Details about map content are available here Click on the map dots to view record details.
Species Information
Summary: Features include 1) pear-shaped to round, whitish to yellowish to brownish fruiting body without prominent spines, 2) white threads connecting the base to the wood it fruits on, 3) clustered growth, and 4) subgleba that remains white even when mature.
Apioperdon pyriforme is widely distributed and common. New York Botanical Garden has collections from WA, OR, ID, and also AB, ON, AK, AL, CA, CO, CT, FL, GA, IA, IL, IN, KS, KY, LA, MA, ME, MI, MO, MT, ND, NE, NH, NM, NY, OH, PA, SD, UT, WI, Jamaica, Mexico, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Uruguay, Venezuela, Austria, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, (NYBG). It is also reported from AR, AZ, DE, MD, MN, MS, NC, NH, NJ, OK, SC, TN, TX, VA, VT, WV, WY, (Bates). The Pacific Forestry Centre and the University of British Columbia have collections from BC.
Outer Surface: 1.5-5cm high and almost as wide, pear-shaped to nearly spherical; "whitish to pale brown when young", yellowish to dark rusty-brown when old; "at first smooth or with a few small scattered spines on top, then becoming finely cracked to form small patches or minute granules or particles", the outer layer slowly falling away to reveal smooth inner layer in which a pore or tear is slow to form at the top, (Arora), 1-3.5(5)cm wide, 1-5(7)cm high, pear-shaped, club-shaped, head more or less spherical, with abrupt transition to conic stem; white when young, then ocherish and when old chestnut-brown; coarsely granular to finely verrucose [warty], sometimes finely areolate-reticulate, almost blunt spinose on stem; consistency of fruitbody tough, (Breitenbach), outer peridium fairly persistent, feels like a file when the tip of the finger is run over the surface, (Bowerman)
Inner layer: papery, firm; whitish when young, then light to chestnut brown; "rarely entirely smooth"; ruptures at maturity to form a pore at top, (Breitenbach), pore at top irregular, often slit-like (McKnight), opening at the top, where there is a papilla, (Lincoff(1))
Spore Mass: at first firm, finally powdery; white then yellow to olive and finally deep olive-brown, (Arora), in cross section "the gleba and subgleba are white when young, but the gleba becomes olive-brown and cottony-powdery when mature, while the subgleba remains white and small-chambered", (Breitenbach)
Stem: usually with stem-like sterile base that is small or well-developed, spongy when fresh with very small chambers, conspicuous white thread-like rhizomorphs usually radiating from base and connected to others in surrounding wood or humus, (Arora), conic, stem 1/3 to 1/2 the total height of fruiting body; with conspicuous basal rhizomorphs, (Breitenbach)
Microscopic: spores 3-4.5 x 3-4.5 microns, round, smooth, (Arora), spores 3.5-5.5 x 3.5-5.5 microns, round, "smooth, brownish, thick-walled", with droplets; basidia 9-13 x 3-4.5 microns, clavate, without basal clamp connection; capillitium 2.5-6 microns wide, brownish, elastic, branched, without septa, thick-walled, sometimes with bumps, without pores [pits]; paracapillitium 3-6 microns across, brownish, thin-walled, without clamp connections; sphaerocysts "irregularly rounded, fusiform, to polygonal-thorny", (Breitenbach)
Habitat / Range
"scattered to densely gregarious or clustered on stumps, rotting logs, sawdust, and in lignin-rich humus", (Arora), usually "in clusters of up to dozens", more rarely single, on dead, usually rotten wood of hardwoods and conifers, "commonly on stumps and roots, sometimes also on soil, but then always connected to wood by mycelial strands", (Breitenbach), fruits in fall, but spore cases persist throughout year, (McKnight), also on dead Fomes fomentarius (Schalkwijk-Barendsen), summer to fall (Buczacki)
Similar Species
Lycoperdon perlatum grows on the ground and has flesh in the sterile base that turns olive-brown at maturity, while that of A. pyriforme is still white, (Breitenbach). Lycoperdon nigrescens has short spines that lean together to form pyramids, has sterile base tissue that is white but becomes olive-brown, and grows on soil. See also SIMILAR section of Lycoperdon nettyanum and Lycoperdon molle.
