had to go for a check-up at the doctor's today (boooo!
) . . . . . but found something interesting in the wood-chip in the shrubbery adjacent to the Surgery (hoooray!)
an interesting-looking agaric, present in quantity; the most obvious character was the cracking cap - but these were no
Agrocybe praecox - they had the stocky look of a
Tricholoma, with rather bulbous stem-bases for one thing, and not the slightest evidence of a ring:
I thought I might be posting these as a "what are these please?" post, but decided I should give it a go - there were plenty of specimens to play around with
once home I had a closer look: the gills had distinctly white edges, which usually suggests a sterile margin and plenty of cheilocystidia; the stem discoloured brown where handled:
note also the hint of a decurrent tooth, the slightly inrolled cap margin and the minute "frosting" on the stem, suggesting caulocystidia, evident particularly at the top and bottom edges of the stem here (note also the pattern of rings around the stem, combining with those running down it to produce a distinctive pattern:
under the microscope I checked to see that this was four-spored, and lo and behold it had brown spores (knocking any lingering thoughts that this might indeed be a strange
Tricholoma out of the window):
the caulocystidia on the stem were abundant and distinctive under the 'scope:
spores were rather thick-walled and generally in the range 11 x 6-7µm
so based on habitat, general shape, lack of a ring zone, spore-size, abundant lageniform caulocystidia etc. I was able confidently to come up with a name:
Agrocybe putaminum
having checked around I think I can also confidently say that it is new to Yorkshire - and quite possibly a considerable jump north-westwards judging from the NBN map:
NBN Gateway: Agrocybe putaminum grid map (I'm a bit concerned by that dot floating in the North Sea off Mablethorpe
a slip somewhere perhaps); also of interest as that it was recorded at a fair altitude (admittedly in a suburban area, but still at 250 metres above sea level)
I know that Andy O has recorded this several times, so wait in some trepidation, lest he tells me I've got the ID wrong . . . .
if I am correct then we may have to be wary of identifying top-of-the-cap-shot only
Agrocybe species with cracked caps as definitely
A. praecox though:
cheers
Chris
cripes - it's time for the IT Crowd!
PS just thought . . . . . .
"Me? . . . . . looking at large-ish toadstools? . . . . . with
my reputation? . . . . . "
LOL
Linear Mode
