HOLARCTIC SPECIES OF HUPERZIA (LYCOPODIACEAE) REVISITED

Curtis R. Björk (2020): Notes on the Holarctic Species of Huperzia (Lycopodiaceae), with Emphasis on British Columbia, Canada. Annales Botanici Fennici 57(4-6): 255-278; (28 October 2020). https://doi.org/10.5735/085.057.0410

Abstract

HERBARIUM RECORDS AS THE SOURCE OF PHENOLOGICAL DATA

Christopher W. Kopp, Barbara M. Neto-Bradley, Linda P. J. Lipsen (Jennings), Jas Sandhar & Siena Smith. 2020. Herbarium records indicate variation in bloom-time sensitivity to temperature across a geographically diverse region. International Journal of Biometeorology 64: 873–880.

Abstract

References

Menzel A &Fabian P. 1999. Growing season extended in Europe. Nature 397:659–659. https://doi.org/10.1038/17709

Menzel A, Sparks TH, Estrella N, et al. 2006. European phenological response to climate change matches the warming pattern. Glob Chang Biol 12:1969–1976. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2486.2006.01193.391

Prevéy JS, Rixen C, Rüger N, Høye TT, Bjorkman AD, Myers-Smith IH, Elmendorf SC, Ashton IW, Cannone N, Chisholm CL, Clark K, Cooper EJ, Elberling B, Fosaa AM, Henry GHR, Hollister RD, Jónsdóttir IS, Klanderud K, Kopp CW, Lévesque E, Mauritz M, Molau U, Natali SM, Oberbauer SF, Panchen ZA, Post E, Rumpf SB, Schmidt NM, Schuur E, Semenchuk PR, Smith JG, Suding KN, Totland Ø, Troxler T, Venn S, Wahren CH, Welker JM, Wipf S. 2018. Warming shortens flowering seasons of tundra plant communities. Nat Ecol Evol 3:1–11. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-018-0745-6

Robbirt KM, Davy AJ, Hutchings MJ, Roberts DL. 2011. Validation of biological collections as a source of phenological data for use in climate change studies: a case study with the orchid Ophrys sphegodes. J Ecol 99: 235–241. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2745.2010.01727.x

Wolkovich EM, Cook BI, Allen JM, Crimmins TM, Betancourt JL, Travers SE, Pau S, Regetz J, Davies TJ, Kraft NJ, Ault TR, Bolmgren K, Mazer SJ, McCabe G, McGill B, Parmesan C, Salamin N, Schwartz MD, Cleland EE. 2012. Warming experiments under predict plant phenological responses to climate change. Nature 485:494–497. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11014

[BEN Editor: It is a pity that the authors did not take the photoperiodicity of certain plants into account!]

HISTORY OF AMANITA PHALLOIDES IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

By the early 1990s Amanita phalloides was well documented in the US Pacific Northwest as far north as Seattle, but was not then known to occur in British Columbia, or anywhere else in Canada. Reports in the popular press of "Death Cap" mushrooms occurrence in Oregon and Washington, and especially of a group poisoning in 1989 in Portland Oregon [1], caused concern that this dangerous mushroom may be present yet undetected in British Columbia.

Members of amateur mushroom clubs in BC, the Vancouver Mycological Society (VMS) and the South Vancouver Island Mycological Society (SVIMS), were informed of these developments and were asked to help report and document any possible occurrences of Amanita phalloides in British Columbia and requested to help disseminate cautionary information to other amateur mushroom enthusiasts. This approach was successful.

The first record of Amanita phalloides growing in Canada is a British Columbia collection of a single mushroom, UBC F13925, found on October 13 1997 in a grove of large Castanea sativa or Sweet chestnut trees. It was collected by an Italian immigrant man collecting edible chestnuts in Lake Errock near Mission BC. Subsequent visits to the location by Tom Tatum, an amateur mycologist from the VMS, determined that numerous fruit bodies grew in a grove of large and old Castanea trees, a non-native tree species introduced for edible nut production.

Lake Errock community is about 100 kilometres to the southeast of the city of Vancouver and had first developed in the 1890s. According to the Heritage Places website of Heritage Places Branch, Mission Historical Society; Sweet chestnut trees already grew in Lake Errock on the old Ross Ranch described in the 1893 BC Directory as "the largest fruit ranch in the lower province" [2].

The second Canadian record of Amanita phalloides, DAVFP 25413 and UBC F14647, was collected on October 24 1998 under a large ornamental Fagus sylvatica or European beech tree in the landscaped grounds of Government House, official residence of the Provincial Lieutenant General, in Victoria on southern Vancouver Island British Columbia. It is known that planting stock for this landscaping was provided by Layritz Nurseries in 1906. Richard Emil Layritz (1867-1954) was a pioneer nurseryman from Germany who studied horticulture in Germany, France and England. He was an early advocate of the City Beautiful movement which promoted the creation of landscaped public parks and tree-lined boulevards in cities throughout North America. For a summary of the City Beautiful Movement in Vancouver see [3].

