Puffball

Template:Short description {{#invoke:other uses|otheruses}} Template:Multiple image

Puffballs are a type of fungus featuring a ball-shaped fruit body that (when mature) bursts on contact or impact, releasing a cloud of dust-like spores into the surrounding area. Puffballs belong to the division Basidiomycota and encompass several genera, including Calvatia, Calbovista and Lycoperdon.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The puffballs were previously treated as a taxonomic group called the Gasteromycetes or Gasteromycetidae, but they are now known to be a polyphyletic assemblage.

The distinguishing feature of all puffballs is that they do not have an open cap with spore-bearing gills. Instead, spores are produced internally, in a spheroidal fruit body called a gasterothecium (gasteroid 'stomach-like' basidiocarp). As the spores mature, they form a mass called a gleba in the centre of the fruitbody that is often of a distinctive color and texture. The basidiocarp remains closed until after the spores have been released from the basidia. Eventually, it develops an aperture, or dries, becomes brittle, and splits, and the spores escape. The spores of puffballs are statismospores rather than ballistospores, meaning they are not forcibly extruded from the basidium. Puffballs and similar forms are thought to have evolved convergently (that is, in numerous independent events) from Hymenomycetes by gasteromycetation, through secotioid stages. Thus, 'Gasteromycetes' and 'Gasteromycetidae' are now considered to be descriptive, morphological terms (more properly gasteroid or gasteromycetes, to avoid taxonomic implications) but not valid cladistic terms.

True puffballs do not have a visible stalk or stem, while stalked puffballs do have a stalk that supports the gleba. None of the stalked puffballs are edible as they are tough and woody mushrooms.<ref name="MushroomsNA"/> The Hymenogastrales and Enteridium lycoperdon, a slime mold, are the false puffballs. A gleba which is powdery on maturity is a feature of true puffballs, stalked puffballs and earthstars. False puffballs are hard like rock or brittle. All false puffballs are inedible, as they are tough and bitter to taste. The genus Scleroderma, which has a young purple gleba, should also be avoided.<ref name="MushroomsNA">Template:Cite book</ref>

Puffballs were traditionally used in Tibet for making ink by burning them, grinding the ash, then putting them in water and adding glue liquid and "a Template:Transliteration decoction", which, when pressed for a long time, made a black dark substance that was used as ink.<ref>Cuppers, Christoph (1989). "On the Manufacture of Ink." Ancient Nepal – Journal of the Department of Archaeology, Number 113, August–September 1989, p. 5.</ref> Rural Americans burned the common puffball with some kind of bee smoker to anesthetize honey bees as a means to safely procure honey; the practice later inspired experimental medicinal application of the puffball smoke as a surgical general anesthetic in 1853.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Edibility and identification

File:Puffball fungai.jpg

Cloud of spores poofs out of a puffball fungus

While most puffballs are not poisonous, some often look similar to young agarics, and especially the deadly Amanitas, such as the death cap or destroying angel mushrooms. Young puffballs in the edible stage, before maturation of the gleba, have undifferentiated white flesh within, whereas the gills of immature Amanita mushrooms can be seen if they are closely examined. They can be very toxic.

File:Puffball Mushrooms On Sale.jpg

Puffball mushrooms on sale at a market in England

The giant puffball, Calvatia gigantea (earlier classified as Lycoperdon giganteum), reaches Template:Convert or more in diameter, and is difficult to mistake for any other fungus. It has been estimated that, when mature, a large specimen of this fungus will produce around 7 × 10¹² spores, which is more than any other known organism.

