Grey Puffball

Grey Puffball Bovista plumbea Pers. (illustrated 65% life size) Fruit body 2–3cm across, subglobose, attached to substrate by a clump of fibres which often break, leaving the fruit body free to roll in the wind; outer wall white, flaking off in large scales at maturity; inner layer lead-coloured, fragile, opening by a circular pore. Gleba clay to olive-brown; sterile base absent. Capillitium of highly branched, brown, dendroid elements. Spores 4.5–6×4.5–5.5¼, oval with a long pedicel, finely roughened; brown. Habitat in short grass on lawns, golf-courses and pasture; late summer to late autumn. Common. Edible when young.