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Harmless🍽️ Edible

🍄 Wood mushroom

Agaricus silvicola · Agaricaceae

🌳 Temperate Europe🏔️ Mountains🍁 North America
🧠 To remember it"Clear anise and no volva" — without both at the same time, put the mushroom back down.
Wood mushroom — Agaricus silvicola

🔍 Identify it without mistakes

Woodland agaric with a strong anise smell, a cousin of the field mushroom but growing under trees. Like all white agarics, it requires the same vigilance as the field mushroom regarding young deadly amanitas, which are also white.

  1. cap 6-12 cm, spherical then flattening, creamy white, staining yellow when touched or with age
  2. gills free, creamy then pink, turning dark brown at maturity
  3. stem slender, bulbous base, fragile and hanging white ring
  4. flesh white with a strong, characteristic ANISE or almond smell
  5. spore print chocolate-brown
  6. no volva at the base of the stem
Sizecap 6-12 cm, stem 6-12 cm
Floweringsummer-autumn
Habitatdeciduous and coniferous forests, in small groups

⚠️ Not to be confused with

Deadly white amanitas (especially white forms of the death cap) (Amanita phalloides forma alba, Amanita virosa)mortelle

To tell them apart: deadly amanitas have a sack-like VOLVA at the base of the stem (always dig up the full stem to check), gills that REMAIN white, and no anise smell; the wood mushroom never has a volva, its gills turn pink then brown, and its anise smell is clear and immediate

Yellow-staining mushroom (Agaricus xanthodermus)toxique (troubles digestifs)

To tell them apart: the yellow-staining mushroom turns bright yellow immediately at the base of the stem when cut, with an unpleasant phenol/ink smell, unlike the frank anise scent of the wood mushroom

🍽️ Eating it

Partscap, stem
Seasonsummer-autumn
Tasteaniseed, mild

Preparation : always cooked; only harvest normal-sized adult specimens to avoid any confusion with young amanitas

Sources (3)

No entry replaces a certain identification in the field, or medical advice. When in doubt: don't eat it. If ingestion is suspected: poison control or 112/911.