Lycoperdon species- Shimla

 
 

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[efloraofindia:33359] Mushroom from Shimla_RVS05 : Attachments (1). 13 posts by 6 authors.
Forming beautiful small colonies.

Lycoperdon sp not quit sure about the species. Can be Lycoperdon ovalicaudatum but not sure !!

Lycoperdon ovalicaudatum seems to be a recently described species, and no photos available in the net yet.
can it be young L. perlatum, the common puffball?

Can be !! but without a close look and photos from different angles I cant confirm a species if I do this will be ambiguous even spore colour can differentiate a species in fungi. So I can’t take the risk ..

To me this look like Lycoperdon pyriforme. It looks similar to one which I collected from Jagdalpur, Bastar (Chhatisgarh) when I was posted there.

The same thing I will also tell you i.e. Can be!! I will never move into the species level of a fungus when there is any ambiguity. Identification of fungus is bit tough than that of plants and the photo provided by … delimits the morphology of the organism to a certain percentage. Hence I will not make any ambiguous comment regarding species. Please dont mind but I follow this strict rule when it comes to identification of fungi. I know many people from fungal taxonomy who make such hasty decision and ultimately most of there identification goes into vain. Kindly forgive me.

Thanks …, for the clue. When we were conducting botanical survey in Bastar (Jagdalpur), we noticed some tribes (Kond?) collecting edible mushroom. These mushrooms were not seen above the soil but were subterranean, and these people were able to find the location and collect them, by using a sharp digger. Right now i have no access to the photos. But these mushrooms were small, 2-3 cm across, nearly globose and brown. Any idea about their id?

I hope these are “Truffle ” please see from the link

Here is special gift for you from Agronomist by education i.e. me.
Some Mushroom species of Bastar.
http://ecoport.org/ep?SearchType=pdb&PdbID=96171
http://ecoport.org/ep?SearchType=pdb&PdbID=99092
http://ecoport.org/ep?SearchType=pdb&PdbID=99093
http://ecoport.org/ep?SearchType=pdb&PdbID=98490
http://ecoport.org/ep?SearchType=pdb&PdbID=98079

I have prepared plus 10 GB report on traditional medicinal uses of these mushrooms.

Thank you … Nice collection of mushrooms!

There are two genera of truffles which grow underground – Tuber and Elaphomyces. Identification depends on colour, size etc. Some such ball like fungi needs to be cut in half to see their internal structure. There is another genus, Phallus which in its initial stages is egg like. When in B Sc we used to confuse it for Lycoperdon. But by touching it u can feel it is mucilaginous inside and cutting it into half will reveal everything. So just pics are not enough to identify a fleshy fungus.

truffles are supposed to be very expensive mushrooms, at least the ones found in Europe. They grow underground and are difficult for human beings to locate. People go with Pigs to search Truffles. Pigs supposed to have better sense for smell, even better that dogs. Truffles are always located by pigs.
I haven’t seen any pigs on the airport searching drugs, anyways :-)))))