Our Edible Toadstools and Mushrooms and How to Distinguish Them / A Selection of Thirty Native Food Varieties Easily Recognizable by their Marked Individualities, with Simple Rules for the Identification of Poisonous Species

by W. Hamilton Gibson

PLATE XVI
THE SHAGGY-MANE MUSHROOM

Coprinus comatus

Pileus: Egg-shaped in young specimens; at length more cylindrical, and finally expanded, melting away in inky fluid. Color, creamy white, becoming black at edge with advancing age, as is also the case with the shaggy points upon its surface, which generally cover the pileus.

Gills: Crowded; equal in length; creamy white in young specimens, becoming pink, brown, and finally black, and always moist.

Stem: Cylindrical; creamy white; hollow, or with a loose cottony pith.

Spores: Black, falling away in drops.

Taste: Sweet, which applies only to the pink or white condition, at which time alone the species is considered esculent.

Habitat: Lawns, pastures, gardens, and rich grounds in the neighborhood of barns, etc.; usually grows in dense clusters.

Diameter of cylindrical pileus in average specimens, two inches.