North American species of Mycena.

404 NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES OF MYCENA

finally whitish or yellowish white, usually rather sordid in age; flesh
thin and moderately fragile, pallid, odor and taste not recorded;
lamellae arcuate-adnate, becoming decurrent in age, subdistant, 14 -18 reach the stipe, narrow to moderately broad, white, edges even;
stipe 2-3 (5) cm. long, 1 mm. ~t thick, equal, elastic, base strigose,
bluish black near the apex at the very first but quickly fading to
whitish, base becoming sordid brownish in age, when young embedded
in a thick glutinous sheath, the gluten gradually becoming aggregated
toward the base in relatively large masses.
Spores narrowly ellipsoid, 8-10 X 4-5 ju or 9-12 X 4.5-6, (fourand two-spored basidia respectively), amyloid (reaction strong);
basidia 26-30 X 5-7 A; cheilocystidia abundant, smooth, fusoidventricose to nearly cylindric, often irregular in outline, 26-34 X
6-10,; pleurocystidia not differentiated; gill trama reddish to purplish brown in iodine, subhymenium and gill edges not gelatinous;
pileus trama corticated by a palisade of inflated pedicellate cells with
sordid-brown contents, the cells 25-40 X 15-30 u above the pedicel,
pedicel 12-30 X 3-5 A, a narrow band of slender hyphae immediately
beneath the palisade layer, the remainder of the trama of floccose
tissue composed of more or less enlarged hyphae, all parts except the
palisade layer reddish to purplish brown in iodine; stipe tissue dark
vinaceous brown to purplish in iodine.
Habit, habitat, and distribution.-Gregarious on needle beds under
conifers (often in large numbers) and scattered on small sticks or
branches of conifer wood, not rare. Fruiting during spring, summer,
and fall. Kauffman found it at Echo Lake, Montana, in 1928. I
have collected it in North Carolina, New York, Michigan, Washington, Oregon, and California in the United States and in Nova Scotia
and Ontario in Canada.
Material studied. Smith, 327, 732, 767, 3278, 3515, 3845, 3922,
3975, 4778, 4863, 5027, 6305, 7507, 8044, 8350, 8769, 13735, 14124,
14454, 14475, 14639, 16501, 16657, 16702. Kauffman, Montana.
Slipp, UIFP: 3037, 3111, Idaho. Wehmeyer, 516a, 642.
Observations.-Both the two-spored and the four-spored forms
occur in North America; in fact, one often finds pilei with both twoand four-spored basidia. The four-spored form is more abundant
along the Pacific coast, whereas the two-spored form is more frequent
in eastern North America. The manner of fruiting and the habitat
are a bit peculiar at times. In the vicinity of Lake Tahkenitch,
Oregon, it frequently occurs on dead twigs of cedar trees six to ten
feet or more above ground instead of on the forest floor, where one