To key the things out precisely is not always possible without all
work diagnostic being done, but to shoot semi-educated guesses is
easy. You need to:

(1) Spend on literature, I’m one of the few who have Largent’s
monograph. (2) Read it, that’s even harder, works best on
transcontinental flights when one is pinned down without hope of doing
anything more useful. (3) Look a lot of material, again not many treat
this Genus as well as it deserves.

I can have a friendly bet with Christian, over a cup of coffee that
this there are most ordinary basidioles and not cystidia. These guys
rarely have cystidia and when it shows up, it is prominent.

Irene, for European stuff I use strictly Noordeloos’ two bricks from
the Fungi Europaei series 5 & 5a. Nothing else works for me.

I only saw promise for this to be pseudostrictia because from what I
can see it is a sturdy Nolanea. The spores seem a bit too small for
any of them, so I’d question them to be re-measured.

Anyway guys, have fun,

When I try, I’m rarely sure about the result. One of the few I have learned to recognize is hirtipes, with a brown cap, and a high and very brittle stem. It smells like cucumber.
This is not it, but that’s about the only thing I can say for sure..

Those are basidioles? They look rather “cheilocystidioid”…

N. hirtipes has odor that can’t be missed. Also it has heterodiametric
spores.

Compare:

http://mushroomhobby.com/...

This there on the micro photographs is not cheilocystidia, but the most ordinary
basidioles. Yes, I know, Entoloma can be frustrating.

But what don’t you like about N. pseudostrictia — it tends to fruit
exactly now, late winter to early Spring.

Compare:

http://mushroomhobby.com/...

Of course, there are several other Nolanea that also fruit later int he season.

Have fun,

It looks like that description is right-on “clavate cheilocystidia”.

But I definitely sympathize – interpreting what one sees under the microscope is a definite challenge sometimes, especially in groups with specialized micro-morphology (ie. the crystal-encrusted cystidia of Inocybe or the non-cheilocystidia of Amanita – see Rod Tulloss’ corrections of my recent posting of “Amanita pantherina”). Pictures can help a lot, ESPECIALLY if you take your own for comaprison.
Practice helps most.

This is a helpful site from Machiel Noordelos:
http://www.entoloma.nl/html/engels.html