What’s the concept of Puffball mushroom explosion?
How does it all work, and what time is most favorable for it?
This article will cover everything, including the different varieties of Puffball mushroom.
Let’s start from the basics…
The first step to grow your own mushrooms is to buy a puffball, cut it at the base and place a piece of cardboard or paper towel on top to catch the falling spores.
Once cut, place the puffball in a gallon jar with non-chlorinated water. You can purchase distilled water for growing mushrooms or you can let it sit out for 24 hours before adding it to the jar.
Salt and molasses are good additions as they help to keep the bacteria out of the water, and they also feed the spores.
Calvatia gigantea
The giant puffball, known as Calvatia gigantea, can be up to a foot in diameter and is difficult to mistake for any other kind of mushroom.
In addition, the ITS sequence of the species confirms that it belongs to the puffball family, which includes Calvatia. As such, it is safe for human consumption. The text above is adapted from Wikipedia, a free information source released under the GNU Free Documentation License.
In recent years, the conditions are perfect for a puffball mushroom explosion. There has been lots of moisture and warm days, so this is the perfect time for puffball mushroom hunting.
As a result, the giant puffballs appear almost overnight in grassy edges of forests and meadows. Puffballs are also relatively easy to identify, so they’re a great place to start mushroom hunting.
During the peak of the puffball mushroom explosion, the spores released from one giant mushroom would fill up to 800 times Earth’s surface.
Puffballs are known for their spore-producing ability, and a single mature specimen could produce up to seven trillion spores. However, don’t be fooled into thinking that all puffball mushrooms are stalkless. False puffballs, also known as false shaggy manes, can also be easily mistaken.
The best time to harvest a Calvatia gigantea puffball mushroom is late July or early November, when it’s most abundant.
Puffballs can be harvested from July until November, but only after a good rainfall. If they don’t receive enough water to grow, they can die. However, if you wait until the spores are fully matured, they’ll be worth the wait.
Aside from being an excellent source of food, nutrients and medicine, puffball mushrooms are also a great source of medicinal value.
To find out more about this mushroom, researchers conducted morphological studies. They also investigated its antidiabetic properties using methanol extract. The extracts were evaluated using the a-amylase assay.
Lycoperdon
Lycoperdon puffball mushrooms are known for their large size. They are between 10 and 80 centimeters in diameter and have a lumpy, leathery appearance.
Their stems are connected to the substrate by a mycelial cord, and the interior is white or greenish brown.
In mature forms, these mushrooms form fairy rings with their hyphae spreading in a radial pattern.
While a common puffball mushroom looks ugly when it explodes, giant puffball mushrooms are edible when they are fully grown and cooked. They can be filled with breadcrumbs and eggs and can satisfy a crowd of people.
A large ‘skull’ containing more than a pound of mushroom is known as a Lycoperdon puffball mushroom. These mushrooms are found in mine shafts in the Black Isle.
While Lycoperdon is Latin for “wolf fart,” its etymology is more complicated. The term puffball may originate from the Latin for wolf fart.
Either way, it’s an entertaining mushroom that you won’t soon forget. You’ll definitely want to check out the mushroom’s spores before trying it for yourself. They contain about 7x the number of spores of a standard puffball.
In case you aren’t sure if you should make your own, you can always buy a jar of distilled water and soak the puffballs in it. After 24 hours, you can then place the puffballs into the water to ensure they don’t fall prey to bacteria. In addition, you can use salt and molasses as food sources for the spores.
When a raindrop hits the base of a puffball mushroom, it causes spores to shoot out at a speed of 100 cm/s.
These spores then form a centimetre-high cloud after impact. This spore cloud is typically between 3.5 and four microns in size. It can release more than a million spores. One puffball mushroom can produce over a million spores in its lifetime.
Wolf-fart
A wolf-fart puffball mushroom explodes from the ground when it’s hit by a raindrop. They’re 3.5 to 4 microns in diameter and shoot out in a cloud, measuring a centimeter tall. Puffballs belong to the genus Lycoperdon, which means wolf farts. Puffballs are a type of fungi in the Basidiomycota family.
These mushrooms are part of the Lycoperdon genus, which is found in many parts of the world and comprises around 50 species. They used to be in the now-obsolete order Lycoperdales, but have been separated and placed in the Agaricaceae family. They have a name derived from two Greek words, wolf and perdon, which means “to break the wind.” As such, they’re aptly named, and their explosive bursts can be a sight to behold.
This puffball mushroom has a fascinating etymology. Lycoperdon means “wolf fart” in Latin, but there’s no real consensus on how this name came about. Its name is actually a mistranslation of Leuco-perdon, which means “white puff”. In addition to being white, Lycoperdon spores do not have a distinct odor. However, inhaling them can cause respiratory issues.
While a puffball has no visible gills, it does contain a dense network of sterile yellowish tubes. The exoperidium is made of a pseudo-parenchymatic structure. As the peridium breaks, spores will be released. During the peridium’s life cycle, a puffball can live for up to 30 years before it shrivels.
Lycoperdon fungi
In a forest, the puffball mushroom, or Lycoperdon perlatum, is a common occurrence. This saprobic fungus eats decaying organic matter and humus. Its fruitbodies are pear-shaped or club-shaped and grow in woods and grasslands.
They are edible when young, but can also be cooked or fried. Elias Fries recommended frying or baking the fruit bodies in batter or egg and serving them with salt and oil.
The fruitbodies are sometimes known as Devil’s Snuff-bo or Wolf Farts.
The puffball’s exoperidium sloughs away to reveal the ostiole, a pore that is the opening to the spores. The gleba is white, and firm when young, but it turns brown once the spores mature and form a cap.
Inside, there are many minute chambers lined with hymenium, a fertile spore-bearing tissue.
The hymenium collapses when the puffball reaches maturity. When touched, or compressed, the mature puffball releases powdery spores through the ostiole. It can also be dispersed by raindrops.
The origin of the puffball’s name may be misunderstood. The genus Geastrum contains two kinds of mushrooms: the giant puffball and the brown puffball.
Both fungi produce spores, which are contained in the slime that is typically brown or liver brown. In addition, the spores attract flies, which eat the spores.
Although these fungi are not considered edible, they have a bioaccumulative property, making them useful as an indicator of soil pollution.
For example, samples from grassy areas near an interstate highway in Connecticut showed high levels of lead and cadmium.
Moreover, L. perlatum biomass has been shown to remove mercury ions from aqueous solutions.
Consequently, this mushroom is being studied as a low-cost renewable biosorptive material.
Polypores are a subphylum of fungi and comprise the largest group.
he other important orders are Hymenochaetales and Russulales, which are wood decayers. They comprise over 4,000 species and 80 genera and 12 families.
There are many types of polypores, including those that have gills. Moreover, they have numerous forms including mycorrhizal partners and insect symbionts.