Gray-pink amanita (Amanita rubescens)
- Division: Basidiomycota (Basidiomycetes)
- Subdivision: Agaricomycotina (Agaricomycetes)
- Class: Agaricomycetes (Agaricomycetes)
- Subclass: Agaricomycetidae (Agaricomycetes)
- Order: Agaricales (Agaric or Lamellar)
- Family: Amanitaceae (Amanitaceae)
- Genus: Amanita (Amanita)
- Type: Amanita rubescens (Amanita gray-pink)
- Pink mushroom
- Reddish toadstool
- Fly agaric pearl
Amanita gray-pink forms mycorrhiza with deciduous and coniferous trees, especially with birch and pine. It grows on soils of any type, everywhere in the temperate zone of the Northern Hemisphere. Fly agaric gray-pink bears fruit singly or in small groups, is common. The season is from spring to late autumn, most often from July to October.
Hat ∅ 6-20 cm, usually no more than 15 cm. Initially or later, in old mushrooms, without a noticeable tubercle. The skin is most often greyish-pink or red-brown to flesh-red, shiny, slightly sticky.
Pulp, or, with a rather weak taste, without a special smell. When damaged, it gradually turns first into light pink, then into a characteristic intense wine-pink color.
Leg 3-10 × 1,5-3 cm (sometimes up to 20 cm high), cylindrical, initially solid, then becomes hollow. Color – white or pinkish, the surface is tuberculate. At the base it has a tuberous thickening, which, even in young mushrooms, is often damaged by insects and its flesh is permeated with colored passages.
The plates are white, very frequent, wide, free. When touched, they turn red, like the flesh of the cap and legs.
The rest of the cover. The ring is wide, membranous, drooping, first white, then turns pink. On the upper surface it has well-marked grooves. Volvo is weakly expressed, in the form of one or two rings on the tuberous base of the stem. The flakes on the cap are warty or in the form of small membranous scraps, from white to brownish or dirty pink. Spore powder whitish. Spores 8,5 × 6,5 µm, ellipsoidal.
Fly agaric gray-pink is a mushroom, knowledgeable mushroom pickers consider it to be very good in taste, and they love it because it appears already in early summer. Unsuitable for eating fresh, it is usually consumed fried after preliminary boiling. Raw mushroom contains non-heat-resistant toxic substances, it is recommended to boil it well and drain the water before cooking.
Video about gray-pink amanita mushroom:
