Matsutake or Smith's amanita
Tricholoma murrillianum · Amanita smithiana
Allenic norleucine and related compounds
Vomiting after several hours, then kidney failure developing over the following days. Cases regularly require dialysis, and some do not recover full kidney function.
Check in this order
Most decisive first
| Feature | Matsutake | Smith's amanita |
|---|---|---|
| 01Smell | Powerful, unmistakable, cinnamon and dirty socks together. | Faintly unpleasant or nothing at all. |
| 02Ring | A thick shaggy ring, with the stem brown-fibrous and patterned below it. | A fragile ring that often falls apart, with the stem smooth or cottony below. |
| 03Base | Tapering, solid, no bulb and no sac. | An abrupt swollen base, sometimes with a rim, and often with soft scales. |
| 04Flesh | Extremely firm and dense. | Softer, snapping more easily. |
Where people go wrong
Both push up under conifer duff on the same slopes in the Pacific Northwest in the same weeks, and commercial pickers work fast in poor light. This is the pair where the answer is genuinely to use your nose before your eyes.
This page tells you what to check. It does not tell you the mushroom in your hand is safe, and it cannot. If you are not certain, do not eat it, and if you have already eaten something and feel unwell, contact a poison centre immediately and keep an uncooked specimen for identification.
Other pairs