In 2000 on September 13 Amanita phalloides was found under Tilia cordata Basswood or Linden trees in the Uplands neighbourhood of Victoria, which is a garden suburb designed by the landscape designer John Olmsted. Starting in 1912 planting stock for landscaping in the Uplands development was provided by Layritz Nurseries.

In 2002 further locations and host trees for Amanita phalloides were identified. They were collected under old Corylus avellana, Hazelnut or Filbert, trees in Mission in the Fraser Valley, not far from the original Lake Errock location. In Victoria on Vancouver Island they were collected under Carpinus betulus or European Hornbeam trees near the Crystal Gardens, a public saltwater pool facility built in 1925 and landscaped in 1926 with planting stock from Layritz Nurseries.

On October 13 2008 the first Amanita phalloides in Vancouver city were collected from under a Carpinus betulus or Hornbeam, city street trees apparently planted in the 1960s. The vast majority of subsequent collections of Amanita phalloides within the city of Vancouver have been under the "Fastigiata" cultivar of Carpinus betulus planted as street trees. By 2015 there were numerous records of Amanita phalloides from the south-western corner of British Columbia in two adjacent regions. The Lower Mainland includes Vancouver city and its neighbouring municipalities in the Fraser Delta and in the Fraser Valley.

Southern Vancouver Island has numerous locations scattered around Victoria. Over 130 British Columbia Amanita phalloides collections are presently in the DAVFP and UBC Herbaria. Potential ectomycorrhizal tree hosts when noted have all been non-native broadleaf tree species with the exception of the native Garry oak, Quercus garryana [4], and no collections have been associated with conifer trees. Since 2017 there have been a few more reports from the Victoria area of Amanita phalloides growing with Garry oak.

In 2018 Amanita phalloides DNA was isolated and identified from ectomycorrhizal root tips of Carpinus betulus trees in Kelowna indicating that this species is also present in the Okanagan Valley of BC. The species was expected to occur there because of the mild climate with warm winters and a long history of settlement and commercial tree nursery activity in that area.

In 2020 Amanita phalloides was found growing under Quercus palustris in downtown Vancouver in an area extensively landscaped as the site of the 1986 World's Fair. It is now expected that numerous trees planted for the 1986 event, and during redevelopment of the expo lands immediately following, may be hosts for many more Death cap mushrooms in coming years.

Table 1: Host trees for Amanita phalloides in British Columbia:

Three serious human poisonings are known to have been caused by Amanita phalloides growing in British Columbia, with one fatality:

1. In 2003 on August 17 an adult male in Victoria consumed what he believed were puffball mushrooms growing in the lawn of his residence. Two days later he presented at the hospital emergency department with severe gastrointestinal symptoms and was hospitalized. A visit to the residence by a mycologist from the Pacific Forestry Centre three days after ingestion revealed several mature Amanita phalloides growing under a large Quercus robur tree. The patient recovered and was released on August 22, 5 days post-ingestion.

2. In 2008 on September 6 an adult female ingested a large quantity of Amanita phalloides gathered from an agricultural property in Langley BC. The woman was a recent Korean immigrant who believed she had found paddy-straw mushrooms or Volvariella volvacea, a cultivated species popular in parts of Asia. The patient presented two days later with severe gastrointestinal symptoms and indications of liver damage and was hospitalised. She survived and was released on September 23 after 16 days.

3. In 2016 in October a three year-old child died more than a week after eating Amanita phalloides that grew under hornbeam on a residential property in Downtown Victoria.

In addition there are two cases of apparent amatoxin poisoning where the mushrooms were never identified but were suspected to be Amanita phalloides:

1. In fall of 2013 a Victoria older adult male ate 6-7 mushrooms. The next day he presented with gastroenteritis, was treated and sent home. Three days post-ingestion he returned with vomiting and diarrhea and signs of liver damage. He was treated with intravenous silibinin, a compound extracted from milk-thistle, flown up from the USA. No mushroom specimens were recovered, and tests for amatoxin in urine were not completed. He recovered.

2. In October of 2014 a adult male in Vancouver ate mushrooms in a meal and developed symptoms 8 hours later and was hospitalised and arrangements for obtaining intravenous silibinin were begun. By the time the silibinin (Legalon-SIL) arrived, the patient had mostly recovered so it was not administered. He was released after 8 or 9 days. The exact identity and provenance of mushrooms was never established with certainty. Dude Chilling Park was mentioned as where the patient had picked the mushrooms and the area was searched but no amatoxin-containing mushroom suspects were found.

Table 2: Location and tree host first records of Amanita phalloides in British Columbia

References