Psilocybe silvatica

Psilocybe silvatica, is a psilocybin mushroom of the Agaricales family, in the section Semilanceatae, having psilocybin as main active compound. It is closely related to Psilocybe pelliculosa.

Description

• The cap is 0.8— 2(2.5) cm broad and is obtusely conic, becoming broadly campanulate to broadly conic, often with an acute umbo. It is tawny dark brown when moist, fading to pale yellowish brown or grayish brown. It is even to striatulate when moist, smooth, hygrophanous, and viscid when moist from a thin gelatinous pellicle that is barely separable, if at all. It sometimes has a grayish-green tinge along the margin. It fades to pale buff.
• The gills are adnate to adnexed, close to subdistant, narrow to moderately broad, and dull grayish brown to cinnamon brown at first then smoky brown at maturity, edges remaining whitish.
• The spores are dark purplish brown, (6.6)8.5 — 9.5(11) x (3.8)4 — 5.5(6) µm from 4-spored basidia, which are sometimes 2-spored.
• The stipe is 2— 8 cm long by 1— 3 mm thick, equal to slightly enlarged at the base, tubular, and somewhat flexuous. It is pallid to brownish beneath a silky fibrillose covering. It becomes darker towards the base, partial veil poorly developed, cortinate, thin to obscure, and soon absent. It is slightly bluish-green at base.
• It has a farinaceous taste and odor.
• Microscopic features: Pleurocystidia are absent. The cheilocystidia are 24 — 34(40) x 4.4 — 6.6(8.8) µm, fusoid ventricose to lageniform, with a long flexuous neck, and are1.6 — 2.2 µm thick.

Habitat and formation

It is gregarious but not cespitose on wood debris or on wood chips or in well-decayed conifer substratum or among fallen leaves of hardwoods from the end of September until December. It is known from Ontario, Canada the Pacific Northwest, Michigan, New York, and northern Europe. The Northwest and European finds are more recent; it was once only known in the northeast.

References

• Stamets, Paul (1996). Psilocybin Mushrooms of the World. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press. ISBN 0-9610798-0-0. 
• Guzman, G. The Genus Psilocybe: A Systematic Revision of the Known Species Including the History, Distribution and Chemistry of the Hallucinogenic Species. Beihefte zur Nova Hedwigia Heft 74. J. Cramer, Vaduz, Germany (1983) [now out of print].