It forms very long, slender, cylindrical pinkish or orange fruiting bodies that grow on the ground among plant litter.

Corner considered Clavulinopsis sulcata to be a synonym of Clavaria miniata,[4] originally described by the English cryptogamist Miles Joseph Berkeley in 1843, from collections made in Uitenhage, South Africa.

Corner also considered Clavaria phoenicea, described from Java in 1847 by the Swiss mycologist Heinrich Zollinger, to be a further synonym.

[6] But a study of the type specimen by British mycologist Derek Reid showed that C. miniata had ellipsoid (not globose) spores and was therefore possibly not synonymous,[7] as later acknowledged by Petersen.

The spores are borne on the sides of the clubs and have thin walls; they measure 5.8–7.2 by 5.8–6.8 μm, and are globose and opalescent.