Chemical Reactions: KOH negative, solution leaching to yellow-orange, FeCl3 green, (Methven)
Odor: not distinctive (Methven)
Taste: mild or bitter (Arora), not distinctive or slightly sweet, (Methven), slightly bitter (Miller)
Microscopic: spores 8-18 x 3-6 microns, elongated-elliptic, smooth, (Arora), spores 12-16.5 x 3.5-4.5 microns, "narrowly ellipsoid, boletoid or sway-backed in profile", smooth, thin-walled, inamyloid, colorless to pale yellow in KOH, contents "multiguttulate and refringent to aguttulate and amorphous"; basidia 48-85 x 8-11 microns, clavate, inflated apically when mature, with uninflated clamp connections; leptocystidia scattered and scarcely projecting, 40-75 x 2.5-5 microns, "cylindric to narrowly clavate, at times apically or subapically branched", contents amorphous, colorless to pale yellow in KOH, walls thin and smooth, clamp connections uninflated; hymenium thickening, extending over top of fruitbody; tramal hyphae 4-8 microns wide, interwoven, uninflated, inflated (- 12 microns), or broadly undulate, contents amorphous, colorless to pale yellow in KOH, walls thin or irregularly thickened up to 1 micron when mature, branched, clamp connections uninflated or inflated (- 12 microns), sometimes medallion or ampulliform; gloeoplerous hyphae 2.5-5 microns wide, arising from generative hyphae at clamp connections, uninflated, inflated (- 8 microns), or strangulated, contents subopalescent, pale yellow in KOH, branched, walls thin and smooth, clamp connections uninflated or inflated (- 10.5 microns), sometimes medallion or ampulliform, (Methven)
Spore Deposit: white to pale yellowish (Arora, but Methven specifically says not white), "light buff", "cartridge buff", "pale ochraceous buff", or "pale ochraceous salmon", (Methven), white (Miller)
EDIBILITY
worthless, (Arora)
Habitat and Range
SIMILAR SPECIES
Clavariadelphus sachalinensis: Petersen says "Macrochemically as gross morphologically, it is impossible to separate C. ligulus and C. sachalinensis, but the two are easily distinguished microscopically". C. sachalinensis is distinguished microscopically by the size of the basidia and the spores, (Castellano). Clavariadelphus mucronatus differs in height, shape, and color of the fruitbody, and in spore size, (Methven). See also SIMILAR section of Clavaria maricola and Clavariadelphus occidentalis.
Habitat
scattered to densely gregarious or tufted in humus under conifers, (Arora), scattered to gregarious, on ground, in duff, under mixed conifers, (Methven)