Asterophora lycoperdoides

powdery piggyback

Scientific identification: Asterophora lycoperdoides (Bull.) Ditmar
Family: Lyophyllaceae
Class: Agaricomycetes
Genus: Asterophora

Names across languages

English: powdery piggyback
German: Stäubender Zwitterling
Finnish: Haperonvieras
Estonian: Tolmav parasiitlehik
Russian: Астерофора дождевиковая

The scientific profile

From the latest record: 2025-09-13.

Hymenium

Gills—thick, distant, often reduced or poorly formed, sometimes vein-like rather than clearly gilled, whitish to pale grey

Cap

Convex to nearly round, dry, initially whitish and a bit lumpy or roughened, quickly becoming covered by a dense orangish-brown chlamydospores powder

Hymenium Attachment

Adnate to the stipe

Stipe

Slender, more or less equal, surface dry, initially whitish or pale, becoming powdery orangish-brown, basal mycelium white

Spore print

Spore print white

Ecology

Parasitic on decaying mushrooms (Russula, Lactarius spp.), appears when the host has begun to blacken and decay, singly, groups in mixed, hardwood, coniferous forests, summer through autumn

Edibility

Inedible—too insubstantial, with foul smell

Fruit body

Fruit body small, stipe 4–30 mm long, ~2–5 mm thick

Dimensions

Cap 4–20 mm diameter

Chemical reactions

No significant staining reactions noted, flesh unchanging when cut

Odour

Rotten and foul to decaying fungi substrate

Taste

Foul

Microscopy

Basidiospores ellipsoid, smooth, hyaline in KOH, ~5–6 × 4–5 µm, 4-sterigmate, chlamydospores globose to subglobose, ornamented, 16–20 × 14–17 µm, hyaline to faintly yellowish