unpleasant; taste unknown
GILLS: White; free from the stem or barely reaching it; close; edges even; covered at first with a white partial veil that may break to form a skirt-like ring or may form remnants on the cap margin
STEM: Up to 3-1/2 in. long; white; surface smooth or with floccose bands; equal or tapering upward from a basal bulb; emerging from a white to buff or brownish sack-like volva
VOLVA: White to brownish; encasing the entire mushroom at first like a chicken egg, then leaving a sack-like structure with a free limb at the bottom of the stem; mid to bottom portions are thicker than the thin opening; often almost completely buried in the soil and can be appressed against the stipe
SPORE PRINT: White
ECOLOGY: Mycorrhizal; scattered to gregarious or in small clusters under oaks, especially red oak, often in lawns; summer and fall; uncommon but locally abundant
EDIBILITY: Deadly poisonous
COMMENTS: This species caused a fatal poisoning in New Jersey. It resembles robust fruitings of the Destroying Angel, Amanita bisporigera (p. 10). Its thick volva, cap with brownish or olivaceous tints, robust stature, and usually gregarious habit will help distinguish it.
Amanita sturgeonii
SCIENTIFIC NAME: Amanita flavoconia G. F. Atk.
SYNONYM: None
COMMON NAME: Yellow Patches
FAMILY: Amanitaceae
Cap: Up to 3-1/2 in. wide; orange to yellowish orange; ovoid to convex, becoming flat at maturity; surface sticky when wet; not striate or barely so in age; surface covered at first with bright-yellow patches, remnants of the top of the universal veil, which are easily removed or washed off, leaving a bald cap
FLESH: White, buff near the cap; thin; firm; odor mild; taste unknown
GILLS: White; margins may have a yellow dusting from veil remnants; close; barely free; edges even; covered by a yellow partial veil in the button stage
STEM: Up to 4 in. long; yellow, white, or a combination of the two; usually there is yellow near the apex; solid; equal or tapering slightly upward; surface smooth or scurfy, with a yellow, skirt-like ring near the apex; a small bulb at the base may show yellow patches from the universal veil, or these patches may also be on the soil surrounding the stem
SPORE PRINT: White
ECOLOGY: Mycorrhizal; solitary, scattered to gregarious in humus, moss, or lawns under hemlock, red spruce, and other conifers as well as under oaks, beech, and in mixed woods; summer and fall; very common
EDIBILITY: Unknown, probably toxic
COMMENTS: This is a beautiful species when seen with the bright-yellow patches decorating the orange cap. It is abundant and can be found throughout the region. Several species have a similar aspect. Amanita frostiana (p. 13) has a striate cap and a more prominent bulb rimmed with yellow material from the universal veil. It is much less common. Amanita muscaria (p. 14) is larger and has whitish warts.
Amanita flavoconia
SCIENTIFIC NAME: Amanita frostiana (Peck) Sacc.
SYNONYM: None
COMMON NAME: Frost’s Amanita
FAMILY: Amanitaceae
CAP: Up to 3-1/2 in. wide; orange to yellowish orange, usually persistently reddish over the disc; surface moist, tacky, bald, with separable yellowish patches of the universal veil; striate.
FLESH: White; thin; odor mild; taste unknown
GILLS: Cream; close; free; edges flocculose; covered at first with a fragile partial veil
STEM: Up to 3-1/2 in. long; white to pale yellowish, with a pale yellow evanescent ring near the apex or midway down the stem; solid; equal down to a distinct white bulb whose top is decorated with yellow remnants of the universal veil; surface dry; bald to flocculose
SPORE PRINT: White
ECOLOGY: Mycorrhizal; solitary to gregarious in humus and moss; associated with pines and oaks; summer and fall; uncommon
EDIBILITY: Unknown, possibly toxic
COMMENTS: This species is uncommon in Appalachian forests, and some reports of it are probably misidentifications of Amanita flavoconia (p. 12), which lacks the prominent striations and the collared bulb with the yellow rings around the top.
Amanita frostiana
SCIENTIFIC NAME: Amanita muscaria (L.) Lam.
SYNONYM: None (See Comments for nomenclature issues)
COMMON NAME: Fly Agaric
FAMILY: Amanitaceae
CAP: Up to 8 in. wide; orange, reddish orange to yellow; deepest color in the center, fading from sunlight or in age; roundish, becoming convex to broadly convex and eventually nearly flat; surface viscid when wet, covered with a scattering of white cottony warts that may wash off in rainy weather; margin not usually striate, or only faintly so, and may have patches of the universal veil
FLESH: White, thick, unchanging when exposed; odor and taste not distinctive
GILLS: White to cream; free or barely reaching the stem; crowded; broad; edges are minutely hairy; covered at first with a white partial veil
STEM: Up to 8 in. long; white to pale cream or pale yellowish; tapering upward from a white to buff basal bulb; the base usually with two or three rings of tissue; surface dry, finely hairy to cottony scaly, with an apical to mid-stem, skirt-like, white, flaring ring, at times edged in yellow
SPORE PRINT: White
ECOLOGY: Mycorrhizal; solitary, scattered to gregarious in humus, moss, or grass, usually
