Echinoderma echinaceum

What You Should Know

Echinoderma echinaceum is a rare mushroom find that is growing in mixed woodland on calcareous soil. The pointed scales on the cap, the fragmentary stem ring, and intermediate gills of varying sizes all help to differentiate between Echinoderma echinaceum and the many other similar smallish pale-capped dapperlings.

The dried species has a misleading, very pleasant mushroomy smell.

Echinoderma echinaceum Mushroom Identification

1. Cap

   Conical then convex or bell-shaped and finally expanded with a broad umbo; cream or ochre background covered in pyramidal brown scales 1-2mm tall in concentric rings. Cap diameter at maturity ranges from 1.5 to 5cm.

2. Gills

   The free, crowded gills are pinkish cream, becoming browner with age; they are interspersed by intermediate gills of varying lengths.

3. Stem

   2 to 4cm long and 2.5 to 8mm in diameter; pinkish, the lower part covered in pointed brown scales, darkening towards the base. The woolly stem ring is fragmentary.

4. Spores

   Oblong to ellipsoidal, smooth, 4-5.5 x 2.5-3; dextrinoid.

5. Spore Print

   White or very pale buff.

6. Odor

   Slightly unleasant odor.

7. Habitat

   Solitary or in small groups in mixed woodland on chalk-rich soil.

8. Season

   July to October in Britain and Ireland.

Echinoderma echinaceum Taxonomy and Etymology

This remarkable but sadlyall too seldom seen mushroom was described scientifically in 1940 by Danish mycologist Jakob Emanuel Lange (1864 - 1941), who gave it the binomial name Lepiota erinacea. Its currently-accepted scientific name, Echinoderma echinaceum, dates from a 1991 publication by French mycologist Marcel Bon (b. 1925).

The generic name Echinoderma comes from echin- meaning spiny or prickly; and -derma meaning skin. This mushroom genus certainly does contain spiny-skinned fungi. As far as I can tell the specific epithet echinaceum merely re-emphasizes the spiny characteristic of this mushroom.

Echinoderma echinaceum Synonyms

1. Cystolepiota echinacea (J.E. Lange) Knudsen, Bot. Tidsskr. 73: 127 (1978)

2. Echinoderma cedriolens (Bon) C.E. Hermos. & Jul. Sánchez

3. Echinoderma echinaceum var. cedriolens Bon, Docums Mycol. 22(no. 88): 27 (1993)

4. Echinoderma echinaceum (J.E. Lange) Bon, Docums Mycol. 21(no. 82): 63 (1991) var. echinaceum

5. Lepiota echinacea J.E. Lange, Fl. Agaric. Danic. 5(Taxon. Consp.): V (1940)

6. Lepiota echinacea var. cedriolens E. Ludw., Pilzkompendium (Eching) 3: 419 (2012)

7. Lepiota echinacea J.E. Lange, Fl. Agaric. Danic. 5(Taxon. Consp.): V (1940) var. echinacea

Sources:

Photo 1 - Author: rob Stoeltje from loenen, netherlands (Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic)