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| The families of mushrooms and toadstools represented in Britain and Ireland |
‘Earth Tongues’.
Morphology. The fruit-bodies producing asci and ascospores; erect-elongate, unbranched; ligulate, or clavate, or capitate (sometimes grooved; usually dark, the hymenium sometimes setose); stipitate to sessile; small to large; 2–8 cm high; dark brown, or blackish; apothecial; producing asci and spores on an exposed hymenium; stromata absent. Asci inoperculate; the asci thin walled. The walls of the asci with J+ or J- pore. The ascospores elongate (often), or ellipsoid; brown; transversely septate. The hymenial layer not readily separable from the supporting flesh (i.e., the hymenium not usually separable from the stalk).
The hyphae without clamp connections. The hyphal walls lamellate, double layered, with both layers electron dense.
Ecology. Saprophytic (in soil or on rotting vegetation). The fruit-bodies borne on the ground. Found in grassy places, in coniferous woodland, in broad-leaved woodland, and in mixed woodland.
Representation in Britain and Ireland. Corynetes, Geoglossum, Thuemenidium, Trichoglossum.
World representation. 48 species; genera 6. Widespread, especially in grassland.
Classification. Ascomycota; Ascomycetes; Leotiomycetidae; Helotiales.
Comments. Taxonomically associated with the ‘Inoperculate Discomycetes’; interascal tissue of paraphyses, often strongly pigmented, often with complex branching and swollen apices.
Illustrations. • Microglossum viride (with Geoglossaceae) (LH). GEOGLOSSACEAE. 1, Geoglossum fallax. 2, Trichoglossum hirsutum. FAMILY ASSIGNMENT UNCERTAIN: 3, Microglossum viride. Sunesen & Dahlstrøm, in Lange & Hora (1965). • Trichoglossum hirsutum (Berkeley). GEOGLOSSACEAE. 2, Trichoglossum hirsutum var. hirsutum (Pers.) Boud. LEOTIACEAE. 1, Leotia lubrica (Scop.) Pers. PEZIZACEAE. 4, Peziza badia Pers.; 5, Peziza micropus Pers. MORCHELLACEAE. 6. Disciotis venosa var. reticulata (Grev.) Boud. BULGARIACEAE. 7, Bulgaria inquinans (Pers.) Fr. HELOTIALES incertis sedis. 3, Microglossum olivaceum (Pers.) Gillet. From Berkeley (1860).
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2008 onwards. The families of mushrooms and toadstools represented in Britain and Ireland. Version: 5th August 2019. delta-intkey.com’.
