Purple cobweb (in Latin - Cortinarius violaceus) is a very rare and interesting mushroom with an unusual color, thanks to which it got part of its name. In the people it is called the purple bog. In Belarus, the mushroom is called a fat woman. The purple cobweb is edible - its taste is rated as average. You can eat it boiled, pickled, s alted, fried and even fresh, although you rarely try it. The first and second courses are prepared from the bog. Connoisseurs love this mushroom very much and consider it a great delicacy.
Description and morphological features
Purple cobweb has a finely scaly, pillow-like, convex, radial-fibrous cap, the diameter of which can reach 15 cm. Its edges can be bent down or simply lowered, in maturity it becomes flat. The cap is dark purple. Its flesh is thick, slightly bluish, soft, with a faint aroma of cedar wood or oil. May fade to white. She has a tastewalnut. The plates are dark purple (with time a rusty-brown coating appears), descending along the stem, rare. The spores of the fungus are unequal, broadly ellipsoid, warty. Their powder has a rusty-brown hue. The leg is dark purple, dense, there is a tuberous swelling at the base. It has traces of bands of cobweb cover. It can grow up to 16 cm in length. Diameter - 1, 5-2 cm. Purple cobweb has a very interesting appearance. You can see his photo in this article.
Habitat and distribution
Swampweed is a very rare edible mushroom that grows in small groups, but more often singly. Since the purple cobweb does not have a very high yield, it was listed in the Red Book of the Russian Federation. This mushroom bears fruit only under strictly defined conditions. This macromycete is mycorrhizal. Cobweb purple has a symbiotic relationship with deciduous and coniferous trees: pine, birch, spruce, beech, oak. Therefore, it can be found in all types of forests where they grow, although this mushroom is rare. Macromycete can also be found in damp birch forests and massifs with the presence of hornbeam. Purple cobweb bears fruit from August to October. It prefers humus, acidic soils, growing on leaf litter, on mossy soils near the edges of sphagnum bogs. Thanks to the latter, macromycete got its popular name "bog". The fungus grows throughout the Russian Federation, in European countries, in North America, as well as in New Guinea and the islands of Borneo.
Similar species
Spider web mushrooms have a very interesting and exotic appearance. Their photos are proof of that. What is most interesting, these macromycetes are rarely similar to other varieties of cobwebs. However, there are a number of exceptions. The mushroom can be confused with the goat's cobweb, which, although inedible, is not dangerous. It is found in the lower tiers of mountains and coniferous forests and has a strong unpleasant odor. Bogweed also looks a bit like camphor cobweb, which is also inedible.
