Phosphorescent Mushrooms
In 1840 a botanist in Brazil encountered a group of children "playing with a glowing object that turned out to be a luminescent mushroom." He sent samples back to Kew Gardens, where it was named after him: Agaricus gardneri. The glow-in-the-dark mushroom was then promptly lost to science, and not rediscovered until a recent intrepid midnight rainforest survey by a San Francisco State research team.
The Brazilian phosphorescent mushroom is locally known as "flor-de-coco," for its habit of growing at the roots of a particular species of dwarf palm. It is one of the world's brightest phosphorescent mushrooms, almost bright enough to read newspaper by, according to some accounts. But it is by no means the only phosphorescent mushroom.
The Brazilian phosphorescent mushroom is locally known as "flor-de-coco," for its habit of growing at the roots of a particular species of dwarf palm. It is one of the world's brightest phosphorescent mushrooms, almost bright enough to read newspaper by, according to some accounts. But it is by no means the only phosphorescent mushroom.
