Summary:
Also listed in Truffles etc. category. Montagnea arenaria is at first deeply buried and enclosed in a tough membrane, then expands as the ruptured outer skin forms a volva at the base of the stem. The mature fruiting body has a stem and a cap (all but the cap disc (cap center) soon splitting into spore-bearing plates). The online Species Fungorum, accessed December 15, 2015, gave the name as Montagnea arenaria (DC.) Zeller as above, and it would seem that the Latin word ''arenarius'' meaning ''sandy'' should agree with the ending of the genus named after Montagne, but Zeller called it Montagnea arenarius when combining the name in 1943. The description is derived from Arora(1).

Cap:
1-3.5cm across, merely a thin disc-like expansion of the stem, convex becoming flat or depressed, persistent, all but the disc soon splitting into spore-bearing plates; "white to grayish, buff, or occasionally straw-colored"; surface smooth, often with a volval patch or remnants, margin often tattered or fringed when old

Flesh:
in stem white when fresh

Gills:
spore mass exposed at maturity, composed of thin plates that radiate or hang from the margin of the disc-like cap and are entirely free from stem, plates often wavy or curled up, up to 3.5(6)cm long, reddish-black to blackish when mature, eventually falling off the cap or disintegrating but not deliquescing

Stem:
(5)8-30cm x 0.2-1.5(2.5)cm, percurrent [going through cap], more or less equal or often narrowing downward, "hollow, tough or almost woody when old and dry (but very light)", white to buff or sometimes discoloring darker when old; "smooth or longitudinally fibrillose-striate, often splitting or cracking into fibrillose or shaggy scales", volva at base of stem sac-like, "usually buried in soil, loose (often remaining in ground), two-layered, the outer layer white and ample, the inner layer composed of tough fibers"

Veil:
absent or rudimentary

Microscopic spores:
spores (7.5)12-20(28) x (4.5)6-11(14) microns, elliptic to nearly round, smooth, with germ pore, capillitium absent

Spore deposit:
print not obtainable

Notes:
Arora(1) mentions distribution in the arid and semi-arid parts of western North America (from Mexico and TX to CA, OR, and eastern WA). Collections were examined from OR, AZ, NM, Texas, Mexico, Russia, and Algeria, (Zeller). There are collections at the University of British Columbia from BC, AZ, CA, and NM. There are collections at the College of Idaho from ID and Mexico.

EDIBILITY

too tough and thin

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Arcangeliella caudata Zeller & C.W. Dodge