A whitish to buff, later grayish-brown oak milk cap. It has very distant, decurrent gills and a cap margin that becomes scalloped or pleated. Its white latex dries pink and stains the gills and flesh salmon pink. It is especially common in the southeastern United States.
Widespread east of the Rocky Mountains, especially common in the southeastern United States; also Mexico.
Characteristics
Cap: 3-10 cm, flat with a central depression or shallowly vase-shaped; margin becoming scalloped or pleated; smooth to somewhat wrinkled, bald or very finely velvety; whitish to yellowish buff, darkening to light or grayish brown. Gills: decurrent, very distant (about 1-3 mm apart at the margin), yellowish, stained salmon pink by the latex. Stem: 3-8 cm long, 0.5-1.5 cm thick, equal or tapered, smooth, dry, becoming hollow, colored like the cap or paler. Flesh: soft, whitish, staining salmon pink. Latex: white, drying pink and staining tissues pink. Odor: not distinctive. Taste: acrid, sometimes mild in older specimens. KOH: negative on the cap. Spore print: creamy to buff. Spores: 7-9.5 x 7-8 µm, subglobose, with tall amyloid spines and branched ridges 1.5-2.5 µm high, generally not reticulate.
