Details about map content are available here Click on the map dots to view record details.
Species Information
Summary: Features include confluent masses of minute orange cushion-shaped fruitbodies surrounded by cobwebby mycelium, growth on burned or sterilized soil, and microscopic characters. Hansen, L.(1) gives this as synonym of Pyronema confluens (Pers.) Tul. & C. Tul.
Pyronema omphalodes is found in BC, WA, ID, AB, CA, and UT, (Larsen), Europe, Australia, and probably world-wide (Seaver), and specifically in the United Kingdom (Dennis), and Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden, (Hansen, L.).
Upper surface: usually not over 0.1-0.2cm, usually convex, pale orange (slightly yellowish to bright orange, sometimes with a purplish tinge), soon becoming confluent and forming congested masses several centimeters in diameter, "surrounded by a dense superficial white mycelial growth", (Seaver), up to 0.1cm across but often confluent in large patches, pulvinate [cushion-shaped], light red to reddish orange, without a raised margin, (Dennis)
Underside: bald (Hansen, L.)
Stem: none (Hansen, L.), surrounded by a conspicuous cobweb-like white mycelium, (Dennis)
Microscopic: spores 10-13 x 5-8 microns, elliptic, smooth, colorless, 1-seriate, asci 8-spored, cylindric or nearly cylindric, 150 x 10-14 microns; paraphyses "rather stout, very slightly enlarged above, reaching a diameter of 6-7 microns at their apices, filled with orange granules", (Seaver), spores 11-15 x 6.5-8.5 microns, elliptic, smooth, without oil droplets; asci up to 150 x 15 microns, not turning blue with iodine; paraphyses simple, slightly clavate, tips 3-4 microns wide, (Dennis), spores 11-15 x 6.5-8.5 microns (Breitenbach), spores 14-16.5 x 8-9.5 microns, fruitbodies without hairs, (Hansen, L.)
Habitat / Range
on burned places, in greenhouses on steamed soil or soil that has been sterilized by dry heat, (Seaver), on burned ground, throughout the year, (Dennis), already one to two weeks after a burn, fruiting all year, (Hansen, L.)
Similar Species
Pyronema domesticum differs especially by larger spores 15-17 x 10-11.5 microns. Its color tends toward salmon-pink (but varies from orange-red to smoked-salmon-color), (Breitenbach(1)). P. domesticum has larger spores 16-20 x 10-12 microns, and apothecia have microscopic pointed hairs, (Hansen, L.(1)). P. domesticum "is highly variable in color, often ranging from red to pink, salmon, ivory, and pure white within a single collection. It is characterized by definite hairs on the exterior surface of the fruitbodies, particularly near the margin." (Beug(3)). In North America the greenhouse invader is Pyronema domesticum, although P. omphalodes has been found in greenhouses in Japan, (Beug(3)). Iodophanus carneus is usually on dung, wet rags, etc. but according to Beug(3) occurs in burn areas. I. carneus is whitish, yellowish, or pinkish, has a pubescent exterior that later becomes bald, and has delicately warted [use oil immersion] or wrinkled spores that measure 17-22 x 10-12 microns, (Beug(3)). Anthracobia species have tufts of brown hairs on the exterior, may be closely packed but are not confluent, and lack the conspicuous white cobwebby subiculum of P. omphalodes. See also SIMILAR section of Anthracobia macrocystis and Anthracobia melaloma.
Seaver(1), Dennis(1), Larsen(1), Hansen, L.(1) (as P. confluens, giving P. omphalodes as a synonym), Courtecuisse(1)*, Buczacki(1)*, Desjardin(6)*, Beug(3)*, Breitenbach(1) References for the fungi
