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Bovista

Genus of fungi

  • 5 min read
  • 6 chapters

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Description

Fruit bodies are oval to spherical to pear-shaped, and typically 1 to 8 cm (0.4 to 3.1 in) in diameter with a white or light-colored thin and fragile exoperidium (outer layer of the peridium). Depending on the species, the exoperidium in a young specimen may be smooth, granular, or finely echinulate. This exoperidium sloughs off at maturity to expose a smooth endoperidium with a single apical pore (ostiole). The fruit bodies may be attached to the ground by fine rhizomorphs that may appear like a small cord. Some species develop a subgleba—a sterile base that is typically not well developed. The fruit bodies of mature specimens can develop surface alterations such as scales, plates, areolae, or verrucae. At the microscopic level, these features are made of hyphae, sphaerocysts (rounded cells), claviform (club-shaped) cells. Bovista sclerocystis is the only species in the genus with mycosclereids (setoid elements) in the peridium.

Spores are brown to purple-brown, roughly spherical or ellipsoid in shape, and 3.5–7 μm in diameter. A short or long pedicel (stalk) may be present. At maturity, the entire fruit body may become detached from the ground, and the spores spread as the puffball is blown around like a tumbleweed.

In Bovista, the capillitium (a network of thread-like cells in which the spores are embedded) is not connected directly to the interior wall of the peridium. Instead, it is made of separate, irregularly branched units that end in tapered points. This type of capillitium, also present in the puffball genera Calbovista and Bovistella, has been called the "Bovista" type by Hanns Kreisel, who published a monograph on Bovista in 1967. Kreisel also defined the "Lycoperdon"-type (a capillitium comprising long, threads with occasional dichotomous or irregular branches), and the "intermediate" type (a transitional form between the Bovista type and Lycoperdon type, featuring threads that may be pored, with several thick main stems connected by multiple branches). All three types of capillitia structure are found in Bovista. "Bovista"-type capillitia are elastic, a feature shared with the gasteroid genera Lycoperdon and Geastrum. The flexibility of the capillitium gives the gleba a cottony texture that persists even after the exoperidium has been sloughed off.

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