Amanita nehuta, also called Maori Dust Amanita, is a species of fungus

Fungus

A fungus is a member of a large group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds , as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, Fungi, which is separate from plants, animals, and bacteria...

 in the Amanitaceae

Amanitaceae

Amanitaceae are a family of fungi or mushrooms. The family, also commonly called the Amanita family, is in order Agaricales, gilled mushrooms...

 family. It was first described by New Zealand mycologist Geoff Ridley in 1991. It occurs in New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 in large number. It has only a dark ring rather than a universal veil and white spores. It is found under leptospermum

Leptospermum

Leptospermum is a genus of about 80-86 species of plants in the myrtle family Myrtaceae. Most species are endemic to Australia, with the greatest diversity in the south of the continent; but one species extends to New Zealand, another to Malaysia, and L. recurvum is endemic to Malaysia.They...

 and Nothofagus

Nothofagus

Nothofagus, also known as the southern beeches, is a genus of 35 species of trees and shrubs native to the temperate oceanic to tropical Southern Hemisphere in southern South America and Australasia...

. It grows on ground usually in late summer. Its height is 110 mm and width is 100 mm.

Physical description

The physical description is as follows :

• Cap : The cap is 25 - 65 mm wide, plano-convex to plano-depressed, buff, non-viscid, with a striate margin. The volval remnants are pulverulent on the center raised into wart-like peaksor warts or radial ridges, colored pale sepiAmanita

• Gills : Gills are crowded and free, measure 6 - 7 millimeters wide, and appear white to pale buff. The short gills are subtruncate.

• Stem/Stipe : Its stem, or stipe, is 20 - 75 × 4 - 11 millimeters, hollow
  Hollow
  -A noun:*A non-closed body which is not solid or filled. i.e. contains empty space or air.**Hollow Earth theory, the idea that the planet Earth has a hollow interior and possibly an inhabitable inner surface....
  
  , exannulate, with a smooth to subfloccose upper stem and smooth lower stem. The surface is white, very pale buff, or very pale grayish sepia in color like the cap. The basal bulb is clavate to bulbous, 10 - 16 mm in diameter. The base has a rim or band of powdery volva, the same color as on the cap. The stem has no ring.

• Spores and microscopic features : The spores measure 6.5 - 9 × 5.5 - 8 (-8.5) µm and are subglobose to broadly ellipsoid to ellipsoid and inamyloid. They are white in color. Clamps are absent at the bases of the basidia.

• Flesh : The flesh is white, with a very pale area under the skin in the center.

Distribution and habitat

This species was originally described from Wellington

Wellington

Wellington is the capital city and third most populous urban area of New Zealand, although it is likely to have surpassed Christchurch due to the exodus following the Canterbury Earthquake. It is at the southwestern tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Rimutaka Range...

, New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

, associated with many types of Nothofagus

Nothofagus

Nothofagus, also known as the southern beeches, is a genus of 35 species of trees and shrubs native to the temperate oceanic to tropical Southern Hemisphere in southern South America and Australasia...

, leptospermum

Leptospermum

Leptospermum is a genus of about 80-86 species of plants in the myrtle family Myrtaceae. Most species are endemic to Australia, with the greatest diversity in the south of the continent; but one species extends to New Zealand, another to Malaysia, and L. recurvum is endemic to Malaysia.They...

, and kunzea

Kunzea

Kunzea is a genus of 36-40 species of shrub in the myrtle family Myrtaceae. They are native to Australia, with one species extending to New Zealand. They are found throughout the Australian continent with most species occurring in southwestern Western Australia...

. It is also known from both North and South islands of New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

.

Similar species

Amanita nehuta is said to be similar to Amanita farinosa

Amanita farinosa

Amanita farinosa, also called Eastern American Floury Amanita, is a North American poisonous mushroom of the genus Amanita, a genus of fungi including some of the most deadly mushrooms, as well as notably psychedelic mushrooms.-Taxonomy:...

,Amanita obsita, Amanita subvaginata and Amanita xerocybe. All these species appear to have a cap surface that gelatinizes late in development so that the volva remains intimately connected to the cap skin well into maturity of the fruiting body. For this reason, the cap often remains powdery looking well into maturity.