Figure 101.—Mycena cyanothrix. Cap viscid when young, blue, becoming pale and whitish in age, and fuscous in center; gills white; stem faintly purple when young, then flesh color or white, blue, clothed with blue hairs at base (natural size). Copyright.
The pileus is conic, then bell-shaped, and as the margin of the cap expands more appears umbonate, obtuse, smooth, even or somewhat striate on the margin. The color varies from whitish to flesh color, or dull red, and appears more or less saturated with a red juice. The thin margin extends a short distance beyond the ends of the gills, and the margin is then beautifully crenate. The gills are adnate, and often extend down on the stem a short distance by a little tooth. The stem is firm, sometimes smooth, sometimes with minute hairs, at the base with long hairs, hollow, in color the same as that of the pileus.
Figure 102.—Mycena hæmatopa. Dull red or flesh color, or whitish, a dull red juice exudes where broken or cut, margin of cap serrate with thin sterile flaps (natural size). Copyright.
The color varies somewhat, being darker in some plants than in others. In some plants the juice is more abundant and they bleed profusely when wounded, while in other cases there is but little of the juice, sometimes wounds only showing a change in color to a deep red without any free drops exuding. Figure [102] is from plants collected at Ithaca, in August, 1899. It is widely distributed in Europe and North America.
Mycena succosa Pk., another species of Mycena with a juice, occurs on very rotten wood in the woods. It is a small plant, dull white at first, but soon spotted with black, and turning black in handling or where bruised, and when dried. Wounds exude a "serum-like juice," and the wounds soon become black. It was described by Peck under Collybia in the 25th Report, p. 74.
OMPHALIA Fr.
The genus Omphalia is closely related to Mycena and Collybia. It differs from these mainly in the decurrent gills. In the small species of Mycena where the gills are slightly decurrent, the pileus is not umbilicate as it is in corresponding species of Omphalia. In some of the species of Omphalia the pileus is not umbilicate, but here the gills are plainly decurrent. The stem is cartilaginous.