SUBSECTION IIYCROPHORUS 297 



Stipe (4)5-10 cm long, 3-6(8) mm thick, slender, whitish, in age 

 tinted like the pileus from the drying veil, white within, equal or 

 slightly ventricose and attenuated at the base, solid, covered at first 

 by a hyaline glutinous sheath. 



Spores (10)12-18(20) X 7-9 /*, ellipsoid, smooth, yellowish in 

 Melzer's reagent. Basidia 55-71 X 7-12 /a, 4-spored. Pleurocystidia and 

 cheilocystidia none. Gill trama divergent, hyphae 4-7 /a broad. Cuticle a 

 well-defined gelatinous zone, 260-350 ^ thick, of brownish hyphae 

 (3-6 fi broad) which are interwoven, and both radially and peri- 

 clinally disposed. No hypodermium evident. Pileus trama of inter- 

 woven, radial hyphae. Clamp connections present on the cuticular hy- 

 phae. 



Habit, Habitat, and Distribution" — Scattered or solitary, rarely 

 subcaespitose on humus or mossy areas, in dense coniferous forests, 

 California, Oregon, and Washington, October-December. 



Material Studied — California: Smith 56476. Oregon: Smith 

 20210, 24976, 28399, 28400. Washington: Brown, Lake Quinault, Nov. 

 3, 1925; Kauffman, Lake Quinault, Nov. 5, 1925, and type, from Lake 

 Quinault, Nov. 2, 1925. 



Observations — In his notes Kauffman points out that this species 

 belongs in the subgenus Limacium (section Hygrophorus) and is 

 close to H. olivaceoalbus. It has the same stature as the slender variety 

 of the latter, but lacks the peronate sheath of fuscous fibrils beneath the 

 gluten on the stipe, possesses a glabrous pileus, and much larger spores 

 borne on 4-spored basidia. 



180 



Hygrophorus occidentalis Sm. & Hes. 



Lloydia 2: 18. 1939 



Illustrations: 

 Fig. 90. 

 Smith and Hesler, Lloydia 2, pi. 6. 



Pileus 2-8 ( 10 ) cm broad, convex, soon plane, at maturity the disc 

 slightly depressed and the margin decurved, in age the disc deeplv 

 and broadly depressed and the margin elevated, glutinous, somewhat 

 appressed-fibrillose streaked, color variable, disc "hair brown" to "fus- 

 cous," at times yellowish or smoky, the margin white to pale cinere- 

 ous. Context thin, white; odor and taste not distinctive. 



Lamellae adnate, becoming subdecurrent or decurrent, white, 

 then tinged cream, close to subdistant, narrow to moderately broad, 

 thin, edges even. 



