White Spindles
Clavaria fragilis
Also called fairy fingers, white worm coral, white spindle coral
Clusters of slender, brittle, pure white unbranched clubs that grow in tight tufts among moss and short grass. They snap at the slightest pressure, giving the species its name.
Overview
White Spindles, also widely known as Fairy Fingers and sometimes listed under the name Clavaria vermicularis, forms dense tufts of narrow, chalk-white clubs 3-12 cm tall that look like a handful of pale candles pushed into the turf. The clubs are unbranched, slightly flattened or grooved, and taper gradually to a blunt or pointed apex.
The species belongs to Clavaria in the Clavariaceae, the family of soft, brittle, white-spored club and coral fungi. Its extreme fragility is diagnostic: the flesh is so brittle that clubs commonly break when brushed, and the specific epithet refers directly to this.
It is a familiar member of the grassland fungus community that includes waxcaps, earthtongues and Entoloma species, and in Britain and Europe it is one of the most frequently recorded of the grassland clubs.
How to identify it
Fruiting body
A dense, often crowded tuft of unbranched clubs, each 3-12 cm tall and 2-6 mm thick, arising close together from a common patch of mycelium. Individual clubs are cylindrical to somewhat flattened, sometimes slightly curved, wavy or shallowly grooved along their length.
Surface and apex
The surface is smooth, dull to slightly shining, and pure white when fresh, yellowing at the tips and finally browning from the apex downward as the fruiting body ages. There is no distinct stem, though the extreme base is often narrower and slightly translucent. The apex is blunt to acute and never crested or branched.
Flesh and spore print
Flesh is white, very brittle and hollow-feeling in larger clubs, snapping cleanly under light pressure. The spore print is white, and spores are elliptical and smooth.
Where and when it grows
White Spindles grows among moss and short grass in unimproved, unfertilised grassland: old pastures, churchyards, lawns, dune slacks and heathy turf. It also occurs on mossy banks along woodland edges and rides where the ground has not been enriched.
The main season is late summer to late autumn, with fruiting triggered by rain following warm weather. It is widespread and common in Europe, North America and much of the temperate world, though the quality grasslands it prefers are far less common than they once were.
Ecological role
Along with the other grassland clubs, corals and waxcaps, Clavaria fragilis has been shown by isotope studies to be biotrophic rather than a straightforward litter decomposer, with a nutritional relationship to the roots of grasses and herbs that is still being worked out in detail.
What is well established is its need for low-nutrient, undisturbed turf. It disappears rapidly under fertiliser application, ploughing and reseeding, and its persistence makes it part of the standard grassland fungus indicator group used to assess the conservation value of old meadows and churchyards. The mycelium is long-lived, so tufts recur in the same spots season after season.
Similar species
Clavaria acuta has more solitary or loosely grouped clubs with a distinct short translucent stem and a sharper apex, and lacks the tightly packed tufted habit. Clavulina rugosa is stouter, tougher, distinctly wrinkled and often shortly branched at the top. Ramariopsis kunzei is white but repeatedly branched into a small coral rather than simple spindles.
Macrotyphula juncea produces very slender, thread-like, tan to buff clubs on leaf litter rather than white spindles in turf. Yellow-toned grassland relatives such as Clavulinopsis fusiformis share the tufted habit but are clear egg-yellow throughout.