Amanita wellsii - Amanitaceae.org - Taxonomy and Morphology of Amanita and Limacella
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name Amanita wellsii
name status nomen acceptum
author (Murrill) Murrill
english name "Salmon Amanita"
images
  • Amanita wellsii - RETAmanita wellsii - RET

    1. Amanita wellsii - RET

  • Amaninta wellsii - Hesler photo, Univ. Tenn., KnoxvilleAmaninta wellsii - Hesler photo, Univ. Tenn., Knoxville

    2. Amaninta wellsii - Hesler photo, Univ. Tenn., Knoxville

  • Amanita wellsii, faded specimens - Maine, U.S.A. - Dr. S. S. RistichAmanita wellsii, faded specimens - Maine, U.S.A. - Dr. S. S. Ristich

    3. Amanita wellsii, faded specimens - Maine, U.S.A. - Dr. S. S. Ristich

  • Amanita wellsii - Prov. Ontario, Canada - Walter SturgeonAmanita wellsii - Prov. Ontario, Canada - Walter Sturgeon

    4. Amanita wellsii - Prov. Ontario, Canada - Walter Sturgeon

  • Amanita wellsii - Pennsylvania, U.S.A.Amanita wellsii - Pennsylvania, U.S.A.

    5. Amanita wellsii - Pennsylvania, U.S.A.

    • intro The following description is based on the description of Jenkins (1977).  Additional observations from RET are included.
    cap The cap of A. wellsii is 30 - 130 mm wide, globose to convex, eventually plano-convex to planar, zinc-orange to ochraceous-salmon, fading to near antimony yellow, remaining darker in the center, dry to viscid when moist, with a striate margin (less than 20% of the cap radius) in age.  The margin often extends past the gills (a so called sterile edge).  The "volval remnants are present as irregularly distributed, delicate warts to soft squamules or patches of easily removable floccose material, often forming a tomentum on the margin"; the volval remnants are yellowish-buff to cadmium yellow, paler after exposure to sunlight, and are rarely whitish.  The flesh is white, except yellow just below the cap skin.  Faded specimens are depicted in the third and fourth photographs, above.
    gills The gills are white at first, becoming pale cream to Naples yellow, free or adnexed, crowded, widest nearer the margin, yellow floccose at the edge, with an occasional, faint, decurrent, floccose line on the top of the stem.  The short gills are truncate, plentiful, of diverse lengths, and unevenly distributed.
    stem The stem is 70 - 160 × 5 - 20 mm, tapering upward, expanded at the top, pale yellow (darkens from handling), stuffed or hollow, with delicate and fragmentary volval remnants—often loosely woven, evanescent, floccose patches or as a distinct yellow line around the bulb.  The ring is superior, very delicate, loosely woven, evanescent, often torn away and partially remaining on the edge of the cap.  The basal bulb is 15 - 27 mm wide, up to 29 mm long, ovoid to subglobose to ellipsoid to broadly clavate or somewhat turnip shaped, and pallid.  The flesh is white.
    odor/taste The taste is mild with lingering unpleasantness.  No odor is present.
    spores The spores measure (8.7-) 10.5 - 13.8 (-18.0) × (4.9-) 5.6 - 8.4 (-10.8) µm and are ellipsoid to elongate, infrequently cylindric, and inamyloid.  Clamps occur at 3 - 7% of bases of basidia/basidioles.  [Jenkins (1977) reported infrequent clamps in the volva.]
    discussion Originally described from New Hampshire, USA, the current known range of A. wellsii extends from the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina to the northern limit of the distribution of alder in Canada (David Malloch, pers. corresp.). It has also been reported growing in commercial blueberry (Vaccinium) fields in Maine (Samuel Ristich, pers. corresp).  RET has recently received material of A. wellsii from Newfoundland's Avalon Peninsula (Andrus Voitk, pers. corresp.) where it was found in a dwarf willow (Salix)-dwarf birch (Betula) coastal heath barren.  RET believes this is a first report from such a habitat.  In northern Quebec Prov., Canada, the species is sometimes found growing within blueberry bushes, with diverse tree taxa relatively close by (e.g., Betula, Pinus, Populus, etc.).

    The set of characters represented in A. wellsii are, so far as is known, unique in section Amanita.  The reader may wish to compare A. wellsii to A. pulverotecta Bas described from Africa, which also has a pigmented powdery volva, weak or absent ring, elongate spores, etc.  There are only eight taxa is section Amanita that are described as having the average spore shape elongate; none are described with narrower spores.  The reader will find references to elongate-spored taxa on the pages for A. agglutinata (Berk. & M. A. Curtis) Lloyd, A. breckonii Ammirati & Thiers, A. eliae Quél., A. lippiae Wartchow & Tulloss, and A. siamensis R. Sanmee et al.

    In the past, some U.S. mycologists have misapplied the name A. parcivolvata (Peck) E.-J. Gilbert to the present species.—R. E. Tulloss
    brief editors RET

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