Wolf's Milk

Lycogala epidendrum

On rotting coniferous, more rarely deciduous wood. Summer, autumn.

Plasmodium reddish-pink. Aethalia usually globose, from the size of a pea to that of a nut (0.5–2 cm), orange-pink when young, yellowish-brown, yellowish-grey when mature, covered with reddish-brown warts; the inner mass liquid, soft, pink, when old hardening, turning grey and developing into spores. Spores 5-7 pm. Characteristic features: the most widespread slime mould, the colour of whose aethalia varies greatly. Grows singly or in groups. Very common in forests, parks, gardens and homesteads.