How to tell Liberty cap from Deadly webcap

The cap is small, 1-2.5 cm across, sharply conical or bell-shaped with a pronounced pointed knob in the centre, which gives it the epithet semilanceata ("half-lance-shaped"). The cap skin is smooth, slimy in wet weather, dry with lengthwise grooves in dry weather. The colour is ochre-cream; olive-brown with a greenish tint when wet, pale cream when dry. The pointed central knob is the most characteristic diagnostic feature.

The cap is 3 to 8 cm across. It starts conical or bell-shaped, then becomes convex and flattened, but keeps a bump in the middle. The bump is often pointed but can be blunt, so it isn't a reliable feature.

The colour is tawny orange, fox brown or reddish brown. The surface is dry, finely felty and fibrous, sometimes finely scaly towards the margin.

The gills are attached to the stem and moderately crowded. In young mushrooms they're greyish-cream, darkening to purplish-blackish as the spores mature. The spore print is dark purple-black, a diagnostic feature of the genus Psilocybe.

The gills are true, thin and broad, fairly widely spaced and attached to the stem. In young specimens they're ochre to cinnamon-orange and hidden by a cobweb-like veil stretching from the cap edge to the stem. As the spores ripen, the gills turn rusty brown.

The spore print is rusty brown. Those true gills are what separate it from chanterelles, which have only thick, forked ridges underneath.

The stem is 5-10 cm tall and 0.15-0.3 cm thick, so very long and thin, often curved. The colour is yellow-cream to light brown, and the surface is smooth with fine lengthwise fibres. There is no ring, and this is essential. It often turns blue when damaged, a characteristic psilocybin reaction and one of the diagnostic tests.

The stem is 5 to 12 cm tall and 0.5 to 1.5 cm thick, cylindrical, slightly thickened or tapering at the base. It's the same colour as the cap or paler, with a fibrous surface.

The key feature is yellow to golden bands or a zigzag pattern left by the veil, clearest on young specimens. On old ones they can almost disappear.

The flesh is very thin, soft, yellowish to greenish. It quickly turns blue to blue-green when cut or damaged, a characteristic reaction of psilocybin alkaloids on contact with air. The smell is faint, mealy in some populations.

The flesh is yellowish to orange-yellow, rusty brown at the stem base, and doesn't change colour when cut.

Faint, neutral or mealy, nothing distinctive. The smell is not a warning sign.

The smell is faint and slightly radish-like. It won't help you identify it. Never taste it, not even a small piece: the toxin works in small amounts.