Full name: Hebeloma foedatum Peck (1895)
Published: Bull. Torrey bot. Club 22 (5): 202 (1895)
Taxonomic status: This is a Pholiota.
Notes: Current name: Pholiota foedata (Peck) A.H. Sm. & Hesler, The North American species of Pholiota: 348 (1968).

Types: UNITED STATES: California: Pasadena (approx. 34.14°N, 118.13°W, alt. approx. 250 m a.s.l.) on soil in urban roadside, 20 Dec. 1895, A.J. McClatchie, det: C.H. Peck (Holotype. herbarium acc. no. NYS-F-001228, HJB1000086).

Diagnosis: Pileus fleshy, convex becoming plane or centrally depressed, glabrous, very viscid or glutinous, reddish cinnamon, flesh yellowish-white; lamellae subventricose, emarginate with a decurrent tooth, cinnamon-color, becoming mummy-brown; stem solid, equal or slightly thickened at the base, fibrillose, paler than the pileus; spores broadly elliptical, .00024 to .0003 in. long, .00016 to .0002 broad. Pileus 1.5 to 3 in. broad; stem 1.5 to 2.5 in. long, 2 to 4 lines thick. Streets of Pasadena. December. McClatchie. The species is apparently related to H. firmum, H. testaccum and H. glutinosum, from all of which it is separated by its small spores. Its viscid pileus causes dirt to adhere to it in such quantity as to give the plant a very defiled, unattractive appearance.

Commentary: The spores are thick-walled, without an obvious germ pore (although Smith and Hesler (1968) mentioned a minute apical pore), and on average 6.8 × 5.1 μm. Both cheilocystidia and pleurocystidia are present and chrysocystidia absent. An ITS sequence provides further evidence in favor of this recombination into Pholiota. We are not aware of any published sequences of this taxon. Interestingly, a spore print of a collection of C.F. Baker from 1909 exists in MIN, identified as H. foedatum, that matches the type of P. foedata. Pholiota foedata is a member of Pholiota clade 2 as recognized by Tian and Matheny (2021), tentatively named P. subgen. Flammuloides. Based on currently available sequence data, the sister species of P. foedata is P. gallica. No other ITS sequences exist that are likely to be conspecific with P. foedata – unless P. foedata was conspecific with P. gallica. The spore size of the two species appears to match (see Holec and Kolařík 2014). The p-distance between the types of P. foedata and P. gallica is 2.1%; the distances between all collections ascribed to P. foedata or P. gallica is 0.4–2.1%.