Summary: Features include a minute (less than 0.1cm) yellowish fruiting body that is obconic to cup-shaped, with stiff setae arising from the lower and median parts of receptacle, growth on dung, and microscopic characters.
Microscopic: spores (16)18-24(26) x (9)12-14(16) microns, elliptic, rounded at both ends, more or less colorless, smooth-walled, each with a conspicuous deBary bubble, biseriate or obliquely uniseriate; asci 8-spored, 100-215 x 19-36 microns, broadly clavate, rounded in upper part, abruptly constricted in lower part, short pedicellate; paraphyses filiform [thread-like], colorless, septate, simple or branched, slightly inflated to 3.0-4.5 microns at apices, shown in diagram as straight or curved at top; setae 100-450 microns long and 10-24 microns wide at widest part
Notes: Lasiobolus cuniculi was found in ID and OR (atypical specimens in each case), and also ON, CA, CO, CT, FL, NY, WY, Bermuda, Mexico, Czechoslovakia, France, Germany, Switzerland, and the Ukraine (Bezerra). There are collections by O. Ceska from BC at the University of British Columbia.
Habitat and Range
SIMILAR SPECIES
Lasiobolus ciliatus has asci that are cylindric or clavate-cylindric, and setae that are ventricose and up to 42 microns wide at base, whereas L. cuniculi has asci that are broadly clavate, and setae that are subventricose and up to 24 microns wide at the base, (Bezerra). Lasiobolus papillatus has wider asci and narrower setae (Bezerra). Lasiobolus lasioboloides and Lasiobolus intermedius have smaller spores (Bezerra). Lasiobolus macrotrichus and Lasiobolus ruber have longer setae (Bezerra).
Habitat
gregarious on dung of rabbit, hare, sheep, goat, raccoon, cow, horse, and other animals