The discovery of a new species of mushroom in Denmark has been announced in the scientific journal Mycological Progress. It can grow to a height of up to 10 cm, which makes the find unusual because most new species discovered aren’t as visible.

The new fungus, which was found on the forest floor of Marieskovlunden near Kolding in southern Jutland, has been given the name Cortinarius Koldingensis.

The samples of the mushroom were first found ten years ago, but researchers had to wait until 2013 for enough data to be able to officially prove that it is a new species.

Tobias Guldberg Frøslev, a researcher at the natural history museum at Copenhagen University, was the lead author of the reported findings. He explained that the species is thought to be quite uncommon.

“Cortinarius Koldingensis is a large, green-yellow cap mushroom that belongs to the Cortinarius family,” he said.

“Cortinarius is one of the first groups of mushroom that have been studied in detail with DNA analysis, but despite the extensive analysis of Cortinarius, Cortinarius Koldingensis is to date exclusively known from Marielundskoven near Kolding. So we assume that the species is very rare in Europe.”