| | The families of mushrooms and toadstools represented in Britain and Ireland |
‘Truffles’.
Morphology. The fruit-bodies producing asci and ascospores; tuberous to globose (thick walled, solid, often ornamented, the asci forming in irregular, marbled veins separated by sterile strands, interascal tissue absent at least at maturity); small to large; 0.5–7(–9) cm across; foxy reddish-brown (Tuber rufum), or purplish brown to dark brown, or blackish; cleistothecial; tuberous or globose and subterranean, the asci and spores produced from an enclosed hymenium; stromata absent. The asci more or less globose; asci inoperculate; without obvious apical thickening; more or less thick walled (and indehiscent, usually with fewer than 8 spores). The walls of the asci not staining blue with iodine. The ascospores usually strongly ornamented; brown; simple; without appendages; without a mucilaginous sheath.
The hyphae without clamp connections. The hyphal walls lamellate, double layered, with both layers electron dense.
Ecology. Mycorrhizal. The fruit-bodies subterranean. Found in broad-leaved woodland.
Representation in Britain and Ireland. 18 species in Britain (mostly in Tuber); Choiromyces, Tuber.
World representation. 87 species; genera 6. “Widespread”.
Classification. Ascomycota; Ascomycetes; Pezizomycetidae; Pezizales.
Comments. Tuber aestivum edible (but esteemed less than the mainland-European Truffle, T. melanosporum). ‘Operculate Discomycetes’.
Illustrations. • Tuber aestivum and Tuber rufum (LH). TUBERACEAE. 1, Tuber rufum; 2, Tuber aestivum. Sunesen & Dahlstrøm, in Lange & Hora (1965). • Tuber aestivum (Berkeley). TUBERACEAE. 2, Tuber aestivum Vittad. (Peasant's Truffle). PYRONEMATACEAE. 1, Fimaria hepatica (Batsch) Brumm. ELAPHOMYCETACEAE. 3, Elaphomyces muricatus Fr. CLAVICIPITACEAE. 4, Cordyceps militaris (L.) Link; 5, Cordyceps entomorrhiza (Dicks.) Fr.; 7, Claviceps purpurea (Fr.) Tul. HYPOCREACEAE. 6, Podostroma alutaceum (Pers.) G.F. Atk. From Berkeley (1860).
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2008 onwards. The families of mushrooms and toadstools represented in Britain and Ireland. Version: 5th August 2019. delta-intkey.com’.
