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The giant puffball is large enough to be kicked around like a soccer ball when fully grown. Doing so will help release many of its seven trillion spores.
(Clay Wollney)
Puffballs are a form of fungi that develop a more-or-less spherical shape. During the summer and fall they seem to spring forth out of nowhere. In fact, each fungus actually begins as a microscopic spore that is only five microns (1/5,000 of an inch) in diameter. Unlike seeds, spores do not carry a food supply along with a developing embryo. Instead, spores are simply a single cell that can reproduce into a new organism if the correct nutrients and water are available. When these spores land in a place with the right nutrients and moisture, they can grow so rapidly that they literally appear overnight.
The largest member of the group that can be found on Staten Island is the giant puffball (Calvatia gigantea). This is one of the easiest fungi to identify since there are few things like it in the forests and fields around here. The majority of specimens are about the size of a soccer ball, however, large examples of this fungus can reach a diameter of as much as five feet with a weight of as much as 50 pounds. Compared to the size of the spore from which they started, an average-sized giant puffball grows to be more than seven trillion times its original size.
Puffballs get their name from the way that the spores are released once the puffball is mature. While the body of a fungus is actually made of thin filaments of cells that lace their way through a food source, the purpose of the above ground part of a puffball, or any fungus for that matter, is to produce spores. Unlike most other mushrooms, puffballs produce their spores in an internal spore sac. The insides of the puffball is known as the gleba, which means "clod of earth" in Latin, a reference to the appearance of the trillions of spores that it is made of.
As the puffball is growing, the gleba has a solid, but spongy texture and is white in color. When the spores are fully developed they have a powdery consistency and a greenish-brown color. At this point, the outer skin breaks into hollowed patches that flake off to expose the inner layer. The inner layer cracks into fragments, which leaves the spores open to be blown away by the wind. If stepped on or struck by a raindrop the spores shoot out in puffs of a million or more all at once. This feature is the reason the group is named puffball.
Until recently, all puffball mushrooms were thought to belong to one group that was given the name Gastromycetes. The "gastro" part of the name means "stomach or belly" in Latin, a reference to their method of spore production. Upon reevaluation it has been shown that the various species of puffballs are really members of a few different genera of fungi that have evolved similar forms.
The one feature that all the puffballs share is that they do not have an open cap with spore-bearing gills. True puffballs do not have a stalk, an important feature to mushroom enthusiasts since the true puffballs are edible when the gleba is still white. Stalked puffballs and false puffballs are inedible and even dangerous. The poison pigskin puffball is a common example. Though not usually deadly it can be painful. Only experts should collect mushrooms for eating - mistakes can be deadly.
The main groups of true puffballs are the Calvatia and Lycoperdon. The giant puffball is a member of the Calvatia genus, whose name means "bald, dome of the skull." A good description. The Lycoperdon is a wide-ranging genus with 50 species. Their name basically translates as "wolf farts." A third genus, the Calbovista or sculptured puffball, consists of a single species that is found in the Pacific Coast and Rocky Mountain ranges.
Besides being edible while the gleba is still white, giant puffballs have served a number of other uses in folk medicine. One common use for puffballs in ancient times was as a dressing for wounds. Indeed, giant puffballs were sometimes collected and cut into inch-thick slices just for this purpose before battles. Giant puffballs also had uses during peaceful times. In Tibet, they were reportedly once part of a mixture that was used as ink. The fumes produced by burning dried puffballs were also used for smoking out beehives by the Native Americans.