Description and Classification
Candy caps are small to medium-size mushrooms, with a pileus that is typically under 5 cm in diameter (though L. rubidus and L. rufulus can be slightly larger), and with coloration ranging through various burnt orange to burnt orange-red to orange-brown shades. The pileus shape ranges from broadly convex in young specimens to plane to slightly depressed in older ones; lamellae are attached to subdecurrent. The entire fruiting body is quite fragile and brittle. Like all members of Lactarius, the fruiting body exudes a latex when broken, which in these species is whitish and watery in appearance, and is often compared to whey or nonfat milk. The latex may have little flavor or may be slightly sweet, but should never taste bitter or acrid. These species are particularly distinguishable by their scent, which has been variously compared to maple syrup, camphor, curry, fenugreek, burnt sugar, Malt-O-Meal, or Maggi-Würze. This scent may be quite faint in fresh specimens, but typically becomes quite strong when the fruiting body is dried.
Microscopically, they share features typical of Lactarius, including round to slightly ovular spores with distinct amyloid ornamentation and sphaerocysts that are abundant in the pileus and stipe trama, but infrequent in the lamellar trama.
The candy caps have been placed in various infrageneric groups of Lactarius depending on the author. Bon defined the candy caps and allies as making up the subsection Camphoratini of the section Olentes. Subsection Camphoratini is defined by their similarity in color, odor (with the exception of L. rostratus – see below), and by the presence of macrocystidia on their hymenium. (The other subsection of Olentes, Serifluini, is also aromatic, but have very different aromas from the Camphoratini and are entirely lacking in cystidia.)
Bon and later European authors treated all species that were aromatic and had at least a partially epithelial pileipellis as section Olentes, whereas Hesler and Smith and later North American authors treat all species with such a pileipellis (both aromatic and non-aromatic) as the section Thojogali. However, a thorough molecular phylogenetic investigation of Lactarius has yet to be published, and older classification systems of Lactarius are generally not regarded as natural.
Like other species of Lactarius, candy caps are generally thought to be ectotrophic, with L. camphoratus having been identified in ectomycorrhizal root tips. However, unusually for a mycorrhizal species, L. rubidus is also commonly observed growing directly on decaying conifer wood. All candy cap species seem to be associated with a range of tree species.
The most notable differences between L. camphoratus, L. fragilis, and L. rubidus are as follows:
| L. camphoratus | L. rubidus | L. fragilis | |
| Pileus shape | papilla sometimes present at disc | papilla or umbo typically not present | umbo sometimes present at disc |
| Color | darker reddish-brown | more deep reddish-brown ("ferruginous") | lighter reddish-brown to light brown |
| Lamellae | more light yellowish to light orange | more light reddish | more light reddish |
| Spores | ellipsoid to subglobose; 7.0–8.5 x 6.0–7.5 µm; ornamentation not connected (spines to short ridges) | subglobose to globose; 6.0–8.5 x 6.0–8.0 µm; ornamentation semi-connected (broken to partial reticulum) | subglobose to globose; 6.0–7.5 x 6.0–7.5 µm; ornamentation connected (partial to complete reticulum) |
| Odor | more curry-like | more maple-like; strong only upon drying | more maple-like; strong, even when fresh |
| Distribution | Europe, Asia, eastern North America | western North America; also reported from Costa Rica | eastern North America |
Read more about this topic: Candy Cap
Famous quotes containing the word description:
“As they are not seen on their way down the streams, it is thought by fishermen that they never return, but waste away and die, clinging to rocks and stumps of trees for an indefinite period; a tragic feature in the scenery of the river bottoms worthy to be remembered with Shakespeare’s description of the sea-floor.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)