About Huautla (Psilocybe cubensis): Name, Origin Claims and Spore Traits Mushrooms
Updated: October 9, 2026
Mushroom spores are sold strictly for microscopy and research purposes only. Cultivation of Psilocybin-containing fungi is illegal in many jurisdictions. This page is not a guide to finding, growing, or taking mushrooms.
Short answer: Huautla is a trade name for material sold as Psilocybe Cubensis (Earle) Singer. It is not a separate species, a published variety, or a recognised variant. Sellers say it is named for, or comes from, Huautla de Jiménez, a Mazatec town in Oaxaca, Mexico. No voucher or published record backs that up, the dates and the collector credits that sellers give conflict, and nothing documents a link between the trade line and the people or the history the town is known for. Under a microscope, a sample shows the spore characters of P. cubensis, which cannot confirm the label or the origin.
Home » Strain Encyclopedia » Psilocybe Cubensis » Huautla
In this guide
- What Huautla is
- Taxonomy
- What is documented and what is lore
- Spore and cap traits
- Origin claims, source by source
- The town, the trade name and the history
- Names and spellings
- Identifying it, and what a microscope can't tell you
- Examining a slide
- Mushly products
- Legal note
- References
- FAQ
What Huautla is
Huautla is one of many named lines of Psilocybe cubensis in Mushly's all-strains library. The name is a catalogue label used by spore sellers. It describes a product and not a taxon, and a town in the name is a seller's claim and not a specimen record. For the difference between a species and a trade name, see our species vs strain primer and the Psilocybe cubensis species guide.
"Huautla is a trade name for Psilocybe cubensis, not a species or published variety, and it is not documented as coming from Huautla de Jiménez. Sellers name the Oaxaca town; dates and collector credits conflict. Claims compared."
Taxonomy
| Rank | Entry |
|---|---|
| Kingdom | Fungi |
| Phylum | Basidiomycota |
| Class | Agaricomycetes |
| Order | Agaricales |
| Family | Placement varies by source: Index Fungorum, Species Fungorum and NCBI list Agrocybaceae, while Wikipedia and many other references use Hymenogastraceae |
| Genus | Psilocybe |
| Species | Psilocybe cubensis (Earle) Singer, Sydowia 2(1-6): 37 (1948) |
| Basionym | Stropharia cubensis Earle (1906), described from Cuba. The type is from Cuba, not from this trade line. |
| Trade name | Huautla (informal) |
Species records: Index Fungorum 290107, the Species Fungorum synonymy and NCBI Taxonomy 181762. None lists Huautla.
What is documented and what is lore
| Question | Status |
|---|---|
| Is Huautla a species or published variety? | No. The only formal name is Psilocybe cubensis. |
| Spore size and shape | Published for the species only, with no Huautla-specific measurements. |
| From Huautla de Jiménez | Seller claim only. No voucher or herbarium record is published. |
| Collected by "Club99" | Credited by several sellers. Unverified. |
| Date | Conflicting: mid-2001 in two strain lists, "recent collection" elsewhere, and none in others. |
| Any link to the town's history | Not documented. Seller pages mention the history without tying the strain to it. |
| Published literature using the line name | None is known. |
Spore and cap traits
Short answer: the published measurements describe the species, not this name.
Singer and Smith's 1958 Mycologia monograph (Mycological investigations on Teonanácatl) describes P. cubensis spores as:
- Size: 11.5-17.3 × 8-11.5 × 7-9 µm
- Surface: smooth, with a thick, complex wall
- Apex: truncate, from a distinct apical pore
- Colour in a mountant: dark yellow brown in KOH, dark olive brown in NH4OH
The KOH and NH4OH colours are mountant colours, not spore-print colours. The paper does not mention Huautla. Guzmán et al. (2012) give a second species-level range of (12-)13-15(-17) × 8-10(-11) × 7-9 µm.
