Key to 20+ Volvariella and Volvopluteus Species in North America
1. | Growing on other mushrooms (species of Clitocybe). | Volvariella surrecta |
1. | Not growing on other mushrooms. | 2 |
2. | Growing directly from wood (stumps, logs, trees). | 3 |
2. | Growing terrestrially, or in compost or woodchips. | 9 |
3. | Mature cap less than 4 cm wide. | 4 |
3. | Mature cap 4 cm wide or wider. | 5 |
4. | Cap velvety, brownish black over the center with radial brownish black fibers elsewhere; margin not lined; stem light gray; recorded from Florida (by a more trustable source than the state's elections board). | Volvariella lepiotospora |
4. | Cap not velvety, gray to bluish gray with dark radial fibers; margin lined; stem white; recorded from North Carolina. (Imperfectly described species; type collection lost.) | "Volvariella cinerea" |
5. | Cap surface bald (not granular, silky, or hairy) and slimy; margin lined; recorded from New York. | Volvariella peckii |
5. | Cap surface granular, silky, or hairy, dry; margin lined or not; variously distributed. | 6 |
6. | Margin lined; cap surface "granular"; recorded from the Caribbean. | Volvariella jamaicensis |
6. | Margin not lined; cap surface silky or hairy; variously distributed. | 7 |
7. | Cap more highly colored. | 8 |
8. | Cap sooty to dark coffee-colored; recorded from Mexico, Cuba, and Puerto Rico. | Volvariella bakeri |
8. | Not as above. Various wood-loving Volvariellas with non-white caps may key out here. Whether or not these mushrooms represent undescribed species or mere color forms of Volvariella bombycina remains to be determined. | Volvariella spp.? |
9. | Mature cap medium sized to large—usually 5 cm wide or wider. | 10 |
9. | Mature cap small to medium-sized—usually under 5 cm. | 17 |
10. | Cap white or nearly so. | 11 |
10. | Cap more highly colored. | 12 |
11. | Stem with grooves; cap dry; recorded from Florida. | Volvariella canalipes |
11. | Stem without grooves; cap sticky to slimy when fresh; widely distributed. | |
12. | Cap drab to grayish, gray, or brownish—but not dark brown. | 13 |
13. | Cap sticky when fresh (ixocutis present). | 14 |
14. | Spores 10.5–13.5 µm long; known with certainty from a single collection, on sawdust in Michigan, but possibly often identified as Volvopluteus gloiocephalus. | Volvopluteus michiganensis |
14. | Spores 13–20 µm long; widely distributed in North America. | |
15. | Stem often with a "ring" (resulting from the collapsing of the volva); cap drab with brownish scales; spores 9–12 µm long; reported from Washington D.C. and possibly Michigan. (Imperfectly described species; type collection lost.) | "Volvariella avellanea" |
15. | Stem not as above; cap gray to brown, smooth to silky; spores 7–10.5 µm long; fairly common and "widely distributed" but typically reported from woodchips, greenhouses, botanical gardens, compost piles, and so on. | |
16. | Cap bald; odor not distinctive; spores 15–20 µm long; recorded from Alabama. | Volvariella alabamensis |
16. | Cap with dark radiating fibrils; odor at least sometimes strong and unpleasant; spores 6–8.5 µm long; recorded from Cuba and South America. | Volvariella cubensis |
17. | Volva white and conspicuously hairy; cap grayish, 2.5–3.5 cm across, finely hairy; spores 6–7 µm long; found east of the Rocky Mountains. | Volvariella villosavolva |
17. | Volva not conspicuously hairy, white to gray or brown; cap varying; spores varying; variously distributed. | 18 |
18. | At least the center area of cap white (the rest of the cap variously colored). | 19 |
18. | Center of cap not white. | 22 |
19. | Cap sticky when fresh, relatively bald; spores longer than 10 µm long; cheilocystidia primarily rostrate. | Volvopluteus earlei |
19. | Cap dry when fresh, appressed-fibrillose or finely hairy; spores 9 µm long or shorter; cheilocystidia not usually rostrate. | 20 |
20. | Cap 0.5–1.5 cm across when mature; recorded from Michigan. | Volvariella pellucida |
20. | Cap larger than above when mature; variously distributed. | 21 |
21. | Stem bald; cap margin lined at maturity; primarily found east of the Rocky Mountains. | |
21. | Stem fuzzy to hairy; cap margin not lined;widely distributed in North America. | |
22. | Cap gray to brown, evenly colored (not markedly darker over the center portion); margin not lined; found east of the Rocky Mountains. | |
22. | Cap grayish to brownish or whitish, with a notably darker center; margin lined or not; variously distributed. | 23 |
23. | Cap whitish overall with a pinkish center; margin not lined; recorded from the Pacific Northwest. | Volvariella smithii |
24. | Cap whitish overall with a black center; margin not lined; spores 7–8.5 µm long; recorded from Florida. | Volvariella alachuana |
24. | Cap grayish overall with a dark brown to blackish center; margin or nearly the entire cap lined or deeply grooved; spores 5–7 µm long; possibly widely distributed east of the Great Plains. | |
References
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Boekhout, T. (1990). Volvariella. In Bas, C., Th. W. Kuyper, M. E. Noordeloos & E. C. Vellinga, eds. Flora Agaricina Neerlandica: Critical monographs on families of agarics and boleti occurring in the Netherlands. Volume 2. Rotterdam: A. A. Balkema, 56–64.
Boekhout, T. & M. Enderle (1996). Typification of Volvariella gloiocephala (DC.:Fr.) Boekhout & Enderle. Persoonia 16: 249–251.
Coker, W. C. (1947). North Carolina species of Volvaria. Journal of the Elisha Mitchell Scientific Society 63: 220–230.
Desjardin, D. E. & D. E. Hemmes (2001). Agaricales of the Hawaiian Islands—7. Notes on Volvariella, Mycena sect. Radiatae, Physalacria, Porpoloma and Stropharia. Harvard Papers in Botany 6: 85–103.
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Wartchow, F. (2009). Volvariella cubensis: a rare neotropical agaric new to South America. Mycotaxon 107: 181-187.
Weber, R. & Webster, J. (1996). Volvariella surrecta: An uncommon mycoparasite. Mycologist 10: 160.
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Kuo, M. (2018, December). The genera Volvariella and Volvopluteus. Retrieved from the MushroomExpert.Com Web site: http://www.mushroomexpert.com/volvariella.html
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