Details about map content are available here Click on the map dots to view record details.
Species Information
Summary: {See also Elfin Saddle Table.} Features include 1) a pale gray-brown cap that is irregularly lobed to 2-lobed and saddle-shaped, the margin inrolled at first, becoming reflexed [bent down] when mature, 2) a cap underside that is finely pubescent to pubescent [downy], and 3) a solid white stem that is round in cross-section or shallowly fluted at the base. The description is derived from Abbott(1).
Collections were examined from ID, AB, MB, ON, IA, MI, France, Norway, and United Kingdom, (Abbott(1)). There is a collection from BC as Helvella stevensii Peck at the Pacific Forestry Center.
Cap: 0.3-1.6cm across, 0.5-1.5cm high, irregularly lobed to bilobate [with 2 lobes] and saddle-shaped, margin inrolled at first, becoming reflexed [bent down] when mature; pale gray-brown to medium brown fresh, when dried pale yellow brown to brown; smooth to slightly undulate-rugose [wavy-wrinkled]
Underside: cream to pallid gray brown; finely pubescent to pubescent
Stem: 0.6-2.0 x 0.1-0.5cm, equal or slightly widened to base, top typically tapered, round in cross-section or shallowly fluted at base, internally solid; white, when dried cream to pallid grayish yellow-brown; finely pubescent to pubescent
Microscopic: spores (16.5)18.6-19.9(20.8) x (10.9)11.4-12.4 microns, broadly elliptic, smooth, colorless, with one droplet; asci 290-330 x 13.3-15.6 microns; paraphyses 5.1-8.6 microns wide at tip, clavate, widening gradually to tip, colorless, contents finely granular
Habitat / Range
gregarious on soil or litter in hardwood, mixed, or coniferous woods, from June 27 in ID to August 29 in MB
Similar Species
Helvella compressa is darker in the color of the upper surface, the underside is villose, and the RANGE of collections examined only overlaps in ID, H. compressa being the western species, (Abbott). Helvella albella is separable by color, and the cap margin is less strongly rolled over the upper surface in initial stages, (Abbott). Helvella elastica has its cap margin bent down (rather than inrolled upward initially), the stem is hollow, and the underside is bald, (Abbott).
