Fungus: Specimen #10 Agaric (Gilled) Fungus

Fig. 1 Side view of the fungus showing the way the cap
formed to exposethe gills along its margin (Brooke Warren).

Fig.2 Top view of fungi growing in a lawn.
Note the warts that cover the cap.
(Brooke Warren)

Name: Amanita muscaria - Fly Agaric; Fly Amanita

Family: Amanitaceae

Collection Date: October 8, 2011

Habitat: Growing with a few others in a lawn

Location: Bancroft Street Hiram, Ohio

Fig. 3 As you can see this fungus comes in various colors and forms
depending on the age of the fungus (Lee, 2009).

Description: "The cap is 5-30 cm broad, round becoming convex and finally plane or slightly depressed; surface viscid when moist, color variable: bright red to blood-red, scarlet-red, or orange-red when fresh, but often fading to orange, yellow-orange, or paler; bright yellow-orange to yellow, then fading; yellow with a peachy center; or white to buff to silvery-grayish-white; covered at first with a dense coating of universal veil fragments (warts) which are usually white (but can be yellow, buff, or tan); warts flattened in age, often when young, soft in age; thick, white. The gills are adnate to adnexed or free, close, broad, white. The stalk is about 5-20 cm long, 1-3 cm thick at apex, tapering upward or equal with a basal bulb up to 6 cm broad; white or whitish, or somewhat discolored in age. The partial veil is membranous, usually forming a thin, persistent, median to superior, skirtlike ring on stalk which may collapse in age; ring white or with yellow patches, margin often torn or toothed. The universal veil is friable, forming a scaly volva at apex of bulb consisting of one or more (usually 2-4) concentric rings. The spore print is white. It usually solitary or scattered densely gregarious or in large rings in forests and at their edges, also with planted trees. Common throughout most of the northern hemisphere- its favorite mycorrhizal mates include pine, spruce, fir, birch, and aspen" (Arora p. 282, 1986).

Interesting Facts: This fungus is both poisonous and hallucinogenic. The effects vary depending on the mushroom, person, region, and the season it is found in. It is given the nickname "Fly Agaric" from the ancient practice of using the mushroom mixed with milk to stupefy flies. It is also used to concentrate vanadium, a rare, malleable, ductile metal used to add tensile strength to steel, from the soil. (Arora p. 283, 1986)
"This is the mystical, rare and powerful amanita muscaria mushroom, which gave Lewis Carroll inspiration for "Alice in Wonderland" (Algrands, n.d.).
Amanita Muscaria is also believed by some to be the Biblical Tree of Knowledge.
Collector: Brooke Warren

Key Used: Arora, D. (1986). Mushrooms Demystified. New York: Ten Speed Press.

Keying Steps:

Key to the Basidiomycetes1A. Basidia and spores borne externally (on the exposed surfaces of gills, tubes,
spines, branches, lobes, etc.); spores forcibly discharged at
maturity, i.e., a spore print often (but not always) obtainable; fruiting body with a cap and stalk, or clublike,
or branched, or bracketlike, or crustlike (without a stalk or sometimes without a cap) or lobed or bloblike, etc. ... 2
2B. Not as above... Hymenomycetes p. 58

Key to the Hymenomycetes1B. Not as above; pores and tubes absent... 3
3A. Underside of cap with radiating blades (gills)... Agaricales p. 59

Key to the Agaricales
1B. Not as above; spores forcibly discharged, hence a spore print obtainable if spores are being produced; gills
exposed at maturity; common and widespread... 2
2A. Spore print white to buff, yellow, yellow-orange, or lilac-tinged...3
3A. Universal veil enveloping young specimens and forming volva at base of stalk when it ruptures and/ or leaving numerous remnants (warts or flat patches) on cap... Amanitaceae, p. 265

Key to Amanita

1B. Volva collarlike (i.e., intergrown with base of stalk but with a free rim), scaly, warty, powdery, or indistinct but not saclike (see p. 264); cap often with many small pieces of universal veil tissue (Warts), powder, etc., occasionally with larger pieces... 15
15B. Universal veil remnants not yellow; cap may or may not be whitish... 22
22B. Not as above... 23

23B. Not as above... 24

24A. Cap brightly colored (red, orange, or yellow); partial veil present, usually forming an annulus (ring) on stalk... 25

25A. Volva usually a series of concentric rings at apex of bulbous stalk base, but sometimes only a single ring or collar; cap medium-sized to large and bright red to orange, apricot, yellow-orange, or yellow (yellow form rare in coastal California, but common in the Sierra Nevada and most of eastern North America)... A. muscaria, p. 282