This is one of our more beautiful endemic native forest agarics, collected on all
islands in this habitat type.  Hygrocybe noelokelani   belongs in sect. Glutinosae ,
subsect. Psittacinae ,  where it is most closely allied with H. laeta  (Pers.: Fr.) Kummer
from North America and Europe, and Gliophorus pallidus  Horak, G. graminicolor
Horak and G. lilacipes  Horak from New Zealand.  The native Hawaiian species
differs from all of these in lacking yellow, orange, grey or violet tones in the pileus,
in lacking an odor, and in having much broader basidiospores.  There are actually two
new varieties of this species in the Hawaiian Islands, var. noelokelani  with clamp
connections, and var. defibulata  that lacks clamp connections.  The epithet
"noelokelani" is Hawaiian for "the pink rose in the mist."