Amanita ameripanthera - Amanitaceae.org - Taxonomy and Morphology of Amanita and Limacella
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name Amanita ameripanthera
name status nomen provisorum
author Tulloss, J. Lindgr., Kudzma, S. D. Russell, Haelew. & Geml
english name North American Panther
images


  • 1. Amanita ameripanthera, diverse cap colors and with a gemmatoid pair on the left, San Francisco, San Francisco Co., California, USA.   (RET 174-10)


  • 2. Amanita ameripanthera, pallid form, Sugar Pine Lk., Placer Co., California, USA.   (RET 869-5)


  • 3. Amanit sp-C17, Bon Tempe Lake, Marin Co., California, U.S.A. (RET 387-10)


  • 4. Amanit sp-C17, Bon Tempe Lake, Marin Co., California, U.S.A. (RET 387-10)



  • 5. Amanit sp-C17, warts, Bon Tempe Lake, Marin Co., California, U.S.A. (RET 387-10)

    • cap The cap of Amanita ameripanthera is 54–91 mm wide, tan to brown to dark brown or pale grayish brown at first and fading or becoming brassier, parabolic to convex to planoconvex to planar, viscid and shiny when wet.  The cap's flesh is mostly white and yellowish tan under the cap's skin.  The cap flesh doesn't change color when cut or bruised.  The margin is very faintly to shallowly striate, downcurved at first, and sometimes has a short sterile extension beyond the ends of the gills.  The volva takes the form of felted warts and patches that are off-white to pale tan and darken with age; these remnants are flattened and very finely warted (use 10× lens) and are easily lost.
    gills The gills of Amanita ameripanthera are free to narrowly attached, sometimes with faint decurrent lines on the top of the stem.  They are close to crowded, off-white in mass, white to off-white or faintly grayish in side view, and unchanging when cut or bruised.  The short gills are squarely cut off, sometimes with a narrow tooth along the underside of the cap.
    stem The stem is 54 – 90 × 10+ – 20 mm, white, becoming slightly brown from handling and sometimes silky fibrillose.  The stem's bulb is 24 – 31 × 21 – 33 mm and ovoid or turnip-shaped (pointed below).  The stem's flesh is off-white, unchanging when cut or bruised, stuffed with firm white material.  The membranous, white ring is skirt-like and connected near the mid-stem.  The volva is off-white to white and present as a short ring of tissue around the stem's base—suggesting a collar or "rolled sock" of tissue—or as a short free limb (several mm high in dried specimens and standing out around the stem's base) on the top of the bulb.
    odor/taste The odor has not been recorded.  The taste is pleasant, according to persons poisoned by ingesting this taxon.  POISONOUS.
    spores The spores of this species measure (8.8–) 9.8–14.2 (–16.5) × (5.5–) 6.5–9.2 (–11.0) µm and are inamyloid and ellipsoid to elongate or (occasionally) broadly ellipsoid.  Clamps are absent from the bases of basidia.
    discussion The present species is frequently found with conifers in western North America (for example, Fir, Pine, Spruce, and Douglas Fir); in some cases, other trees (such as Alder, Aspen, and Oak) may be present where this mushroom is collected.  One instance is known of A. ameripanthera occurring in a pure stand of imported Eucalyptus.

    The northernmost recorded specimen came from British Columbia.  The known limits of distribution to the south are California and Idaho.  The species could well be found outside the current known range.  Suitable habitat occurs in montane regions west of the North American Great Plains.  However, the newly recognized A. tlaxcalipanthera may also be present as far north as Colorado.

    In North American literature, for many years, the present species was confused with the European A. pantherina.—R. E. Tulloss & J. E. Lindgren
    brief editors RET

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