Not all true puffball mushrooms are without stalks.Template:Inconsistent Some may also be stalked, such as the Podaxis pistillaris, which is also called the "false shaggy mane". There are also a number of false puffballs that look similar to the true ones.<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>

File:Common puffball, releasing spores in a burst by compressing the body.webm

Common puffball, releasing spores in a burst by compressing the body

Stalked

Stalked puffballs species:<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>

• Battarrea phalloides
• Calostoma cinnabarina (Stalked Puffball-in-Aspic)<ref name="expert">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

|CitationClass=web }}</ref>

• Pisolithus tinctorius
• Tulostoma (genus)

True

True puffballs genera and species:<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>

• Bovista – various species, including:
  • Bovista aestivalis
  • Bovista dermoxantha
  • Bovista nigrescens
  • Bovista plumbea
• Calvatia – various species, including:
  • Calvatia bovista
  • Calvatia craniiformis
  • Calvatia cyathiformis<ref name="MushroomsNA"/><ref name="expert"/>
  • Calvatia gigantea<ref name="MushroomsNA"/><ref name="expert"/>
  • Calvatia booniana
  • Calvatia fumosa
  • Calvatia lepidophora
  • Calvatia pachyderma
  • Calvatia sculpta
  • Calvatia subcretacea – edible<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
  • Calbovista subsculpta
• Handkea – various species, including:
  • Handkea utriformis
• Lycoperdon – various species, including:
  • Lycoperdon candidum
  • Lycoperdon echinatum
  • Lycoperdon fusillum
  • Lycoperdon umbrinum
• Scleroderma – various species, including:
  • Scleroderma auratium
  • Scleroderma geaster – not edible<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

False

False puffballs species:<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>

• • Endoptychum agaricoides
  • Nivatogastrium nubigenum
  • Podaxis pistillaris
  • Rhizopogon rubescens
  • Truncocolumella citrina

Classification

File:Lycoperdon pyriforme Sasata scale.jpg

Apioperdon pyriforme

File:Lycoperdon echinatum - Vesse de loup hérissée.JPG

Lycoperdon echinatum

Major orders:

• Agaricales (including now-obsolete orders Lycoperdales, Tulostomatales, and Nidulariales)
  • Basidiomycetes: Agaricales: Lycoperdaceae: Calvatia
    • Calvatia booniana<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>
    • Calvatia bovista (Handkea utriformis)
    • Calvatia craniiformis<ref name="expert"/>
    • Calvatia cyathiformis<ref name="MushroomsNA"/><ref name="expert"/>
    • Calvatia fumosa (Handkea fumosa)<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>
    • Calvatia gigantea<ref name="MushroomsNA"/><ref name="expert"/>
    • Calvatia lepidophora<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>
    • Calvatia rubroflava<ref name="expert"/>
    • Calvatia sculpta<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>
    • Calvatia subcretacea (Handkea subcretacea)<ref name="MushroomsNA"/>
  • Basidiomycetes: Agaricales: Lycoperdaceae: Lycoperdon
    • Lycoperdon foetidum (Lycoperdon nigrescens)
    • Lycoperdon perlatum<ref name="expert"/>
    • Lycoperdon pulcherrimum<ref name="expert"/>
    • Lycoperdon pusillum
    • Lycoperdon pyriforme
  • Basidiomycetes: Agaricales: Lycoperdaceae: Vascellum
    • Vascellum curtisii<ref name="expert"/>
    • Vascellum pratense – edible when interior is white<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
• Geastrales and Phallales (related to Cantharellales),
  • Basidiomycetes: Phallales: Geastraceae: Geastrum
    • Geastrum coronatum
    • Geastrum fornicatum
    • Geastrum saccatum<ref name="expert"/>
• Sclerodermatales (related to Boletales)
  • Basidiomycetes: Boletales: Sclerodermataceae: Scleroderma
    • Scleroderma areolatum<ref name="expert"/>
    • Scleroderma bovista<ref name="expert"/>
    • Scleroderma cepa
    • Scleroderma citrinum<ref name="expert"/>
    • Scleroderma meridionale<ref name="expert"/>
    • Scleroderma michiganense<ref name="expert"/>
    • Scleroderma polyrhizum<ref name="expert"/>
    • Scleroderma septentrionale<ref name="expert"/>
• Various false-truffles (hypogaeic gasteromycetes) related to different hymenomycete orders

Similarly, the true truffles (Tuberales) are gasteroid Ascomycota. Their ascocarps are called tuberothecia.

See also

• Lycoperdonosis

References

• Homobasidiomycetes at the Tree of Life Web Project