''Morchella meiliensis'' is a species of

fungus A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately from t ...

in the family

Morchellaceae The Morchellaceae are a family of ascomycete fungi in the order Pezizales. According to a standard reference work, the family has contained at least 49 species distributed among four genera. However, in 2012, five genera that produce ascoma ...

native to China.

Taxonomy

The species was described as new to science in 2006. The specific epithet ''meiliensis'' refers to Meili Snow Mountain in

Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the C ...

, where the

type specimen In biology, a type is a particular specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. In other words, a type is an example that serves to anchor or centralizes th ...

was collected.

Description

The

fruit bodies The sporocarp (also known as fruiting body, fruit body or fruitbody) of fungi is a multicellular structure on which spore-producing structures, such as basidia or asci, are borne. The fruitbody is part of the sexual phase of a fungal life cyc ...

are with a conical

cap A cap is a flat headgear, usually with a visor. Caps have crowns that fit very close to the head. They made their first appearance as early as 3200 BC. Caps typically have a visor, or no brim at all. They are popular in casual and informal se ...

measuring tall by wide. The surface has vertically arranged ridges that are dark brown to black in colour, while the rectangular to quadrangular pits between the ridges are merulioid (wrinkled with low, uneven ridges) and yellowish in colour. The

flesh Flesh is any aggregation of soft tissues of an organism. Various multicellular organisms have soft tissues that may be called "flesh". In mammals, including humans, ''flesh'' encompasses muscles, fats and other loose connective tissues, but ...

is thin, and lacks any distinctive taste or odour. The cylindrical stipe measures tall by thick. Initially whitish, it turns yellowish with a waxy sheen when dry. In deposit,

ascospore An ascus (; ) is the sexual spore-bearing cell produced in ascomycete fungi. Each ascus usually contains eight ascospores (or octad), produced by meiosis followed, in most species, by a mitotic cell division. However, asci in some genera or ...

s are smooth, ellipsoid, hyaline (translucent), and measure 4.7–5.1 by 5.2–5.7 µm. They are thin-walled and contain oil droplets. Asci (spore-bearing cells) are eight-spored, cylindrical, and hyaline, and have dimensions of 5.2–5.9 µm long by 91–94 µm long. The paraphyses are dark, club-shaped, and measure 4.2–5.2 by 40–65 µm.

Similar species

'' Morchella conica'' and '' M. angusticeps'' are similar in appearance to ''M. meiliensis'', but the latter species can be distinguished by more lightly coloured ridges on the cap surface, the merulioid texture of the pits, and microscopically by the club-shaped paraphyses.

Habitat and distribution

''Morchella meiliensis'' fruits on the ground in

deciduous In the fields of horticulture and Botany, the term ''deciduous'' () means "falling off at maturity" and "tending to fall off", in reference to trees and shrubs that seasonally shed leaves, usually in the autumn; to the shedding of petals, ...

mixed forest Temperate broadleaf and mixed forest is a temperate climate terrestrial habitat type defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature, with broadleaf tree ecoregions, and with conifer and broadleaf tree mixed coniferous forest ecoregions. These fo ...

s. It is known from Deqin County,

Yunnan Province Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the ...

in China, where it grows at elevations of .

References

External links

* * {{Taxonbar, from=Q6909543 Edible fungi Fungi described in 2006 Fungi of Asia meiliensis