A small to medium, firm puffball of high-elevation western conifer forests, often attached to the soil by a basal mycelial cord. Its whitish outer skin soon turns gray-brown and cracks into a patchy, areolate pattern, over a thick, persistent inner wall. The interior develops an unpleasant odor as the spores mature.
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Habitat
On soil under montane conifers, especially spruce-fir forests; solitary to scattered or in small clusters; reported in spring in the Sierra Nevada and in summer and fall elsewhere.
Distribution
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Western North America, from the Rocky Mountains westward, including the high Sierra Nevada of California.
Characteristics
Fruiting body: sessile, subglobose to cushion-shaped, about 3-8 cm broad, attached by a mycelial cord. Exoperidium: about 1 mm thick, whitish and minutely matted at first, becoming light to gray-brown, cracking into patches. Endoperidium: persistent, up to 3 mm thick when fresh, hard and rigid when dry. Gleba: white and firm when young, becoming pale yellow-brown, then medium to dark brown and powdery. Odor: often unpleasant during maturation. Microscopic: spores globose, warted, 4.5-6.5 µm, with a central oil droplet.
