Talk:Phallus impudicus

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A fact from Phallus impudicus appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column on 14 July 2007.

I removed the word 'amazingly' from the start of the sentence: "Amazingly, the immature stinkhorn 'egg' is enjoyed and eaten in France...". That doesn't strike me as particularly amazing, and Wikipedia should avoid sensationalist language where possible. Terraxos 20:48, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edibility & odour

Has something gone wrong with the layers in the following text, which I have replaced in the article? Are there not too many layers here?

Sometimes called the witch's egg,^[1] the immature stinkhorn is whitish and egg-shaped and up to 6 cm (2 in) in diameter. On the outside is a thick whitish volva, also known as the peridium, covering the brown/green gelatinous layer. Immediately underneath is a thin white inner layer known as the receptaculum, under which lies the olive coloured gleba. It is this which later stinks and attracts the flies; inside this layer is a green layer which will become the 'head' of the expanded fruit body; and inside this is a white structure (the stalk when expanded) , which is hard, but with an airy structure like a sponge.^[2] The eggs become fully grown stinkhorns very rapidly, over a day or two.^[1]

Or have I misunderstood it?

I don't think that the smell is that of dung - it is much less pleasant. It is sickly sweet, sharp and stinging. I understand that it is the same as the stink of very rotten meat/carrion, but I must admit that I have never smelt meat in such an advanced state of putrefaction.

Strobilomyces 20:12, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 17th century names

while not being offensive to general readers, it strikes me that it would be interesting to know what these strange and wondrous fungi were called in the past, however bawdy their names. To allude to the names and not give them seems teasing.