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The below mentioned article provides a short note on lycoperdon which grows on the rotting wood or in soil.
Mycelium of Lycoperdon:
The primary mycelium produced by the germination of the basidiospore consists of short, uninucleate cells. It grows on the rotting wood or in soil. It is short-lived and soon changes into the dikaryotic mycelium by hyphal fusion and repeated division of the dikaryotic cells by clamp connections.
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The secondary mycelium is extensive and consists of binucleate cells. The hyphae are often bundled into hyphal strands or rhizomorphs which form a branching system in the substratum.
In a section the rhizomorph consists of the following three zones:
1. Outer cortical zone. It consists of loosely arranged hyphae.
2. Inne subcortical zone. It is made up of closely packed hyphae.
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3 Central core or Medulla. The hyphae ran parallel in this region.
Basidiocarp of Lycoperdon:
Development:
It arises as a tiny, hyphal, knot-like outgrowth from the medulla are central core at the tip of the rhizomorphs. Occasionally it may be lateral in position. The young basidiocarp primordium is a homogenous mass of interlaced hyphae.
There is no distinction into gleba and peridium. With further growth, a palisade-like layer of closely arranged hyphae forms all over the basidiocarp primordium.
Later it becomes differentiated into an outer pseudoparenchymatous portion termed the exoperidium and the inner palisade-like endoperidium. With the differentiation of these two peridial layers around the young basidiocarp the hyphae in the cetre of the embryonic gleba begin to pull away from one another.
Consequently numerous small irregular cavities are formed in the central region of the gleba (B). However, their formation spreads towards the periphery. Thus, the gleba of the basidiocarp of Lycoperdon is of lacunose type.
With the increase in the size of the cavities, club-shaped basidia are formed at the tips of the newly formed hyphal branches. These arise from the encircling hyphae which form the walls of the cavities.
The component cells of the hyphae are binucleate and so are the young basidia. The basidia are arranged in a regular fertile layer constituting the hymenium (C) which lines each cavity.
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The fusion of the two nuclei in the basidium is immediately followed by meiosis. With the formation of four haploid nuclei in the basidium four long sterigmata develop at its apex.
They produce uninucleate basidiospores singly at their tips. The mature basidiospore is globose in shape and has a thick variously ornamented wall. It becomes binucleate by the division of a single nucleus. The mature basidiospores fall off the basidia and completely fill the cavities.
