The Galena Creek trailhead made a good impression on us last weekend, so we return for a longer loop hike today. Between the creeks we climb to higher ground, recently covered with snow. Fresh pine smells, a cool breeze, bright red snow plants, flowering Oregon grape, and a few Snowbank Clitocybe mushrooms greet us up here.
Mount Rose Ski Area
Oregon Grape
Ann on the ridge
Snowbank Clitocybe
We have a new favorite nature guide, The Laws Field Guide to the Sierra Nevada. Beautiful illustrations with just enough context to help you understand how things are related.
2 responses to “Jones Creek to Whites Creek Loop”
So how cool that you are giving mushroom I.D. a go….so may I add my 2 cents? Clitocybe mushrooms typically have gills that run down the stem…I would guess this one to be a pretty typical Cortinarius. There are many kinds of Cortinarius mushrooms and most of them are poisonous. They typically have brown, widely spaced gills that are often not attached to the stem….and the bottom of the stem is bulbous. Spores are typically rust brown.
Fun – I should have taken a spore print! These gills look like Clitocybe glacialis in our field guide, I felt more uncertain about the cap. They were under conifers right at snow line, and had a light mat of white mycelium at the base.
The cortinarius varieties in our Sierra book are Purple Cortinarius and Thick-veiled Cortinarius, which don’t seem quite right, but maybe another variety?