A small, brown-spored mushroom with a sticky, two-toned cap: dark brown at the center and pale buff toward the margin. A cobweb-like cortina leaves faint fibrils or a ring zone on the stem, and the flesh often smells like radish. It is ectomycorrhizal, most often with willows and conifers. In North America the name covers a species group.
Poisonous; do not eat. Mykoweb marks it as toxic, and First Nature treats it as probably poisonous, noting that other Hebeloma species are seriously toxic. Hebeloma poisonings are generally gastrointestinal. Small brown mushrooms like this one are also easily confused with toxic Inocybe (muscarine) and Cortinarius species.
Never eat a wild mushroom based on a web page — confirm with an expert.
Habitat
Ectomycorrhizal, scattered or in groups on soil, often sandy, in woodland, plantations and urban plantings. Most often recorded with willow, followed by pine, birch, beech, spruce and poplar (hebeloma.org); MushroomExpert reports it under pines, spruces and firs in North America. Fall to spring in mild climates; summer at high elevations and northern latitudes.
Distribution
Europe (most records), North America, temperate Asia and Australasia. In North America recorded from Alaska and northern Canada through much of the United States and into Mexico. Hebeloma.org notes that some North American collections differ slightly at the molecular level from European material, so the correct name for them is not settled.
Characteristics
Cap: 2-7 cm, convex to umbonate, becoming flat; tacky to sticky when moist, smooth; dark brown to reddish brown at the center, paler buff to whitish at the margin, sometimes with veil remnants. Gills: attached, often notched, close to crowded; creamy or faintly pinkish at first, becoming brown, often with a whitish fringed edge. Stem: 2-9 cm long, up to about 1 cm thick, silky-fibrillose, whitish, darkening to brown from the base upward, with a faint ring zone. Veil: cortina present. Flesh: whitish. Odor: radish-like or not distinctive. Taste: radish-like, mild or bitter. Spore print: brown to pinkish brown. Spores: 8.5-11 x 5-7 µm, ellipsoid, very finely roughened (MushroomExpert).
