Reticularia lycoperdon

Description

Enteridium lycoperdon is one of the more obvious species of slime mold or Myxogastria, typically seen in its reproductive phase as a white 'swelling' on standing dead trees in the spring, or on large pieces of fallen wood. Alder (Alnus glutinosa) is a common host.

It starts as a white globular mass about the size of half a golf ball, and then develops a silver-gray papery skin beneath which the brown spores develop. When the seeds have been dispersed all they leave behind is a faint brown 'spore print' patch on the tree bark.

Though not generally considered edible, E. lycoperdon is not toxic. In Veracruz, Mexico, the very young aethalia are collected, fried, and eaten.

It was first described in 1791 by Jean Baptiste François Pierre Bulliard as Reticularia lycoperdon, but was assigned to the genus, Enteridium, by Marie L. Farr in 1976. The name Reticularia lycoperdon is accepted by the taxonomic databases: Ausfungi Index Fungorum, and IRMNG.

Common names: False Puffball.

Life Cycle

The slime mold has two phases to its life cycle: an actively feeding plasmodial stage and a reproductive sporangial stage.

The plasmodial phase is mobile and is multi-nucleate, formed by the fusion of single cells and typically amoeboid in its movements, through cytoplasmic streaming.

The sporangial or aethalial phase of this slime mold is spherical, elongate, or globular, 50 to 80 mm, and is at first highly glutinous in appearance, resembling small slug eggs. Later a smooth white and silvery surface develops, which eventually splits to expose a brown spore mass beneath. An aethalium is a term relating to slime molds, referring to the relatively big, plump, pillow-shaped fruiting body, formed by the aggregation of plasmodia into a single functional body. The term comes from the Greek for thick smoke or soot; so named from the smokelike spores.

Reticularia lycoperdon Spores

The spores are brown, subglobose or ovoid, punctate (spotted), 5–7 µm in size, and dispersed by wind and rain until only a few delicate threads of the sporangium remain, resembling soft foam padding.

Reticularia Lycoperdon Insect Associates

A slime mold fly, Epicypta testata, is known to lay its eggs within the spore mass and puparia can be seen with their tips protruding. The adult fly lays its eggs within the plasmodial phase, feeding upon it. The larval phase then hatches as worm-like larvae that pupate and then hatch, carrying and dispersing some of the spores which have stuck to them.

Synonyms

1. Fuligo lycoperdon (Bull.) Schumach

2. Lycogala punctata Pers.

3. Lycogala turbinata Pers.

4. Mucor lycogalus Bolton

5. Reticularia lycoperdon Bull.

6. Reticularia umbrina Fr.

7. Strongylium fuliginoides (Pers.) Ditmar

Photo sources:

Photo 1 - Author: Wilhelm Zimmerling PAR (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 2 - Author: Tina Ellegaard Poulsen (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 3 - Author: Wilhelm Zimmerling PAR (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 4 - Author: wearethechampignons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Photo 5 - Author: Michel Langeveld (CC BY-SA 4.0)