Seller descriptions are not diagnostic, and they differ. Caps are "golden to caramel-colored" and "often flatten as they mature" (Zombie Myco), while PNW Spore's image text says "brown and beige caps." These are descriptions and not measurements. None of the pages we checked gives a measured spore size for this label, and syringe volumes such as 10 cc or 12 cc are not spore sizes. Record what you actually see on your own slide.
Origin claims
Short answer: the sellers agree on the town's name and almost nothing else.
| Source | What it says |
|---|---|
| PNW Spore | "Comes from the Oaxaca state of Mexico, near the village of Huautla de Jiminez." Names no collector or date. |
| Zombie Myco | "Takes its name from the town of Huautla de Jiménez." Lists the cross as "None." Names no collector or date for the strain. |
| OnlySpores | "Named after Huautla de Jiménez, a town in the Oaxaca region of Mexico." Names no collector or date. |
Notice the wording: two sellers say the strain is named for the town, and one says it comes from near it. That is not the same claim. A repeated claim is still one claim, and a place name in a product title is not a collection record. We do not state a place, a collector or a year as fact, and we do not state a parent.
The town, the trade name and the history
Huautla de Jiménez is a town and municipality in Oaxaca, associated with the Mazatec people, according to Wikipedia, which also describes the place's wider fame after a 1957 Life magazine article. Seller pages bring that history up. PNW Spore, for example, tells the story of a 1955 visit and a local healer, and says nothing about collecting this strain. OnlySpores mentions the same healer as a resident of the region and says explicitly that the link is to the town. No source that links the trade line to any person or tradition connected with the town is known, and a name taken from a place does not carry the history of that place. For a different species with a type locality in Oaxaca, see our Psilocybe mexicana page, which covers a species formally described from the state.
Names and spellings
Sellers use Huautla, and some sell an Albino Huautla line. No source showing that the two share genetics is known, and a shared prefix is not a lineage. Record the exact label, supplier and date on every sample.
Identifying it
Short answer: microscopy supports a species-level note, not a strain identity.
- What a match shows: smooth, thick-walled spores with a truncate apex and germ pore, within the published species range, support P. cubensis as the species to compare. Ramírez-Cruz et al. 2013 notes that spore characters overlap across Psilocybe.
- What it cannot show: that a packet is Huautla rather than another cubensis label, or that it came from Oaxaca.
- Chemistry: Mushly makes no claims about the chemical content of Huautla, and no published laboratory analysis under this name is known.
Examining a slide
Follow the general method in our Golden Teacher guide and the mushroom spores guide, and then:
- Measure at least 20 spores (length × width) and record the magnification and mountant.
- Note the germ pore, the wall, and the shape in face and side view.
- Record the colour in the mountant and the print colour separately.
- Write down the exact label (Huautla), supplier and date.
- Remember the limit: a fit to P. cubensis does not prove the Huautla label.
Mushly products
Mushly does not currently list a syringe, print or multi-pack named Huautla. This page is a reference note and not a product page. To study related lines, browse our spore syringes for microscopy or see the Psilocybe cubensis strain list.
Legal note
Mushly offers spores for microscopy, taxonomy, and mycological research. Laws on spores, and on psilocybin-containing mushrooms, differ by country and by U.S. state, and cultivation of psilocybin- or psilocin-containing species is illegal under U.S. federal law and in many other jurisdictions. Check the law where you live before ordering.
Browse spore syringes · Strain library · Mushroom spores for microscopy guide
References
- Index Fungorum 290107; Species Fungorum synonymy; NCBI Taxonomy 181762
- Singer, R. & Smith, A.H. (1958), Mycologia 50
- Guzmán et al. 2012, Mycotaxon 119: 65-81
- Ramírez-Cruz et al. 2013, Canadian Journal of Botany
- Wikipedia: Huautla de Jiménez (location only)
- Seller claims (not papers, not verified): PNW Spore; Zombie Myco; OnlySpores; Sporeworks, Mushroom Man Mycology, SporeStore, Ralphsters and Inoculate the World
What is Huautla?