Psilocybe hoogshagenii

🏷️ Description

Psilocybe hoogshagenii offers a glimpse into ancient traditions and natural wonder, blending vibrant colors, intriguing forms, and profound cultural roots. From its diminutive cap to its twisted stem, this "little bird of the woods" sings songs of mysticism and nature's artistry.

🧙‍♂️ Cultural Significance

• Used By: Indigenous groups like the Chinantec, Mixe, and Zapotec peoples of Mexico.

• Purposes: Divination, diagnosis, and locating lost objects.

🌈 Psychoactive Compounds

• Active Ingredients: Psilocybin (up to 0.6%) and Psilocin (up to 0.3%).

• Potency: Moderately active; used for spiritual and ceremonial purposes.

✨ Fun Facts

• Discovery: Described by Roger Heim in 1958, honoring anthropologist Searle Hoogshagen.

• Mistaken Identity: Once mislabeled as Psilocybe zapotecorum in Life magazine.

• Varieties: P. hoogshagenii var. convexa lacks the sharp papilla and has a convex cap.

🔎 Identification

🍄 Cap:

• Shape: Conical to bell-shaped, sometimes convex. Features a sharp, central papilla up to 4 mm.

• Size: 1–3 cm (0.4–1.2 in) in diameter.

• Color: Reddish-brown to orangish-brown when moist, fading to straw or fulvous when dry (hygrophanous).

• Surface: Smooth and slightly sticky when wet, with fine radial ridges extending halfway.

• Flesh: Whitish in the cap, turning yellowish towards the stem.

🌿 Gills:

• Attachment: Adnate to adnexed.

• Color: Brownish when young, maturing to purplish-black as spores develop.

📏 Stem:

• Size: 5–9 cm (2.0–3.5 in) long, 1–3 mm thick.

• Shape: Hollow, slender, slightly thicker at the base, sometimes twisted.

• Veil: A fragile cortina-like partial veil that disappears as the mushroom matures.

• Color: Whitish to yellowish, bruising blue when handled.

🔬 Microscopic Features:

• Spore Print: Dark purplish-brown.

• Spores: Rhomboid to ellipsoid, thick-walled, measuring 6.5–4–5.6 μm, with a broad germ pore.

• Cystidia: Abundant pleurocystidia and cheilocystidia, flask-shaped with a narrow neck.

• Clamp Connections: Present in the hyphae.

🌎 Habitat & Distribution

• Environment: Humus-rich, clayey soils in subtropical coffee plantations. Found in grasslands at times.

• Growth Habit: Solitary to small groups (cespitose).

• Locations: Mexico: Puebla, Oaxaca, Chiapas (1,000–1,800 m elevation). South America: Brazil and Colombia.

• Season: June–December in Mexico; February in Argentina.

Photo sources:

Photo 1 - Author: Nolan Exe (CC BY 4.0)

Photo 2 - Author: Alan Rockefelle (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 3 - Author: Alan Rockefeller (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 4 - Author: Alan Rockefeller (CC BY-SA 4.0)