Common and widespread throughout eastern North America, A. flavoconia grows on the ground in broad-leaved and mixed forests, especially in mycorrhizal association with hemlock.

Amanita flavoconia was first described by American naturalist George Francis Atkinson in 1902, based on a specimen he found in woods north of Fall Creek, Cayuga Lake Basin, New York.

[3] Jean-Edouard Gilbert placed it in Amplariella, in 1941,[4] while in 1948 William Alphonso Murrill thought that it belonged best in Venenarius;[1][5] both of these segregate genera have been folded back into Amanita.

[7] Young specimens are covered with chrome yellow warts that may be easily rubbed off or washed away with rain.

In the era prior to the commonplace use of DNA analysis and phylogenetics, cultural characters were often used to help provide additional taxonomic information; they found considerable variability between different isolates.

[14] The outer layer, or cuticle of the cap (known technically as the pileipellis) is made of filamentous interwoven gelatinized hyphae, with diameters between 3 and 7 μm.

[11] A common mycorrhizal mushroom, A. flavoconia grows solitary or in groups on the ground in the summer to the fall, in broad-leaved and mixed woods.

[7] In North America, A. flavoconia has a wide distribution and has been collected from several locations, including Ontario, Canada;[15] the United States[11] (Iowa),[16] and Mexico.