Maryland, Miss Banning; New York, Peck, Rep. 22; Indiana, Illinois, H.I. Miller.
Said to act as its name implies as an emetic. Certainly poisonous. Stevenson.
Krapp says he has himself experienced rare inconveniences from eating it. Preferred to others in Indiana and Illinois. H.I. Miller, 1898.
The varying reports upon R. emetica are quoted above. In 1881, in the West Virginia mountains, I began testing this Russula and soon found that it was harmless. At least twenty persons ate it in quantity, during its season, for four years. Yet, in my many published articles, I continued, out of regard for the opinions of others and in excess of caution, to warn against all bitter and peppery fungi. But from that time until the present I have eaten it, and I have made special effort to establish its innocence by getting numbers of my friendly helpers to eat it.
It was suggested by one of its prosecutors that perhaps I was mistaking another fungus for it. In October, 1898, I sent to Professor Peck a lot of the Russula I was eating. He wrote: “It seems to be R. emetica as you state. It certainly is hot enough for it.”
R. pectina´ta Fr.—pecten, a comb. Pileus 3 in. broad, at first gluey, toast-brown, then dry, becoming pale, tan, with the disk always darker, fleshy, rigid, convex then flattened and depressed or concavo-infundibuliform (basin-shaped); margin thin, pectinato-sulcate (deeply ribbed), here and there irregularly shaped. Flesh white, light yellowish under the pellicle, which is not easily separable. Stem curt, 3 in. long, ¾–1 in. thick, rigid, spongy-stuffed, longitudinally slightly striate, shining white, often attenuated at the base. Gills attenuato-free behind, broader toward the margin, somewhat crowded, equal, simple, white.
Odor weak, but nauseous, approaching that of R. fœtens. Fries.
Spores 8–9µ diameter Massee.
New York, Peck, 43d Rep. West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey. Common in woods, grassy, mossy places. July to frost. McIlvaine.
Named from the furrows of the margin being like the teeth of a comb.