A sticky, dull grayish-brown to yellowish-brown milk cap of western high-elevation spruce-fir forests. It often grows in tight clusters, which gives it its name. It has scant white latex that slowly stains the flesh yellowish and the gills brownish.
Edibility not documented in the sources consulted; the taste is acrid. Not recommended.
Never eat a wild mushroom based on a web page — confirm with an expert.
Habitat
Mycorrhizal with conifers, mainly Engelmann spruce and subalpine fir, in wet, low-lying areas; alone, scattered or often in tight clusters; late summer and fall (monsoon season at higher elevations).
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Western North America: Rocky Mountains, Cascades and Sierra Nevada.
Characteristics
Cap: 4-15 cm, convex becoming flat or shallowly depressed; sticky, bald, dull grayish brown to yellowish brown, without concentric zones. Gills: attached or slightly decurrent, close to nearly distant, whitish becoming pinkish or dirty orangish, slowly bruising brownish. Stem: 2-7 cm long, 1-3 cm thick, more or less equal, sticky when fresh, usually without potholes, white or colored like the cap, hollow. Flesh: white, unchanging or very slowly yellowish. Latex: white, unchanging, scanty; slowly stains flesh yellowish and gills brownish. Odor: fragrant or not distinctive. Taste: acrid. KOH: dull orange on the cap. Spore print: pale yellowish. Spores: 8-12 x 7-9 µm, broadly ellipsoid, with amyloid warts and lines forming partial reticula.
