Capilano Regional Park in North Vancouver. On the Second Canyon Viewpoint Trail.
Latitude
49° 21’ N
Longitude
123° 6’ W
Altitude
90 meters
Date
23/10/2010 (DD/MM/YYYY)
GeneBank Accession Number
KC581340
Morphological Description
Collector
Liam Harrap
Number
LPM8
Other Collectors
Determined by
Host Substratum
On soil
Notes
Initially, I came to the conclusion of Lactarius fallax, through its morphology. The cap of my mushroom was convex in shape and depressed, with a distinct pointed umbo. It was also quite velvety, dry, and wrinkled. The diameters of the caps were 5.8cm, 4.7cm, and 3.5cm respectively. The colour, when it was fresh was a chocolate brown, and the stem was a lighter brown and was darker in certain places. It also was dry. When dried it became a dark grey. The margins along the cap were scalloped. The stem was hollow, quite brittle and chalk-like and measured 10 cm, 8.5 cm, and 8.0cm respectively amongst all three and was eccentric in shape. The flesh of my mushroom was white and bruised easily, turning brown. However, there was no milky latex when cut. There was also no universal veil or annulus present. The gills are decurrant and subdistant to close in spacing. While they were white, the edges were dark and similar in colour to the cap. I could not distinguish a taste or scent. Under the dissecting microscope, the spores were lightly yellow. Under a compound microscope, I saw that they were round in shape, with ridges and warts. They were both averagely 12.5 microns in width and length. The spores also stained blue (amyloid) with Melzer’s Reagent. I was not successful in obtaining a spore print; however I was able to scrape some spores from my gills, along with some tissue onto three glass slides. The slides are labelled and in room 3008. I also was able to distinguish that some sterile cystidia were present amongst the basidia, within the hymenial layer of the gills. There were also four sterigmata on each basidium, which gave rise to the basidiaspores. These are all characteristics (except for no milky latex) that are associated with L. fallax. I also went to the herbarium to compare their specimens with my own. They had many L. fallax samples. Morphologically, there were very similar to mine. Since they were dehydrated, they also were a dark grey, with a slightly wrinkled surface and depressed with an umbo. The gills also were subdistant to close, and the same color as the cap along their edges. The stems were similar in height (3 – 8cm) and width (0.5 – 2cm). The caps were also similar in diameter (3 – 11cm) and all were scalloped along the margins. I also managed to scrape some of the spores onto a slide looked at them under a compound microscope; they were round, with ridges and warts – just like mine. Most of the samples were also collected in and around the Vancouver area. My DNA sequence, when shown on a color chromatogram, showed clear nucleotide peaks, especially between bases 60 and 620. There, the computer was able to clearly distinguish the nucleotide bonds, with little baseline noise. The most similar DNA sequence to mine that was given through BLAST, was Lactarius fallax, with 98% similarity. The query coverage was 100% , max score was 1698 (score of the longest matching sequence) and the total score was 1698 (sum of all the sequences that match). Other mushrooms that also appeared through the BLAST search were L. pterosporus and L. Lignyotus. Using the distance tree results, L. lignyotus appeared to be the closest related species, being separated by 6 nodes, showing that they share a similar ancestor, but have become genetically distinct overtime. The L. fallax, found through the BLAST search was submitted by another student in Bio 323 from a previous year. He also obtained his sample from Capilano Regional Park.
Habitat
Growing on soil. Under a Western Hemlock tree. In a group of three. Mostly a damp coniferous forest.
DNA sequence in GeneBank
Name of Sequencer
Specimen Images
Cap shape when mature
2 funnel
phylum
Basidiomycota
material collected
gilled mushroom
morphology summary
Material collected: gilled mushroom
Habit: 2 numerous or trooping, but not in clumps
Color of top surface: 11 dark brown
Spore print color: 17 none - no stains or not applicable
Hymenium color when young: 1 white
Hymenium color when mature: 1 white
Spore length: 12.5
Spore width: 12.5
Smell: 2 mild/none
Taste: 3 mild/none
Cap shape when mature: 2 funnel
Cap shape in center: 3 depressed
Cap shape from above: 1 circular-even if wavy
Cap color with age: 11 dark brown
Cap width: -10
Cap surface texture: 4 hairy, include velvety
Cap stickiness: 1 dry
Cap edge: 3 scalloped
Stipe shape: 2 clavate
Stipe core: 2 hollow
Stipe position: 2 off-center
Stipe flesh hardness: 1 soft-spongy, including gelatinous
Stipe flesh color: 8 tan - light brown
Stipe surface texture: 9 hairy
Stipe width: 1.5
Stipe length: 10.5
Gill attachment: 3 decurrent
Ring type: 5 none
Partial veil type: 5 none
Ring location on stalk: 5 none
Volva type: 6 none
Latex color: 17 none - no stains or not applicable
Reaction Melzer's color: 13 blue
Spore shape: 6 circular
Spore ornamentation: 2 rough
cystidia: Yes
