Truffle Genus: Leucophleps

Leucophleps magnata basidiospore scale = 15 µm

Kingdom: Fungi Phylum: Basidiomycota Order: Russulales Family: Albatrellaceae

Spore Characters

Surface: Covered with minute, mucilage-embedded spines, 0.1-2 µm tall.
Shape and Size: Globose to ellipsoid and longitudinally symmetric, 8-19 (-22) x 7-17 (-22) µm.
Wall: Single, 1-2 µm thick.
Color in Water: Hyaline.
Melzer's Reaction: Not distinctive.
Comments: Leucophleps spores are distinctive in being ornamented with crowded, minute, hyaline, mucilage-embedded spines that do not react to Melzer's reagent.

View photos of Leucophleps spores

Sporocarp Characters

Shape and Size: Globose to irregular, 1-3 cm in diameter.
Peridium: White to pale yellow, pale brown, or dark red, felty, often with clusters of rhizomorphs.
Gleba: White, in moist conditions exuding a sticky white fluid from the spore-filled, labyrinthine chambers, 0.3-0.5 mm broad.
Odor: Not distinctive to pleasant to oily.

View photos of Leucophleps sporocarps

Name Derivation

Named by Harvey Wilson Harkness (1899), pioneer at truffle taxonomy in America, from Greek, leuco- (white) and -phleps (vein) in reference to the white walls (veins) of the glebal chamber.

Distribution

Ectomycorrhizal forests from sea level to high in the mountains of western North America, Mexico, and central Europe.
Season: Spring through autumn.
Species known from North Temperate Forests: Four.

Keys and Descriptions

Fogel (1979). Montecchi and Sarasini (2000) for some European taxa.