System maintenance is ongoing as of Monday, October 27, 2025. The portal is currently set to read only with no changes to content available at this time. Please contact me at help@mycoportal.org if you have any questions.
Etym.: The name refers to its having been found in the Mojave Desert, California, U.S.A.
Spore-sac up to 15 mm diam. Exoperidium hyphal, mixed with sand grains. Endoperidium white, almost smooth, with a few scars from sand grains. Mouth tubular, large, plane, with or without a lip. Socket conspicuous, either much adhered to the stem or fairly separated from it, with a membrane covered by sand. Gleba ochraceous ferrugineous, much lighter than in T. volvulatum. Stem obese, in one of the holotype specimens tapering downwards; in genera attenuated towards the base, concolorous, rugose to substriate, up to 30 x 7 mm.
Spores globose, appearing dark yellowish, some ochraceous and smooth under L.M.; some elliptic, apiculate, with a thick episporium, (4)-4.7-5.9 µm diam. Under SEM they appear either totally smooth or very sparsely and minutely asperulate. Capillitium hyaline to almost, branched and septate; threads thin-walled with a visible to lacunar lumen, some wavy; septa uncoloured, numerous, disjointable with blunt ends; 4-8.1 µm diam, but may reach 8.5 um.
Habitat: sandy soil in desertic areas.
Distribution: Asia; North America: United States; South America: Argentina.
Holotype: United States, California, San Bernardino Co., Mojave Desert, Blythe Junction, leg. Munz, 2.IV.1920 (Herb. Lloyd n° 13.637, BPI!).