Technical description (t.b.d.)

BRIEF DESCRIPTION: The following is based on the original description by Wood (1997).

The cap of A. albovolvata is up to 80 mm wide, convex then plane, smooth, dry, dark gray  to somewhat gray-brown, darker in the center, with a striate margin (about 50% of the radius according to text; about 25% of the radius according to the illustration). Volval remnants are present as flat, membranous patches, white at first, becoming slightly gray with age. 

The gills are free, thin, crowded, pale gray to cream gray, with a dark gray, serrate edge. 

The stem is up to 100 × 10 mm, narrowing slightly upward, white to off-white, with fine fibrillose gray decoration of the type called "flame" or "zebra" or "snake-skin."  No ring is present.  The saccate volva is white, membranous, and described as "loose."

The spores measure 9.3 - 12.6 × 8.1 - 10.8 µm and are subglobose to broadly ellipsoid and inamyloid. Clamps are absent at bases of basidia. (Note: While the spore data provided in Wood's text supports the description of the spore shape being subglobose to broadly ellipsoid, the drawing provided for A. albovolvata illustrates predominantly globose spores and none that are broadly ellipsoid.)

Wood describes the mushroom as occurring in tall open forests and sclerophyll forests from the state of New South Wales, Australia. A sclerophyll forest in the Australian bush is a forest of hard-leaved plants including Eucalyptus in the overstory (wikipedia). 

Since at least the upper part of the volva may appear in patches on the cap and become gray with time and since the gills are reported as gray, this species may be related to others having the same pair of characters.  In Europe, Amanita submembranacea (Bon) Gröger would be an example of a species from this group. The reader should see the related species pages.  In North America, a member of this group is Amanita sinicoflava Tulloss.  In Australia, species of section Vaginatae with a graying volva include Amanita punctata (Cleland & Cheel) D. A. Reid among the exannulate taxa and A. murinoflammeum Tulloss, A. M. Young, & A. E. Wood among annulate taxa. -- R. E. Tulloss and L. Possiel

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Last change 20 December 2006
This page is maintained by R. E. Tulloss.
Copyright 2006 by Rodham E. Tulloss.