Deadly toxicHymenogastraceae

Galerina marginata

Funeral bell

Small brown wood-rotting mushroom containing the same amatoxins as the death cap. The single most dangerous lookalike for wood-loving Psilocybe.

Cap: Convex to flat, 1.5-4 cm, tawny to cinnamon brown, hygrophanic drying pale buff.
Gills: Adnate, pale then rusty brown.
Stem: 20-60 mm, brownish with a thin ring that often collapses, whitish fibrils below.
Flesh: Thin, pale brown. Never blues.
Spore print: Rusty brown
Habitat: Rotting conifer and hardwood logs, stumps and wood chips, usually in clusters.
Distribution: Throughout the northern hemisphere, Australia and New Zealand.
Season: Autumn to early winter, sometimes spring.
Bruising: None - no blue reaction at all.
Odour: Faintly farinaceous.

Key features

▪Rusty brown spore print
▪No blue bruising anywhere
▪Thin ring on a brown stem
▪Clustered on rotting wood

Field tests

Always take a spore print: rust means stop
Cut the stem; absence of blue on a wood-chip brown mushroom is a red flag

Edibility

Deadly poisonous. A single cap can cause fatal liver failure.

Warning

Symptoms are delayed 6-24 hours, then falsely improve before liver failure. Seek emergency care immediately on any suspicion.

Lookalikes

Psilocybe cyanescensdeadly

The reverse mistake kills people. Psilocybe prints dark purple-brown and bruises blue in seconds; Galerina prints rust and never blues.

Photo and feature-based identification is probabilistic. Never consume a wild mushroom on the basis of an app result — confirm with an experienced mycologist.