Species flashcards

Description

Fruiting body: 1–4 cm across, developing underground or slightly protruding from soil, globular and tuberous. The surface is blackish and finely warty; the rind has two layers, thin and black outside, thicker and whitish or grey-pink within.

Fertile layer: Located inside the fruiting body. The gleba is whitish at first, then characteristically greenish-blue for a long time, finally maturing into a dark blackish-brown spore mass.

Stem: No stem is present.

Flesh: Hard, dry and brittle. The odour is usually weak or indistinct; the greenish-blue interior is an important identification feature.

Spores: The mature spore mass is dark blackish-brown. Spores are globose, 18–22 µm in diameter, with an irregular thick-walled reticulum 2.5–3.5 µm high.

Occurrence: May occur throughout the year in humus-rich, acidic deciduous woodland, chiefly underground or among moss cushions. A mycorrhizal species also found near oak and beech; very rare in Hungary.

Edibility: Not edible. It is protected and its fruiting bodies must not be collected or damaged.

Lookalikes: It may resemble common deer truffle, patinated deer truffle, umbilicate deer truffle and other dark-rinded deer truffles. The persistently greenish-blue gleba is especially diagnostic.

Note: Elaphomyces combines Greek words meaning deer and mushroom, referring to underground fungi eaten by deer. The species epithet honours Christiaan Hendrik Persoon, a founder of modern mycology.

Species description: Scientifically described by Carlo Vittadini in 1831.

Taxonomy

1. PhylumAscomycota
2. ClassEurotiomycetes
3. OrderEurotiales
4. FamilyElaphomycetaceae
5. GenusElaphomyces

• Species: Elaphomyces persoonii
• Authority: Vittadini (1831)
• English name: Persoon deer truffle
• Ecological status: mycorrhizal
• Edibility: not edible