Tulostoma sacchariolens Finy, Jeppson, L. Albert, Oelvedi & Dima, 2023

Finy, Peter, Jeppson, Mikael, Knapp, Daniel G., Papp, Viktor, Albert, Laszlo, Oelvedi, Istvan, Boka, Karoly, Varga, Dora, Kovacs, Gabor M. & Dima, Balint, 2023, Exploring diversity within the genus Tulostoma (Basidiomycota, Agaricales) in the Pannonian sandy steppe: four fascinating novel species from Hungary, MycoKeys 100, pp. 153-170 : 153

Tulostoma sacchariolens Finy, Jeppson, L. Albert, Oelvedi & Dima sp. nov.

Fig. 5

Holotype.

Hungary, Bács-Kiskun, Bócsa, open disturbed sandy grassland, in a sand pit, on bare ground, 24 Jan 2021, I. Ölvedi, P. Finy, L. Albert, OP20210124 (BP112642, isotype GB). GenBank: ITS OR722632, LSUOR722654, tef1 OR707020.

Etymology.

The epithet refers to its unique sweetish floral smell reminiscent of that of, for example, Hebeloma sacchariolens .

Description.

Spore-sac subglobose, often flattened to depressed or hemispherical, 5-9 mm. Exoperidium hyphal, heavily encrusting sand, more persistent at the base of the spore-sac. Endoperidium white or dirty white, pitted from detached sand grains. Mouth delicately fimbriate. Socket conspicuous, forming a thickening on the upper part of the stem. Stem 25-50 × 1.5-2.5 mm, whitish, ornamented with orange to reddish fibrils, with age remarkably blackening, thickening towards the base, bulbous. The mature basidiomata have a pronounced sweet floral smell, reminiscent of Hebeloma sacchariolens Quél. or Freesia flowers. Gleba ferruginous brown. Capillitium 2.5-7 µm in diameter with walls 0.8-2.2 µm in diameter, lumen in general scarce, mostly straight, little branching. Most septa slightly widened. Spores subglobose, 4.6-5.3 × 4.1-5 µm (av. 4.6-4.9 µm), with coarse elongated ornamentation. SEM-photos show developed crests arranged in lines.

Habitat and distribution.

Recorded in calcareous, sandy steppe areas, mostly in sunny open habitats with sparse vegetation, often in trampled or otherwise disturbed places. It is currently known only from a few localities in the sandy areas of the Danube-Tisza interfluves in Central Hungary.

Notes.

With its fragrant smell and blackening stem, Tulostoma sacchariolens has a unique combination of characters within the genus, easily separating it from any known Tulostoma species. Tulostoma sacchariolens belongs to Clade 7 according to Jeppson et al. (2017) together with T. cf. submembranaceum (MJ9296, see Fig. 2 ) from Spain, T. submembranaceum from Mexico and the above-described T. hungaricum . It differs from its sister species ( T. cf. submembranaceum ) in the ITS region by more than 20 substitution and indel positions, which is a similarity of 96%. The intraspecific genetic variability in the ITS region amongst three sequences of T. sacchariolens was zero (Fig. 1 ), while the ITS sequence of FP-2019-12-06 had six polymorphic sites.

Specimens examined.

Hungary, Bács-Kiskun: Bócsa, open sandy grassland, 6 Dec 2019, P. Finy, FP- 2019-12-06 (ELTE); Ibidem, open sandy grassland, 24 Jan 2021, P. Finy, I. Ölvedi, L. Albert, FP- 2021-01-24 b (ELTE); Orgovány, open sandy grassland, 18 Feb 2021, P. Finy, I. Ölvedi FP- 2021-02-18 (ELTE) .

Morphologically examined specimens.

Hungary, Bács-Kiskun: Bócsa, open sandy grassland, 3 Dec 2022, P. Finy, FP-2022-12-03 (herb. Finy); Fülöpháza, open sandy grassland, 14 Jan 2023, P. Finy, FP-2023-01-14 (herb. Finy); Orgovány, open sandy grassland, 4 Dec 2021, P. Finy, I. Ölvedi, L. Albert, FP-2021-12-04 (herb. Finy); Pest, Örkény, open sandy grassland, 12 Jan 2022, I. Ölvedi, OP-2022-01-12 (herb. Ölvedi); Ibidem, open sandy grassland, 10 Dec 2022, P. Finy, I. Ölvedi, L. Albert, FP-2022-12-10 (herb. Finy).

Figures

Figure 1. Habitats of Tulostoma species in Hungary: a T. hungaricum in Orgovany b T. sacchariolens in Orgovany c T. dunense in Izsak (Soltszentimre) d T. shaihuludii in Izsak (Soltszentimre). Photos: P. Finy.

Figure 2. Maximum Likelihood (RAxML) tree of concatenated nrDNA ITS, nrDNA LSU and tef 1 - α sequences of representative species of the genus Tulostoma and the four newly-introduced species in the present study. Sequences obtained in this study are shown in bold blue. After the voucher number, the species and the country of origin are shown. Then, the type specimens are indicated. ML bootstrap support values (≥ 70) are shown before slashes and Bayesian posterior probabilities (≥ 0.90) are shown after slashes. Highlighted sections indicate affiliations to the four novel Tulostoma species: T. dunense, T. hungaricum, T. sacchariolens and T. shaihuludii. The illustrations exhibit basidiomata and basidiospore characteristics of the novel species. Tulostoma pulchellum (MJ 7833) and T. striatum (Fritz) served as multiple outgroups. The scale bar indicates expected changes per site per branch.

Figure 5. Tulostoma sacchariolens: a, e FP- 2021 - 02 - 18, Orgovany b FP- 2019 - 12 - 06, Bocsa c, d, f OP- 2021 - 01 - 24 (BP 112642, holotype), Bocsa a-c basidiocarps d, e basidiospores f capillitium with basidiospores. Scale bars: 1 µm (d); 10 µm (e); 20 µm (f). Photos: a, b, e, f P. Finy c L. Albert d K. Boka.