View the spoiler for my guess at what I think it might be, but please first come to your own conclusion before looking at mine — I don’t want to bias your guess.
My guess
Psilocybe cyanescens
They were found in mid-november in the Salish Coast region of Cascadia. They were growing out of woodchips composed of a mixture of western hemlock (majority), and western red cedar.
Side view of one full mature specimen:
A group with a sample of the substrate (the cap appears to be umbonate):
A closeup side view, and internal view of the stem (it appears to be hollow):
Cross section of the gills — they appear to be adnate, or sub-decurrent:
Underside of view of the gills:
Spore print (first on white background (the split is due to two halves), second on a black background):
Examples specimens once dried:
Examples of the colony, and the location/substrate in which it was growing:
Cross-posts:
For clarity, are you saying that there are qualities that can only be taught by first having someone that can already identify the mushroom to then point out the quality that you must memorize for future comparison? Or is it simply a failure of proper communication — ie maybe it is possible to describe these qualities and one is perhaps lacking the sufficient descriptive skills?
I’m saying some mushrooms cannot be identified from photographs, you have to be able to smell, taste, touch, or otherwise interact with the mushroom in person (one mushroom I know of requires hearing!). This is a death-blow to the idea that you can just identify mushrooms from pictures on the internet. Of course some mushrooms cannot even be identified with all of those things, you have to take a spore print and then view the spores under a powerful microscope and be able to measure the spores. Even then some mushrooms cannot be identified to species without a DNA analysis.