Stropharia caerulea

Description:

I read on WildAboutBritain that you need to look at these microscopically to determine the species: http://www.wildaboutbritain.co.uk/forums... . According to Wikipedia Stropharia pseudocyanea is 'smaller; slighter, but strikingly similar grassland species, with a very fleeting ring.'. Stropharia caerulea is 'a dowdier cousin.' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stropharia_...). At the moment I think there's three species that are similar (and closely related) in the UK; S. aeruginosa (1879 records), S. caerulea (954 records), and S. pseudocyanea (579 records) all listed as separate species on fieldmycolgy.net. first-nature.com describes S. aeruginosa as being different from S. caerulea; 'Stropharia aeruginosa is darker blue-green and its cap scales are persistent; it has reddish-brown gills with white edges.' Stropharia albonitens has only 14 records in the UK and is similar and only appears to have the deep blue-green colour in small amounts if at all.

Notes:

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