering is formed over the
pileus by the short, slender branches arising from the hyphae of the
cuticle, the pileus appears glaucous or very slightly pruinose. According to my observations, the character is usually found on relatively old carpophores. The variations in color of this species are
great but follow a definite pattern, always remaining in the series of
pinkish or vinaceous browns. The amount of gray present determines
the degree of brightness. In some collections the gills separate from
the stipe but adhere to each other to form a collar. This appears
to be merely a chance variation. The habit of this species is more
like that of M. hemisphaerica than that of M. rubromarginata, and its
consistency also relates it to the cespitose cartilaginous gray species.