Conocybe lactea (Lange) Métrod
Bulletin de las Soc. Mycol. de France, 56: 46. 1940.

Common Name: none

• Pileus

  Cap 0.5-2.5 cm broad, obtuse-conic, occasionally expanding to convex; margin decurved, sometimes slightly upturned in age; surface dry, smooth, striate approximately halfway from the margin to to the disc, at maturity often faintly wrinkled; color: white to cream, the disc pale yellow-brown, senescing to pale-buff overall; flesh very thin, fragile, buff to dull pale-brown; odor and taste mild.

• Lamellae

  Gills adnexed to seceding, very close, narrow, pallid, becoming dull pale orange-brown.

• Stipe

  Stipe 1.5-5 cm long, 1-2 mm thick, more or less equal, thin, fragile, hollow, straight, easily splitting; surface at first pruinose or faintly striate, glabrous in age, cream-white; veil absent.

• Spores

  Spores 10-15 x 6-9 µm, elliptical, smooth, with an apical pore; spore print pale rusty-brown.

• Habitat

  Scattered to gregarious in grassy areas; ephemeral, i.e. persisting only one to two days; fruiting spring, summer and fall.

• Edibility

  Unknown, but too small and unsubstantial to be of culinary value.

• Comments

  Conocybe lactea is a small, very fragile, white mushroom, part of a contingent of grass-inhabiting species that in our area fruit primarily during the summer months. It is characterized by a obtusely-conic cap, striate margin which sometimes becomes slightly wrinkled in age, and pale rusty-brown to cinnamon-brown gills. It often fruits along with Panaeolus foenisecii, Agrocybe pediades, and Marasmius oreades. Marasmius oreades can be distinguished by its larger size, convex cap and well spaced cream-colored gills, while Panaeolus foenisecii has a dark-brown convex cap, dark mottled gills and spores. Finally Agrocybe pediades has a sticky (when moist) pale yellow-brown convex, not conic cap, darker brown gills, and often an annulus.

• Other Descriptions and Photos
  • Fred Stevens: Conocybe lactea (CP)
  • Fred Stevens: Conocybe lactea (CP)
  • Fred Stevens: Conocybe lactea (CP)
  • Agaricales of the Hawaiian Islands: Conocybe lactea (D & CP)
  • Fungus plates painted under the supervision of Elias Fries: Conocybe lactea (I) [as Agaricus lateritius]
  • George Barron's Fungi of Canada (East): Conocybe lactea (D & CP)
  • Arora (1986): p. 472 (D), p. 473 (P)
  • Breitenbach & Kränzlin (vol. 4): sp. 381 (D, I, & CP)
  • Lincoff: p. 560 (D), plate 5 (CP)
  • Miller: sp. 220 (D & CP)
  • Phillips: p. 185 (D & CP)
  • Smith & Weber: sp. 213 (D & CP)

  (D=Description; I=Illustration; P=Photo; CP=Color Photo)