2What Is a Christmas Mushroom?
Known in German as glücklicher pilz or gluckspilz (which literally means “lucky mushroom”), the red-and-white speckled fungi grow deep in the forest. Its real name is Amanita muscaria or fly agaric, and finding one is thought to be a sign of good luck, similar to the way the Irish view four-leaf clovers. That’s because the roots of this specific mushroom can only grow in the root zones of certain types of trees, which happen to be those we generally think of as Christmas trees.
