Gymnopilus validipes


Gymnopilus validipes is a mushroom in the family Hymenogastraceae. It is widely distributed in North America and Europe.

Description

  • Pileus: 7.5 — 15 cm, convex to broadly convex, margin deeply incurved at first, becoming revolute with age, dry, fibrillose or with small ochraceous brown scales, pale-yellow or ochraceous buff, flesh soft, whitish, yellowish near the gills.
  • Gills: Adnate to uncinate, close, thin, yellowish white becoming cinnamon.
  • Spore print: Orangish brown.
  • Stipe: 10 — 13 cm long, 2.5 – 5 cm. thick, equal or swelling in the middle, fleshy-fibrous, solid, elastic, fibrillose, concolorous, white within, the cortina leaves only a faint ring on the stalk. The specific epithet validipes means "having a robust stalk".
  • Taste: Mild, standing in contrast to closely related bitter-tasting species.
  • Odor: Pleasant.
  • Microscopic features: Spores 8 — 10 X 5 — 6 μm, ellipsoid.
Gymnopilus validipes contains the hallucinogens psilocybin and psilocin, the former at a concentration of around 0.12%.

Habitat and formation

Gymnopilus validipes is found growing gregarious to cespitose on tree stumps, hardwood logs and debris, widespread in the United States, common from the Great Lakes and eastward.