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Species Information
Summary:
Not available
Fruiting body: 2-8cm tall, cylindric to spindle- or club-shaped, (i.e., with a slightly swollen upper fertile region, but lacking a well-defined "head"); often with a longitudinal furrow. Upper (fertile) portion of club'' 0.2-0.6cm wide, "orange to orange-buff to orange-red, finely roughened or pimpled by the slightly protruding perithecia (flasklike nests of asci)", (Arora), up to 5cm tall, with head tapering into stem, red or orange throughout the head about 0.5cm wide, cylindric-fusiform and minutely roughened from perithecial ostioles, (Dennis), head 1-2cm high, 0.5cm wide, reddish orange, (Lincoff(2))
Stem: often curved or wavy; usually paler; smooth, (Arora), slender, flexuous [wavy], passing imperceptibly into head, (Dennis), 3-4cm x 0.3-0.5cm, slender and tapering to base; red-orange or paler, smooth, (Lincoff(2))
Microscopic: spores thread-like, multiseptate, smooth, colorless, breaking up into one-celled, barrel-shaped segments averaging 2-6 x 1-1.5 microns, (Arora), 300-500 x 1-1.5 microns, thread-like and many cells, breaking into part-spores 3.5-6 x 1-1.5 microns, barrel-shaped, smooth, (Lincoff(2)), spores "thread-like, as long as the ascus, breaking into part-spores which become slightly barrel-shaped, 3.5-6 x 1-1.5 microns"; asci 8-spored, very long, about 4 microns wide, with thick-walled apex; perithecia completely immersed, (Dennis)
Habitat / Range
single to gregarious or clustered on buried pupae (or less commonly caterpillars) of moths and butterflies, (Arora), usually single, on larvae and pupae of moths and butterflies, which are usually buried in soil, (Dennis), single to several "on the ground or in humus or well-decayed wood"; late summer and fall, (Miller)
Similar Species
Cordyceps washingtonensis is similar but with a whitish to yellow fruitbody, (Arora).
