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Species Information
Summary: Features of Peziza varia include 1) a cup-shaped to flat fruitbody, 2) upper surface that is gray-brown, 3) underside that is furfuraceous and white to gray-brown, 4) flesh distinctly layered under a hand-lens with up to 5 layers, the middle layer often appearing as a dark line, 5) rudimentary stem, 6) growth on buried or rotting wood, and 7) microscopic characters including moniliform paraphyses. Peziza varia group are common in the Pacific Northwest. We use the term Peziza varia group to cover Peziza varia itself, Peziza cerea (which can be considered synonym of Peziza varia), and Peziza ''repanda'' collections that are compatible with the description of Peziza varia. K. Hansen et al. comment about the use of the species concept of Peziza repanda, "Since the name lacks a type specimen and has been used inconsistently it is best treated as of uncertain application." K. Hansen et al. include Peziza cerea Fr. as a synonym (finding that moniliform paraphyses were a result of moisture and not taxonomically valuable), and point out the ambiguities in the various concepts of the similar Peziza repanda, a name they treat as "of uncertain application". The molecular study of Medardi(1) showed that collections in a clade representing Peziza varia grew on a wide variety of habitats including herbivore dung.
Peziza varia is found at least in ID (Larsen), Switzerland (Breitenbach), United Kingdom (Dennis), Finland and Sweden, (Hansen, L.(1)), Italy and Russia (Medardi), and OR, MA, Denmark, Finland, Russia, and the United Kingdom, (Hansen, K.). There is a Paul Kroeger collection from BC deposited at the University of British Columbia.
Upper surface: 2-6cm across, cup-shaped to saucer-shaped, soon irregularly expanded and flat; spore-bearing upper surface hazelnut-colored to cognac-colored, smooth; margin wavy and weakly notched, (Breitenbach), seldom more than 5cm when fully expanded, cup-shaped but soon flattened or even convex; upper surface light gray-brown at first but soon becoming dark grayish brown, (Dennis), 2.5-6.0cm, "more or less regularly cup-shaped", margin "regular or somewhat wavy"; "pale brown, pale hazelnut", hygrophanous, "dark brown if wet", gray-brownish to whitish when dry; smooth, (Medardi)
Flesh: "under the hand-lens up to 5 layers are distinctly identifiable in cross-section", not especially fragile; whitish, (Breitenbach), watery gray to fawn, often with a dark line visible on cross-section under hand lens, (Dennis)
Underside: whitish to gray-brownish; finely furfuraceous, (Breitenbach), whitish to fawn; scurfy, (Dennis), slightly scurfy (Medardi)
Stem: often with indication of a stem (Breitenbach), often with a rudimentary stem (Dennis), sessile or subsessile (Medardi)
Microscopic: spores 14-16 x 8-10 microns, elliptic, smooth, sometimes slightly punctate, colorless, without droplets; asci 8-spored, 250-300 x 12-13 microns; paraphyses septate, with cells that are "sometimes constricted at the septa, that is, arranged in a row to resemble a chain (moniliform), especially in older specimens", up to 20 microns wide, apical end cells slender; cross-section showing up to 5 layers, with middle layer of longitudinal hyphae, (Breitenbach), spores 14-16 x 9-11 microns, elliptic, smooth; asci up to 280 x 14 microns; paraphyses "mostly with the lower or middle cells much inflated, up to 20 microns wide, apical cells slender, tips slightly clavate"; flesh "conspicuously stratified in five layers, beneath the asci is a subhymenium of small cells, then follows a zone of large subglobose or vertically elongated cells, a zone of slender woven hyphae, a lower zone of large globose cells and finally a surface zone of smaller cells and hyphae", (Dennis), spores 14-16(17.5) x 9-11(12) microns, smooth, colorless, without droplets; asci up to 280 microns long, cylindric, paraphyses clavate to moniliform; excipulum multi-layered: texture globulosa-angularis subhymenium with 5-12 microns broad cells, a 3-layered medullary excipulum (internal or upper texture globulosa-angularis layer with 20-100(110) microns broad cells, median textura intricata, external or lower textura angularis layer with 20-45 microns broad cells), and ectal texture globulosa excipulum with 15-20 microns broad cells, (Medardi)
Habitat / Range
single or fused together in clusters, in "forests and gardens on buried or rotting wood, roots, and so forth", (Breitenbach), on soil rich in humus and in contact with rotting wood, decaying tree roots and the like, June and fall, (Dennis), on rotting wood or occasionally in basements (Arora), "wood (raw or trimmed, sometimes also painted, occasionally buried), sandy or gravelly, calcareous or acid soil, composted loam, between floor tiles, in cellars or caves, on burnt remnants", "on building, textile, or papery residues", and on dung of herbivores, such as equine or bovine or bear (but not recorded from moose dung), (Medardi)
Similar Species
Peziza cerea has different paraphyses (Breitenbach). Dennis describes the color of P. cerea differently as "pale ochraceous or yellowish brown" on the upper surface, (Dennis). Peziza repanda has slightly less gray color and spores are smooth, (Arora). Peziza repanda and Peziza cerea cannot be differentiated clearly in the field (Lincoff(2)). Collections designated as P. cerea, P. repanda, and Peziza micropus do not differ from P. varia enough to be separable as species, macroscopically, microscopically, or molecularly, (Hansen, K.). Dennis also describes the colors of the upper surface of P. repanda differently, as "light chestnut brown" (Dennis). Peziza fimetii resembles P. varia in color but has larger spores measuring (18)20-22.5 x 10-12 microns "and a medullary excipulum composed of a single textura globulosa layer" with 50-100 microns broad cells, (Medardi). See also SIMILAR section of Peziza arvernensis, Peziza badia, Peziza domiciliana, and Peziza ''repanda''.
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