Russula turci

Description

Russula turci is a common, edible, Russula mushroom, found under pines and spruces, on sandy soil and clay. The cap is flat when young, and matures to be somewhat funnel-shaped, dark amethyst-violet to brownish pink. The margin is paler and noticeably matt. The cap grows up to 8 cm in diameter. The gills are cream to light ochre, rather crowded, and connected at the base by cross veins. The spores are ochre. The stem is white and evenly thick. The flesh is white, and the base of the stem has a distinct smell of iodine.

It is edible and used after boiling for 15 minutes, boiled, fried, and also salted.

Mushroom Identification

1. Cap

   The cap is 3-10 cm in diameter, fleshy, at first hemispherical, convex, later convex-expanded, flat-expanded, depressed-expanded, with a blunt, initially smooth, later scarred edge. The surface of the cap is smooth, slippery, bluish-purple, dark purple, gray-purple, pink-purple, ochre-pink, purple-brown, lighter or darker in the center, and often yellowish-olive.

2. Gills

   The hymenophore is lamellar. Plates of medium density, accreted, initially whitish, cream, later ocher, sometimes with a reddish tint.

3. Stem

   The stem is 2-8 cm high, 1-2.5 cm in diameter, cylindrical, dense, solid, sometimes hollow, white, and white with a pinkish tint.

4. Flesh

   The flesh is dense, white, loose with age, yellowish, under the skin is lilac, with a sweetish taste and an unpleasant smell, in the stem with the smell of iodoform.

5. Spores

   8-11 * 8-10 μm, egg-shaped, sometimes with a rough-warty surface and with net ornamentation.

6. Spore Print

   Ocher.

7. Habitat

   Grows from July to September, in coniferous pine forests, alone, rarely.

8. Similar Species

   The rare Russula azurea also has a purple cap and grows beneath spruces. Russula amethystina can hardly be distinguished from this mushroom, its blue to reddish-violet cap occasionally has pale patches and also a smell of iodine in the stem base. It can be found in coniferous mountain forests, mostly under silver fir.

Synonyms

1. Russula lateritia Quél., 1886

2. Russula purpureolilacina Fayod, Ann. R. Acad., 1893

3. Russula murrillii Burl., 1913

Photo sources:

Photo 1 - Author: Jerzy Opioła (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 2 - Author: Quartl (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Photo 3 - Author: Maulaff (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Photo 4 - Author: Jerzy Opioła (CC BY-SA 4.0)