The round, dark brown fruiting bodies (ascocarps) have a black-brown skin with small pyramidal cusps.

Subsequent research indicated that black truffles are heterothallic; that is, sexual reproduction requires contact between the mycelia of different mating types.

To avoid fraud or misidentifications in commerce, a RFLP genetic test has been developed to distinguish the two species.

[3] The symbiosis of holm oak saplings and black truffles has been shown to improve photosynthesis and root growth in the plant.

[16] Black truffles suppress the growth of plants around their symbiont, creating the impression of a burnt (brûlé) area around it.

[18] Boars and the larvae of the truffle fly (Suillia tuberiperda), which eat the fruiting bodies, aid in the distribution of the species by excreting the indigestible spores.

For example, the county of Alto Maestrazgo (province of Castellón, Spain) has an ideal ground with suitable conditions for cultivating truffles.

Albocàsser, Atzaneta, Culla, and Morella are just some of the villages in this region where one can find black truffles in large amounts.

[20] Climate change has increasingly affected this form of recollection, and since 2010, a significant drop in productivity has occurred in naturally producing forests.

Some experiments have also been conducted in burnt areas, with promising results, as legally, no need to ask for a land-use change exists when planting truffles, as it can be considered (EU-28) as forest land.

[21] Black truffles are now also cultivated in Australia, New Zealand, Chile,[22] North America, Argentina, South Africa,[15][23] and Wales.

Production data are in metric tonnes and country weights in percentage and come from the Groupe Européen Truffe et Trufficulture, an association of the leading European producers.

As the data show, France has been the leading producer of black truffles in the last decade and a half but is rapidly challenged by Spain, where regions have made use of the EU-funded Rural Development Programme to subsidise cultivated plantations.

[27] This is particularly visible in the Teruel province of the Aragón region, where the black truffle represents the first and main economic activity (in GDP and employment), especially since 2010-2011 when many plantations opened under the last Rural Development Programme 2000-2006 came into production phase.