Mycoscout How to identify the deadly webcap
The deadly webcap is a medium-sized, tawny orange-brown mushroom with a dry, slightly scaly cap that usually keeps a central bump, gills that start pale and turn rusty brown, and a paler stem marked with irregular yellowish bands left by a cobweb-like veil. It grows with pine and spruce on damp acid soil, often among moss, heather and bilberry, in late summer and autumn. The spore print is rusty reddish-brown.
It belongs to Cortinarius, the webcaps, the largest genus of gilled mushrooms. Wild Food UK counts over 400 webcap species in Britain, many of them similar, and its author does not forage the genus at all. First Nature says experts advise against eating any webcap, because the closely related fool's webcap (C. orellanus) carries the same toxin. This page is for recognising the deadly webcap so you can leave it, and for understanding why chanterelle hunters have died of it.
| Feature | Deadly webcap (Cortinarius rubellus) |
|---|---|
| Cap | 4 to 8 cm when expanded (First Nature); 4 to 6 cm (Wild Food UK). Tawny brown to orange or reddish brown, dry, matte, slightly scaly or fibrous; conical to convex, then flatter, usually keeping a raised bump (umbo). The margin often stays slightly rolled down. |
| Gills / underside | True gills, fairly widely spaced, notched where they meet the stem. Pale yellowish when young, turning rusty brown as the spores mature. Young caps carry a cortina, a cobweb-like veil, from cap edge to stem. |
| Stem & base | 5 to 10 cm tall, 7 to 15 mm wide (First Nature); 6 to 8 cm (Wild Food UK). Paler than the cap, fibrous, often slightly bowed, with a yellowish snakeskin or zigzag pattern of veil remnants, and rusty spore marks where the cortina collapsed. Slightly bulbous in the lower half. No ring, no sac. |
| Flesh | Off-white with orange tones, especially near the base (Wild Food UK). |
| Spore print | Rusty reddish-brown (First Nature; Wild Food UK: rust coloured). |
| Smell | Faint radish (First Nature, Wild Food UK). Do not taste it, even a crumb. |
| Habitat | Mycorrhizal with conifers, especially spruce and pine, on damp, acidic soil; mossy spruce forest in Scandinavia, and occasionally beech woods (Svampguiden). Often among heather and bilberry, in small groups. |
| Season | August to November in Britain (First Nature, Wild Food UK); late summer to early winter in conifer woods generally. |
| Range (US / UK & Europe) | Rare in southern England and Wales, more common further north; very common in Scandinavia and northern mainland Europe. Also recorded in parts of North America (First Nature). |
Confirm these features
- The underside has thin true gills, widely spaced, pale at first and rusty brown later, not blunt yellow ridges.
- A rusty reddish-brown spore print. Any orange mushroom from a conifer wood deserves this test before any decision.
- A cobweb veil on young caps, or its remains as yellowish zigzag bands and rusty streaks on the stem.
- A dry, matte, tawny to orange-brown cap with a central bump, not a wavy funnel.
- Growing from damp, acid ground with pine or spruce, often among moss, heather or bilberry.
- A faint radish smell, not apricot. Smell it; never taste it.
Dangerous look-alikes
The danger runs toward the forager who is looking for something else. These are the edible species it has been mistaken for.
Chanterelle (Cantharellus cibarius)
Tell apart: The chanterelle is a yellow to orange funnel with a wavy edge and blunt, forked ridges running into the stem; the webcap is a browner, bumped cap with thin gills that go rusty. The chanterelle's spore print is cream to pale yellow, the webcap's rusty brown. The chanterelle smells of apricots, the webcap of radish. First Nature notes that the orange cap has led to the webcap being "mistaken for the edible chanterelle", despite the different shape, and that some of those mix-ups were fatal. Full comparison: deadly webcap vs chanterelle.
Risk: A chanterelle hunter in pine or spruce woods in Scotland or Scandinavia is on the webcap's ground in the webcap's months. See how to identify chanterelles.
Funnel chanterelle (Craterellus tubaeformis)
Tell apart: The Swedish guide Svampguiden records the deadly webcap being mistaken for this small, brown-capped, yellow-stemmed autumn edible because the two "grow in the same environment", though "they do not look alike". The funnel chanterelle has a hollow yellow stem and blunt veins beneath, not rusty gills, and no veil.
Risk: In the Nordic countries the funnel chanterelle is picked by the bucket from mossy spruce forest. A webcap in the bucket is the Swedish case series below.
Other orange and brown webcaps, including fool's webcap (Cortinarius orellanus)
Tell apart: Wild Food UK notes the fool's webcap looks similar but lacks the zigzag stem pattern; First Nature says it carries the same toxin and grows mainly with broadleaf trees. Svampguiden lists the sunset webcap (C. limonius, more yellow, narrower paler gills) and the conifer webcap (C. gentilis, more slender). None of these should be eaten.
Risk: Telling one webcap from another is specialist work. The practical rule from both British sources is to eat no webcap at all.
