NL·0200Herbarium of the Nature Library
- Name
- Phallus impudicus
- Family
- Phallaceae
- Native to
- Europe and parts of Asia and North America; mainly in woodland and gardens
- Habitat
- Temperate forest, Gardens, Woodland
Common stinkhorn
Phallus impudicus
Also calledGemeine Stinkmorchel (German) · Satyre puant (French) · Witch's egg (English, egg stage) · Sromotnik bezwstydny (Polish)
It bursts from a jelly-filled 'witch's egg' into an unmistakably phallic white stalk capped with olive-green slime that smells of carrion. Flies carry off its spores, and the stalk can grow about 10–15 cm in a few hours.
Phallus impudicus, known colloquially as the common stinkhorn, is a widespread species of fungus in the Phallaceae (stinkhorn) family. It is recognizable for its foul odor and its phallic shape when mature, the latter feature giving rise to several names in 17th-century England. Wikipedia
What it can do
- iGrows one of the fastest of any fungal structures, inflating its spongy stalk by water pressure
- iiIts foul smell can be detected from many metres away and attracts flies
- iiiFlies eat the spore slime (gleba) and spread the spores in their droppings
- ivDecomposes buried wood and leaf litter
At the table
Eateninner layer of the 'egg' stage (raw or cooked)
The immature 'egg' is eaten in parts of Europe (e.g. Germany and France), sliced raw or fried. Deadly lookalike: the egg-like buttons of Amanita species, including the death cap. Always cut eggs vertically: a stinkhorn shows jelly and a coiled white stalk, an Amanita shows gills and a cap outline. The mature stinkhorn is not eaten.
Fruiting body & spores
Spores
Spores (not seeds) in a slimy olive-green gleba; spores ellipsoid, smooth, about 3–5 × 1.5–2 µm
- Dispersal
- Flies attracted by the carrion smell eat the slime and spread the spores
Where it lives
Recorded sightings
—
geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Native range
Europe and parts of Asia and North America; mainly in woodland and gardens
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the old herbals & bestiaries
Woodcuts and engravings matched from the Source Library’s scanned books by name. Plates marked “relative” show a close kin rather than this exact species. Click a plate to read the page it came from, with translation.
Illustrations of Fungi which Grow in Bavaria and the Palatinate around Ratisbon, Vols 1–2
Jacob Christian Schaeffer; C.H. Persoon (ed.) · 1800 · p.424
Illustrations of Fungi which Grow in Bavaria and the Palatinate around Ratisbon, Vols 3–4
Jacob Christian Schaeffer; C.H. Persoon (ed.) · 1800 · p.297
Histoire des Champignons de la France, Vol 2
Pierre Bulliard · 1791 · p.179
Coloured Figures of English Fungi or Mushrooms
James Sowerby · 1797 · p.883
Coloured Figures of English Fungi or Mushrooms
James Sowerby · 1797 · p.882
Les champignons de la France : histoire, description, culture, usages des espèces comestibles, vénéneuses, suspectes, employés dans les arts, l'industrie, l'économie domestique et la médecine
Cordier, François Simon · n.d. · p.615
Illustrations of Fungi which Grow in Bavaria and the Palatinate around Ratisbon, Vols 1–2
Jacob Christian Schaeffer; C.H. Persoon (ed.) · 1800 · p.423
Rariorum Plantarum Historia (with Fungorum Historia)
Carolus Clusius · 1601 · p.677
History of Rare Plants
Carolus Clusius · 1601 · p.671
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Phallus impudicus in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
Marginalia
Gwen Raverat's memoir 'Period Piece' (1952) recalls her aunt Etty, Charles Darwin's daughter, hunting stinkhorns in the woods. She burned them in secret 'for the sake of the maids' morals'.
Curiosity
Its genus name Phallus and species name 'impudicus' ('shameless') were given by Linnaeus in 1753.
Kinship
Photographs: iNaturalist contributors under the licences shown. Records: GBIF.org. Historical plates: Source Library (CC BY-SA 4.0; originals public domain). Summary text: Nature Library editors and Wikipedia (CC BY-SA). Medicinal and edibility notes are historical and educational, not advice. iNaturalist taxon 54594.