Amanita muscaria, commonly known as the fly agaric or fly amanita, is a basidiomycete of the genus Amanita. It is a large white-gilled, white-spotted, usually red mushroom, and is one of the most recognizable and widely encountered in popular culture. The name of the mushroom in many European languages is thought to derive from its use as an insecticide when sprinkled in milk.
About Amanita muscaria in brief
Amanita muscaria, commonly known as the fly agaric or fly amanita, is a basidiomycete of the genus Amanita. It is a large white-gilled, white-spotted, usually red mushroom, and is one of the most recognizable and widely encountered in popular culture. The name of the mushroom in many European languages is thought to derive from its use as an insecticide when sprinkled in milk. A local variety of the Mushroom was used as an intoxicant and entheogen by the indigenous peoples of Siberia and by the Sámi, and has a religious significance in these cultures. Although classified as poisonous, reports of human deaths resulting from A. muscaria ingestion are extremely rare. After parboiling twice with water draining—which weakens its toxicity and breaks down the mushroom’s psychoactive substances—it is eaten in parts of Europe, Asia, and North America. All Amanita musCaria varieties are noted for their hallucinogenic properties, with the main psychoactive constituents being the neurotoxins ibotenic acid and muscimol. The 1987 edition of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature changed the rules on the starting date and primary work for names of fungi, and names can now be considered valid as far back as May 1, 1753, the date of publication of Carl Linnaeus’s Species Plantarum. The original name was Agaricus muscarius, the specific epithet deriving from Latin musca meaning ‘fly’.
It gained its current name in 1783, when placed in the genus ‘ Amanita by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, a name sanctioned in 1821 by the \”father of mycology\”, Swedish naturalist Elias Magnus Fries. The full name was then Amanita Hook. The English mycologist John Ramsbottom reported that Amanita Muscaria was used for getting rid of bugs in England and Sweden, and was an old name for the species. One compound isolated from the fungus is 1,3-diolein agaricus glycerus, which attracts insects. It has been hypothesised that this compound has been intentionally isolated because of the fly-killing properties of this fungus. A new binomial name has been proposed, Agarus agarus, after Pierre Bulliardus de France and proposed a new binational binomial binomial for the fungus, which has been reported as ‘Agarus’ or ‘Fly Agaric’ The name ‘Amanitas’ has also been proposed as a name for a new species of plant, the Amanita Agaros, which was reported as being more popular in France and the Netherlands. The mushroom is native to the temperate and boreal regions of the Northern Hemisphere, but has been unintentionally introduced to many countries in the Southern Hemisphere, generally as a symbiont with pine and birch plantations. It associates with deciduous and coniferous trees.
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This page is based on the article Amanita muscaria published in Wikipedia (as of Nov. 30, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