Why one feature is never enough: "Chanterelles grow under conifers too, and this one is orange" is how the webcap gets picked. The ridges, the spore print, the veil and the smell each contradict a chanterelle. Check all of them, and if the spore print is rusty brown, nothing else matters: leave it.
Where and when it grows
The deadly webcap is a partner of conifer roots. First Nature places it with pine and spruce on damp, acidic soil, fruiting in small groups from August to November in Britain. Wild Food UK agrees on wet, acid conifer ground and the same months. Svampguiden describes its Nordic home as mossy spruce forest, with beech woods a second habitat and pine a rare one.
In Britain it is rare in southern England and Wales and becomes more common northward; Scotland's conifer plantations and native pinewoods are its stronghold. Across Scandinavia and northern mainland Europe it is very common. First Nature also records it from parts of North America, and the North American Mycological Association lists a related species, C. orellanosus, described after a Michigan poisoning in 2010.
Symptoms and why the delay matters
The deadly webcap contains orellanine, a toxin that destroys the kidneys. Its poisoning is defined by a long silence. The North American Mycological Association gives an onset of "36 hours to 3 weeks of ingestion (average is about 8 days)". First Nature gives two or three days. Wild Food UK says symptoms can take up to two weeks, "by which time the damage has already been done". Because there is no illness at the meal, the mushroom is not connected to the symptoms, and the forager may eat it again before the first attack arrives.
When symptoms do come, the North American Mycological Association lists nausea, vomiting, lethargy, loss of appetite, frequent urination, burning thirst, headache and chills, with fever generally absent, followed by evidence of progressive kidney failure. First Nature describes a flu-like start with headache and vomiting, then kidney failure that is fatal if untreated. A Swedish study of 28 patients poisoned by the deadly webcap in western Sweden between 1979 and 2012 (Hedman and colleagues, BMC Nephrology 2017) found that people typically sought medical advice three days to a week after the meal, with nausea and fatigue as the main early complaints; 22 of the 28 needed dialysis, 21 had stage 5 kidney disease a month later, and most of those went on to transplantation. The authors note that because of the lag between eating and symptoms, there are no signs of the toxin left in the blood when patients arrive.
Cooking does not help: Svampguiden states that orellanine is not water-soluble and boiling does not destroy it. If you have eaten an orange or brown mushroom from a conifer wood and are not certain what it was, do not wait for symptoms. Keep any remains for identification and get help now; the emergency numbers are at the top of this page.
Using an app to check a find
A photo can show the bumped tawny cap, the rusty gills and, with luck, the yellowish bands on the stem, which is enough to put the deadly webcap on the list of possibilities. It cannot show the spore print, the radish smell, or the veil that has already gone from an older cap, and it cannot tell one brown webcap from the hundreds of others. Mycoscout asks for the cap, the gills, the stem and the habitat, leads with the verdict, shows its confidence, and names the chanterelle as a look-alike with how to tell them apart. When it is unsure it says so. For anything orange-brown under spruce or pine, treat "unsure" as "no", and take the spore print.
Frequently asked questions
How long after eating a deadly webcap do symptoms start?
Days, not hours. First Nature gives two or three days before flu-like symptoms, headache and vomiting; the North American Mycological Association gives 36 hours to 3 weeks, averaging about 8 days; Wild Food UK says up to two weeks. The kidney damage is already under way by then.
Where does the deadly webcap grow in the UK?
On damp, acid ground in conifer woods, with pine and spruce, often among heather, bilberry and moss. First Nature records it as rare in southern England and Wales and more common further north; it is very common in Scandinavia.
Deadly webcap vs chanterelle: what is the difference?
The webcap has thin true gills that turn rusty brown, a bump on the cap, a cobweb veil when young, a rusty spore print and a radish smell. A chanterelle has blunt forked ridges, a wavy funnel cap, a cream spore print and smells of apricots. The shapes differ; the colour and the woods do not.
Does cooking destroy orellanine?
No. The Swedish guide Svampguiden states that the toxin is not water-soluble and boiling does not destroy it. Nothing you do in the kitchen makes a webcap safe.
Sources
How we checked this page: the Mycoscout team cross-checked every edibility, toxicity and look-alike statement against the sources below on October 31, 2026. It has not been reviewed by a mycologist.
- Cortinarius rubellus Cooke - Deadly Webcap, First Nature. Accessed October 31, 2026.
- Deadly Webcap, Wild Food UK. Accessed October 31, 2026.
- Mushroom poisoning syndromes, North American Mycological Association. Accessed October 31, 2026.
- Long-term clinical outcome for patients poisoned by the fungal nephrotoxin orellanine (BMC Nephrology 2017;18:121), Hedman H, Holmdahl J, Mölne J, Ebefors K, Haraldsson B, Nyström J, via PubMed Central. Accessed October 31, 2026.
- Deadly webcap (Cortinarius rubellus), Svampguiden (Swedish mushroom guide). Accessed October 31, 2026.
