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SPECIES ATLAS · PLUTEUS

Pluteus salicinus

Named by (Pers.) P. Kumm., 1871

Psilocybin record: confirmed (several modern analyses)

A history of a name and a chemistry record, not an identification guide. No name, picture or description can show that a wild mushroom is safe, and poisonous mushrooms are mistaken for magic mushrooms. If someone may have eaten a wild mushroom, call a poison centre without waiting for symptoms: 1-844-POISON-X in most of Canada, 1-800-463-5060 in Quebec. Call 911 if they’re unconscious, not breathing or having a seizure.

How it was named.

Persoon published Agaricus salicinus in 1798 in Icones et Descriptiones Fungorum Minus Cognitorum. Kummer moved it to Pluteus in 1871. In 2014 the North American variety americanus was raised to a separate species, Pluteus americanus.

Named
(Pers.) P. Kumm., 1871
First published as
Agaricus salicinus Pers. (1798)
Other names in the records
Agaricus salicinus Pers., Pluteus beryllus (Pers.) Quél., Rhodosporus salicinus (Pers.) J. Schröt., Pluteus salicinus var. achloes Singer
Type specimen
Not given by Index Fungorum. (Index Fungorum record, Agaricus salicinus)
The record we cite gives no map position for the type specimen. Land outlines: Natural Earth.

The psilocybin record.

Every analysis we could verify, oldest first, including results that found nothing. No amounts are given: they vary between collections and this is not a potency guide.

  1. 1981

    Reported Psilocybin/psilocin reported (title of paper; text not opened)

    Method: not checked. Saupe 1981, Mycologia 73: 781-784 (Crossref metadata only)

  2. 1984

    Confirmed Psilocybin and psilocin found in Norwegian material

    Method: HPLC with UV, fluorescence and electrochemical detection. Christiansen, Rasmussen & Høiland 1984, Planta Medica 50: 341-343 (abstract)

  3. 1985

    Reported One Pluteus among European fungi positive for psilocybin, psilocin and/or baeocystin (species not named in the abstract)

    Method: HPLC and TLC. Stijve & Kuyper 1985, Planta Medica 51: 385-387 (abstract)

  4. 1987

    Confirmed Psilocybin and baeocystin found but psilocin not found

    Method: HPLC and TLC. Gartz 1987, Planta Medica 53: 290-291 (abstract)

  5. 2003

    Reported Included among Czech mushrooms analysed for psilocybin and psilocin; abstract gives no per-species result

    Method: GC/MS. Stříbrný, Borovička & Sokol 2003, Soudní lékařství 48: 45-49 (abstract)

  6. 2018

    Reported Independent genome assembly recaptures the psilocybin gene cluster (preprint)

    Method: genome sequencing. Awan et al. 2018, bioRxiv preprint (abstract)

  7. 2022

    Confirmed Aeruginascin, baeocystin, norbaeocystin, psilocin and psilocybin quantified in three fruiting bodies from two collections, matching earlier studies

    Method: UHPLC-MS/MS. Gotvaldová et al. 2022, Int. J. Mol. Sci. 23: 14068 (full text, PMC9693126)

  8. 2024

    Confirmed Four core psilocybin genes recovered from a specimen vouchered as P. salicinus

    Method: genome sequencing. Bradshaw et al. 2024, PNAS 121: e2311245121 (full text, PMC10801892)

What the record doesn’t show: Results differ on psilocin, and older North American analyses may refer to what is now P. americanus.

Records on file.

GBIF, the global biodiversity database, held 11,814 occurrence records under this name, 63 of them from Canada, when we checked on October 25, 2026. GBIF held 63 Canadian occurrence records on 25 October 2026; since 2014 North American material may belong to P. americanus. Records include unverified observations and old misidentifications, so counts show where people have recorded the name, not where it grows.

See the name on GBIF

Sources

Compiled from the sources above; last checked .

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