Battarrea phalloides
Basidioma: develops underground, 3-4 cm in diameter, ovoid, whitish, enclosed by a two-layered peridium. Receptacle: pendant, convex to hemispherical bearing the gleba (spore mass). Gleba: covered with a whitish to brown membrane (peridial cap) that soon detaches to reveal the reddish-brown spore mass. Stipe: 9-30 (-37) cm high, 6-20 mm in diameter, at first with a gelatinous coat, soon dry, becoming hollow, pale brown to brown or greyish brown, surface fibrous-scaly, often shaggy. Stem base enclosed by a volva but this is often buried. Spores: spherical to ovoid (4.5-) 5-6 (-6.5) µm in diameter excluding ornament. 5-6.5 (-7) µm in diameter including ornament, brown in water, densely ornamented verruculose, verruculae commonly coalescing to form anastomosing ridges. Pseudocapillitium of mostly thin-walled, hyaline hyphae and elaters. Elaters hyaline, cylindric, tapered, sometimes branched, walls with conspicuous, refractive, spiral thickenings. Basidia: not seen.
Map of known distribution in Great Britain and Ireland.
Description adapted from: Pegler, D.N., Laessoe, T. & Spooner, B. (1995). British puffballs earthstars and stinkhorns. An account of the British gasteroid fungi. British Mycological Society.
Listed as a principal species for the conservation of biodiversity in England under Section 41 (England) of the Natural Environment and Rural Communities (NERC) Act 2006. Legally protected from damage or destruction under Schedule 8 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.
Found in dry places, often in sandy soil on hedge banks and roadsides, often associated with ash (Fraxinus), Hawthorn (Crataegus) or elm (Ulmus).