Mushroom giant
Langermannia gigantea, which belongs to the raincoat family, holds the record for the largest mushroom. In common parlance, it is called a giant raincoat.
Scientists have discovered specimens of such mushrooms, reaching 80 cm in diameter, with a weight of 20 kg. These parameters prompted scientists to come up with different names for this mushroom.
At a young age, this mushroom is used in the preparation of various dishes. However, it was previously used in a different way. In the last century, villagers used it as a haemostatic agent. To do this, young mushrooms were cut into pieces and dried.
Also, this mushroom has benefited beekeepers. They found that if you set fire to a piece of such a mushroom, it would burn very slowly, emitting a lot of smoke. Therefore, such a remedy was used by beekeepers to calm the bees. In addition, the raincoat holds another record among fellows – the number of spores in its fruiting body can reach 7 billion pieces.
