Summary:
Features include 1) a spherical to lobed whitish fruitbody that becomes pinkish on handling or with exposure to light, 2) a peridium (outer skin) separating easily from the firm, rubbery, greenish spore mass, 3) a well developed branching columella, 4) underground growth, and 5) microscopic characters including wrinkled spores and mostly 2-spored basidia. It is common among false truffles in the Pacific Northwest (Trappe(13)). It is the most common spring truffle in the western US (Trappe, M.(1)).

Interior:
olive-brown to greenish; composed of small chambers, "at first firm and tough (cartilaginous), but becoming slimy and stinky (putrid) at maturity" or when old, (Arora), green to olive green; "cartilaginous becoming mucilaginous at maturity", (Smith), green when fresh, becoming "citrine drab" or "grayish-olive" to "dark greenish-olive" on drying; "cavities polyhedral to irregular, with a tendency to radiate from the columella, small, empty", (Zeller(8)), "dark olive green, very firm and rubbery", (Trappe, M.(1))

Odor:
offensive at maturity (Zeller(8)), "mild to faintly fruity or sometimes of iodine", (Trappe, M.(3))

Taste:
pleasant when young (Zeller(8))

Microscopic:
spores 12-19 x 6-8 microns, more or less spindle-shaped, smooth within a wrinkled sac, colorless to pale greenish brown under microscope, (Arora), spores 12-19 x 6-8 microns, spindle-shaped, (Smith), spores 12-19 x 6-8 microns (averaging 15.3 +/- 0.9 microns long), lanceolate, "with a thick epispore which sometimes is slightly roughened" and becomes loosened when old, sometimes papillate at apex, spores olivaceous in mass; basidia 3-4-spored, mostly 3-spored, long, irregularly cylindric, sterigmata usually short, but sometimes becoming 16-18 microns long; septa 85-140 microns thick, composed of hyphae 5-7 microns wide, loosely interwoven, large, thin-walled, finally becoming highly gelatinized; peridium 220-450 microns thick, parenchymatous, cells spherical to polyhedral, varying from 12 to 40 microns in diameter "with a very thin filamentous layer between the parenchyma and gleba, easily separable", (Zeller(8)), spores 11-14 x 4-5 microns, fusoid, smooth, "enclosed in a wrinkled outer skin", (Trappe, M.(1)), inflated cells in peridium, (Trappe, M.(3))

Notes:
It is found from OR to southern CA and AZ, (Trappe(13)). The distribution includes New England states, NY, WY, AZ, OR, CA, Chile, Argentina, and Europe, (Zeller(8)). Oregon State University has collections from WA, OR, AK, CA, and NY. The University of British Columbia has collections from BC.

EDIBILITY

"Although it has little odor or flavor, its chewy texture provides an interesting additive to omelettes or scrambled eggs", (Trappe, M.(1))

Synonyms and Alternate Names:
Corticium rallum H.S. Jacks.
Phlebiella ralla (H.S. Jacks.) K.H. Larss. &