Eastern half of the United States
Note orange color at stem base.
This milk cap mushroom grows under red and white pine in the Eastern half of the United States; reported under oak in Texas. Found late summer and fall. Lactarius chelidonium exhibits an array of colors on its cap, gills and stem; and change when damaged or with age. Cap tops can be rather drab, but sometimes shades of blue and green (and spectacularly so). When exposed, cap flesh changes to shades of blue and green also. Gills bruise and age green. Odor fragrant; taste mild to peppery. Yellow/orange spore print. Milk yellowish.
The yellowish color of the milk of this Lactarius mushroom gave rise to its specific epithet, “chelidonium“, which refers to Chelidonium majus, a plant with yellow/orange sap. See discussion at MushroomExpertCom on Lactarius chelidonium var. chelidonioides. Two varieties of this mushroom were described years ago, but people that know what they are talking about agree that more research is needed to determine their exact taxonomic status. (They all may be the same species.)
If you know of some pine groves you can probably find this unique milk cap. If you don’t know of any pine groves, go and find some.
Resources:
- Lactarius chelidonium var. chelidonioides at MushroomExpert.Com
- A taxonomical treatment of the North and Central American species in Lactarius sect. Deliciosi available at The Biodiversity Heritage Library
- Images reported as Lactarius chelidonium at iNaturalist (shows the kaleidoscope of colors this mushroom exhibit).
-Acknowledgment to John Plischke and Fartender for photos from iNaturalist.