Contributions to distribution and taxonomy of genus Amanita in Turkey and Bulgaria

In this study, the description of 8 Amanita species by morphological and molecular studies was performed and it was evaluated whether the variations in spore sizes could be a morphological definition criterion. During the spore measurement, the solution effect was also tested. Molecular identification was carried out by performing DNA sequence analyzes of the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS). Different solutions (water, melzer and potassium hydroxide) were used to measure spore sizes and length (L), width (W) and length/width ratio (Q) of the spores were measured. The data obtained were subjected to statistical analysis. According to analyzes, relationship between subgenus x solution interaction was found to be significant in spore length and the longest spore measure was observed in the Melzer solution in Amanita subgenus with 11.60 µm. The shortest spore was recorded in Melzer solution with 9.63 µm in Lepidella subgenus. In spore width, the relationship between subgenus x solution interaction was found to be significant. The largest measurement was recorded in the Melzer solution in the Amanita subgenus and the lowest in the Melzer solution in Lepidella subgenus with 9.36 µm. Differences between Amanita and Lepidella subgenus in terms of Q value were found to be statistically significant and the highest value was obtained from Lepidella (1.31). In species, in spore length measurements, the highest value (12.21 µm) was observed in A. huijsmanii Melzer solution. The lowest value (8.65 µm) was observed in A. citrina again in Melzer solution. It was determined that the highest value measured in spore width (11.35 µm) was in Melzer solution in A. submembranacea and the lowest value was in Melzer solution in A. ovoidea. Keywords: Amanita, Lepidella, ITS, Phylogeny, Spore Dimensions