Amanita submaculata

After more than 30 years of collecting in the eastern United States, RET has found only one entity that could correspond to Peck's description of A. submaculata.  Nevertheless, because of the limited description of the present species (provided below), the identification has not been formally published.  The candidate has simply been called "Amanita sp. 18" (Tulloss et al., 1995) among other temporary designations.

The cap is 48 - 192 mm wide, grayish-brown to dark brown over the center, grayish brown to brownish or umbrinous gray to umbrinous elsewhere, sometimes pallid at the margin, with appearance of having brown or gray-brown innate fibrils, often with depigmented small spots or short radial lines (hence Peck's epithet), at first often irregularly rounded conic to irregularly convex to plano-convex to plane, with a broad umbo, subshiny to shiny when dry, tacky to waxy when moist, with a nonappendiculate and nonstriate margin (slightly striate, to 15% of the radius with age), incurved at first, then down curved, finally straight..  The volva is absent or present as irregular warts of varying size or filamentous thin squamules, white or off-white or pallid becoming grayish or grayish brown or brown, often over the center only, pulverulent, friable and detersile..  The flesh is white, grayish at the center, 4 - 5 mm thick, thinning evenly to within 4 - 5 mm of the margin, and then membranous to the margin.

The gills are free to very narrowly adnate, subcrowded to crowded, off-white to white to pale cream to cream, staining red brick, rounded on the outer end, 4 - 8.5 mm broad, with or without a decurrent line on the stipe apex..  The short gills are truncate to subtruncate to rounded truncate to subattenuate to attenuate in steps, rather narrow, of diverse lengths, some free from both the stem and margin.

The stem is (38-) 105 - 198 × (5.5-) 11.5 - 26 mm, slightly narrowing upward, flaring at the top, satiny white to whitish to pale ground to blackish to brownish, pale orange-brown with handling, sometimes with vertical red-brown dashes of staining on lower stipe and upper bulb, sometimes sinuous, sparsely pulverulent above the ring, satiny or fibrillose (sometimes coarsely squamulose) below partial veil, with fibrils white or pallid in the topmost quarter of stem, brown to gray brown below, with some fibrils becoming darker from handling, with faintly longitudinally striations at maturity..  The bulb is (13-) 36 - 45 × (13-) 24 - 44 mm, irregularly ovoid to fusiform to napiform to subnapiform, sometimes very small and slender, staining brick red in old insect damage or staining with red-brown marks..  The stem flesh is whitish to pale grayish cream, staining as in other tissues, and solid..  The ring is white, sometimes brownish with age or staining brick red, subapical to apical, superior, membranous, skirt-like (often suggesting a broad, mid-19th Cent. ball gown), copious, striate above, eventually collapsing on stipe, and tearing..  The volva is absent or present as one or two thin whitish to gray rings around the top of the stipe's bulb or as a loose limb against stipe or as loose patches easily overlooked in the substrate, more membranous and more likely to be collected attached to the specimen than in the case (for example) of Amanita flavoconia G. F. Atk.

The species has a distinctive range of odors varying from fruit-like to anise-like, sometimes with both elements present, sometimes with a chlorine-like addition.

The spores measure (6.3-) 7.0 - 9.8 (-13.3) × (4.5-) 4.9 - 6.6 (-8.4) µm and are broadly ellipsoid to ellipsoid to elongate (rarely cylindric) and amyloid.  Basidia lack clamps.

Originally collected in North Carolina where it was reported to occur scattered or clustered in "thin woods" and "open places."  In New Jersey it is often collected in Pine-Oak (Pinus-Quercus) barrens on sandy soil of the Atlantic Coastal Plain.

This species is often misidentified in North America.  RET has been told that A. excelsa (Fr. : Fr.) Bertillon in Dechambre has a fruity odor in North America, which is not true so far as we know.  This error is probably due to the confusion of A. submaculata, A. morrisii Peck, and other often fruity-smelling axa from the Americas, with the European species.

Original description

The information below is derived from the original description (Peck, 1900) supplemented by the description of the type by Jenkins (1978).

The cap of Amanita submaculata is 70 - 90 mm wide, convex or somewhat bell-shaped, dark brown, more or less marked by whitish stripes or spots, and shiny when dry.  The volval remnants are present as a single, floccose patch.

The gills are free, subdistant, white, and thin.

The stem is approximately 70 - 90 × 6 - 12mm, cylindric, white, and solid.  The ring is large, white, flaring, very thin, persistent, and membranous.  An ovoid bulb is present at the stem base without volval remnants.

In the original description, Peck says the specimen he was sent "yielded no spores."  According to Jenkins' type study, the spores measure 7.0 - 8.6 × 4.7 - 6.4 µm and are broadly ellipsoid to ellipsoid to elongate and amyloid.  Clamps are absent at bases of basidia.

Miss M. L. Wilson, Peck's North Carolina correspondent, included a rough watercolor of the material which is preserved at the New York State Museum (Albany).—R. E. Tulloss and L. Possiel

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