#scleroderma citrinum

[lindagoesmushrooming]

Puffballs (Lycoperdon perlatum +Scleroderma citrinum)

[nerosbeastiary]

Pigskin poison puffball (Scleroderma citrinum), September 2023

Southwestern PA

Again, best guess at fungus ID! I didn't get a spore print or break it open.

[hotmushroompics]

[crowdrinkingcoffee]

cool ass mushrooms i found. no idea what any of then are but i’ll check back in if i find out.

EDIT: i believe that the small white ones in clusters may be coprinellus disseminatus, aka the fairy inkcap or trooping crumble cap.

EDIT 2: found another! the big round ones are scleroderma citrinum, i believe, or the common earthball.

EDIT 3: first one is hoof fungus, fomes fomentarius, i think?

[thehousepatron]

Went on a four hour walk today, roughly eight miles. Here’s what I found!

Part 1

Flame Shield Mushroom (Pluteus Aurantiorugosus)

King Alfred’s Cakes (Daldinia Concentrica)

Common Earthball (Scleroderma Citrinum)

[tom-at-the-farm]

Summer shrooms - milk caps, Russula, Scleroderma citrinum

[pastedpast]

A recent find on my nature walks, I think this is a scleroderma citrinum, widely known as the common earthball, or the 'pigskin poison puffball'. Although poisonous, this fungus is not deadly. However, poisonings do occur and are usually due to confusion caused by their similar appearance to the edible common puffball (although the latter tend to be a brighter white).

Side note: In medicine, scleroderma is the name of a disease which involves the hardening ('sclero') of the skin ('derma').

[mycolocat]

Giant puffball spotted! (Calvatia gigantea)

To confirm it's not something else, you can cut it in half. It should have a uniform white texture, with no obvious lines, especially not "mushroom shaped" ones. It's especially important to check the smallest ones.

If it's starting to get kinda grey/brown/olive inside, it's past its prime and is about to turn into a spore balloon. Fun to stomp on!

If it's black inside, that's an absolute unit of an earthball (Scleroderma citrinum). Usually those don't get as large as the puffballs. Not for eating.

check out this huge bastard...... i love coming across funky mushrooms even if i know nothing about them

[mushroomgay]

London, UK, October 2022

Common earthball (Scleroderma citrinum)

A beautiful common earthball just on the brink of maturity, splitting to open to release the dark spores inside.

[deathandmushrooms]

Plums and Custard - Tricholomopsis rutilans

Common Earthball - Scleroderma citrinum

[lindagoesmushrooming]

[timefortrees]

Common earthball (Scleroderma citrinum) 

I like common earthballs, I see them around a fair bit but they always seem to be in a place where I don’t expect them so, no others around, just a little clump doing its thing. 

why the cross section on one of them?

Many earthballs look fairly similar, especially if they are maturing or covered in detritus or moss, they do however all look slightly different inside. For this reason its always worth cutting a cross section and comparing it to the images and description in a fungi book. 

[madmushlove]

Scleroderma citrinum Common earth ball

Walk around any woodland long enough from summer to fall, and you’ll probably come across common earth ball fungi.  If not, they’re probably just hiding from you in the leaflitter.  They are about the same color as dried leaves.

They grow terrestrially.  As in from the ground. I’ve found them growing in moss occasionally, but they don’t seem to have much of a preference, so long as there are trees nearby.

They grow in mycorrhizal relationship with both broadleaf and conifer trees.  That just means they are friends with the trees and they help each other out.

While I’m sure the trees are grateful, some people don’t seem to like them. That’s mainly because they’re poison, and they can be confused with edible puffballs.

Puffballs open a pore to puff out their spores, whereas earth balls just kind of break apart when their insides are crumbly and dusty.  If you eat puffballs, just stay away from tough, tan little ones with spiky skin.  When cut open earth balls will have a dark purple or black interior when mature, though they may be white when young, so be careful.

They sometimes clump up together, but I usually find them growing solitarily.  Others though, are typically in sight of the first.

As the Latin name “Scleroderma” suggests, earth balls have a tough skin and they’re more firm than puffballs.

Some people call these fungi “poison pigskin.”  Look closely at them, and you should see why.  Their peridium, our outside, looks a bit like a football.

Though it probably wouldn’t be lethal to eat one, they can cause severe gasto-intestinal upset.  But that doesn’t mean you have to stay away.  I always like getting a close up look at Scleroderma citrinum, and they are super fun to cut open with a knife.

Something about that dense purple seems to lure me in every time.

[safeintheforest]

Well I lost my job, 2 family members died in the last 3 weeks and I have yet again, no idea what to do with my life, but here’s a picture I shot today. It’s a Scleroderma Citrinum or Common Earthball. They used to eat these even though they were poisonous (but not deadly). 

[shroomingne]

Scleroderma citrinum | Common Earthball

Summer to fall Inedible

The Common Earthball is a puffball look-alike, but it’s toxic!  These fungi are potato-sized, though this one was on the small side, at about 3 inches across.  I found it growing near the base of a dead stump.  It’s also much harder and scalier than a puffball, and has that distinctive crackly toasted marshmallow look.  Another dead giveaway of an older Earthball is a dark brown/purple/black interior, making a cross section of it look like you cut into a bean bun. A young Earthball will have a white interior like a puffball, but it will be much firmer.

[lord-allo]

Dickschaliger oder Gewöhnlicher Kartoffel-/Hartbovist | Common earthball, pigskin poison puffball

Scleroderma citrinum