Omphalinoid
These little white spored mushrooms have a pretty unique shape... a depressed
to umbilicate cap (more concave
than convex), with the cap edge sometimes not rolled down and strongly decurrent gills. To qualify for
this category, you also have to be quite small, 2.5cm across or less on
average, with a
stem only a few mm thick. Larger
mushrooms of this description are considered to be of
clitocyboid stature. Some Clitocybes are in fact this small (but check here
first, this page is shorter), but the decurrent gills or the umbilicate cap may not
be quite as extreme. The caps are not usually viscid, there is no partial
veil and they might be found on the ground, moss or wood.
In days of yore when we had no better way of determining if
mushrooms were related other than whether or not they looked like each other,
mushrooms were simply named after their stature, so many of the mushrooms on
this page were once named Omphalina. Since then all these new names have been created
for the groups that are actually related to each other, but each stature type
still has its "core genus" of mushrooms that have kept that name.
Ironically, there are no local, common Omphalina left!
Arrhenia - these are mostly dark brown, but one
is a beautiful blue-green. Other Arrhenias are oddly shaped and found on
the oddballs page. Possibly confused with
Omphaliaster with a
farinaceous odor. The brown ones are
usually hygrophanous. Except for the first two, very difficult to tell
apart. In the Hygrophoroid clade. (See also
Omphalina, below).
A. chlorocyanea - one of our most beautiful
blue-green mushrooms.
A. 'epichysium' - dark brown on wood. <2.5cm
A. rainierensis - (<2.5cm) on mossy ground with a
pubescent stem.
A. onisca - larger (<5cm) with a longer, smooth stem (>2 cm).
A. obscurata - smaller (<1.5cm),
short stem on sandy soil or moss.
A. hohensis - very similar, with distant, sometimes marginate gills.
A. pubescentipes - another lookalike
A. peltigerina - on Peltigera lichen
A. sphagnicola - <2.5cm, in sphagnum bogs, cap scurfy
Also dark brown, yet unrelated (Tricholomatineae).
Omphalina sp. - warm orange-brown on moss.
Myxomphalia maura - dark brown,
viscid, umbilicate and hygrophanous and only
growing on burnt ground. Amyloid spores (darkening in iodine).
Pseudoomphalina angelesiana (Neohygrophorus
angelesianus) - somewhat waxy with a viscid
cap. Not hygrophanous. In the spring near snow. Amyloid spores.
<2.5cm. See below for a paler brown Pseudoomphalina.
Xeromphalina - known by
their dark wiry stems, which make them resemble some
Marasmius, but they are not in that
family. All may have somewhat
decurrent gills except for X. fulvipes, which may be unrelated and belong in its
own genus. Amyloid spores (darkening in iodine).
X. campanella/enigmatica - found on conifer logs
often in
large numbers.
Cold/temperate weather species.
X. brunneola - related but smaller (<1.5cm),
darker, odor icky and taste disagreeable.
X. cirris/cornui - on conifer debris and moss.
Mild.
<2cm.
X. campanelloides/cauticinalis - on conifer debris or rotten wood,
bitter.
These form a
clade of species not easily distinguished.
Xeromphalina (Heimiomyces) fulvipes -
adnate gills and convex
cap do not look very omphalinoid, but more like
Marasmius. Bitter. On
duff and debris.
Rickenella/Loreleia -
purple or orange, long stemmed omphalinoids on moss and covered in
fine hairs (Rickenella) or on liverworts and not covered in fine
hairs (Loreleia). Caps <1.5cm. These are in the
Hymenochaetales order of polypores!
That is one of the big surprises to come out of DNA testing, to be sure.
Although other orders like the Russulales have
many gilled mushrooms, those were so microscopically different it was obvious
they were not like other gilled mushrooms. These seem for all the world to be
just like other gilled mushrooms.
R. swartzii - purple! Top of stem is darker, may have
orange colours too.
R. mellea - paler orange.
Loreleia postii - larger, <2.5cm stem paler?
L. marchantiae - smaller, <5mm, much like R. fibula on
liverworts.
Contumyces/Omphalina/Aphroditeola - pinkish omphalinoids.
Contumyces rosellus - pink tones, sometimes marginate gills.
Pruinose cap and stem. On moss. Hymenochaetales.
Omphalina pyxidata - similar, rumoured to be here too.
Aphroditeola olida (Hygrophoropsis morganii) - pink with
white or pink forked gills, once thought to be
a gilled bolete!
Smells like tutti-frutti bubble gum! On the ground.
Pleurotineae.
Lichenomphalia - A lichen is a symbiosis between an alga and
a fungus, where neither could live if not in the presence of the
other. The fungal component of almost all lichens is a member of the
Ascomycota (none of which are featured in
these pages), but there are two exceptions around here, this basidio-lichen
and Multiclavula on the club fungus
page. Lichenomphalia is in the Hygrophoraceae.
'Lichenomphalia' umbellifera - tan, paler and less colourful than
most others and found on logs in the presence of lichen, with granular green
lichen material at the base. Hygrophanous.
Pseudolaccaria and Pseudoomphalina - difficult to ID. Somewhat
farinaceous. Pseudolaccaria is bitter and Pseudoomphalina is
not. The spore walls slightly darken in iodine. Tricholomatineae.
Pseudolaccaria pachyphylla
Pseudoomphalina intermedia
A few from other sections can look Omphalinoid.
Mycena picta - <1cm, unique looking gills and
distinctly grooved cap.
