Huge increase in tree-killing disease is result of climate crisis, experts say
A golden mushroom that grows in clusters and can attack and kill trees has increased by 200% in the UK in a year because of the hot summer and damp autumn.
Recorded sightings of honey fungus are up by almost 200% compared with the same period last year, according to iNaturalist.
Armillaria, or honey fungus, is not a single species but a group of closely related ones. “As their name suggests, they are a honey-brown colour, often with greenish tinges when young,” said David Gibbs, a field mycologist. “Large clumps often develop a frosty appearance and become dusted by their white spores.”
The clusters that appear in gardens and woodlands are temporary fruiting bodies of the main part of the fungus, the mycelium.
