This species is distributed in the Americas from the eastern USA south to Colombia. The black pigmentation, wooly pileus and stipe, rufescence then blackening on injury, and globose spores with sparrasoid to verrucose ornamentations are diagnostic (SEM & light micrographs below left). Differences in the quality of the surface scales of the pileus between S. confusus and S. floccopus have been championed by several boletologists as a way of distinguishing between the two. However, the only reliable method to tell them apart is to examine the spore ornamentation. Known in Costa Rica from Guanacaste south to the Cordillera Talamanca. Strobilomyces has been documented for Costa Rica by L. D. Gómez [Brenesia 38: 95-103. 1992(1995)].