Helvella leucopus

With a very dark (almost black) saddle-shaped cap and a stipe with very few folds, virtually smooth.

Outer excipulum with erect emergent terminal elements, cylindrical to pyriform, with faint brownish intracellular pigment inside.

Asci cylindrical, 8-spored, uniseriate, operculate, up to 300 µm long by 17 µm wide, with croziers at their base, inamyloid in Melzer's reagent.

Paraphyses filiform, smooth, septate, with apical swellings and abundant brownish intracellular pigment inside.

Ascospores ellipsoidal, smooth, hyaline, thin-walled, with a large central oil droplet occupying more than three-quarters of the total spore volume.