Wild species

Blue Foot

Psilocybe caerulipes

aka Blue-foot mushroom · Psilocybe caerulipes

A small, easily overlooked wood-lover of eastern North American hardwood forests, named for the blue bruising that shows most strongly at the base of the stem. Uncommon, and routinely lost among other little brown mushrooms despite a fairly wide range.

Field marks

Small cinnamon-brown cap
Blue bruising at stem base
Slimy cap after rain
Cap fades pale as it dries
Narrow whitish gills
Grows on hardwood debris

Habitat

Decaying hardwood debris and logs — particularly birch, beech, and maple — in shaded deciduous forest, often near streams, from Nova Scotia to North Carolina and west to Michigan. Fruits late May through December.

Relative potency

lowRelative only — this guide gives no dosing guidance.

Lookalikes — read this twice

Frequently confused with the larger Psilocybe ovoideocystidiata where ranges and fruiting windows overlap. As with all small wood-decay mushrooms in hardwood forest, deadly Galerina marginata occupies the same logs and stumps and must be excluded by spore print — rust-brown, not purple-brown — and by the absence of blue bruising.

Deadly species grow in the same places as psilocybin ones and can resemble them closely. Never eat a wild mushroom identified from a website — including this one.