Is it really rare to find a 4-leaf clover? Well yes… and no. There are some interesting facts that are worth knowing.
Folklore and superstition say that four leaf clovers bring good luck. Some attribute it to the fact that they are difficult to find. What is the real chance of finding a four-leaf clover?
First of all, we cannot talk about clover as such, because it does not exist. we talk about gender trifoliumsome plants of the family Fabaceae made up of more than 250 species. Therefore there is not a clover as such, but 250 different clovers species.
They are characterized because they have, naturally, three leaves or leaflets. But they can have four… or more. The documented record is a 56 leaf clover that found a japanese.
Odds of a four leaf clover
Tradition says that there is one four-leaf clover for every 10,000 three-leaf clovers. But it’s not like that.
according to account Reader’s DigestSwiss researchers examined no less than 5.7 million cloversand so they calculated that The probability of finding a 4-leaf clover is 1 in 5,076.that is, double what was believed.
They also calculated the probability of finding a five-leaf clover, and is 1 in 24,390. And if you want to find a six-leaf clover, there are 1 in 312,500.
Therefore, it’s really hard to find a clover with more than three leaves. A genetic study at the University of Georgia determined that 4 leaf clover has a recessive gene. In these plants, the chromosomes do not go in pairs like in humans, but 4 by 4. This means that to obtain a 4-leaf clover, it is necessary to receive 4 recessive genes, which is rare.
So why have people found several of these clovers, even on the same day? The reason is that in plants, not only genes count.
there are certain conditions of soil nutrients and climatewhich are even stronger than genes, being able to make a clover with recessive genes only generate three leaves.
On the other hand, by cultivating mixed species and seed selection, some companies they grow 4-leaf clovers with a higher spawn frequency.
And why are four-leaf clovers used as good luck charms? There are several origins. The most obvious is that they are rarerso if you’ve found one, you’ve been lucky, and the clover keeps it.
The Irish say that Saint Patrick explained Christianity using a three-leaf clover, which corresponds to the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Celts, on the other hand, used it to protect themselves from fairies, who sometimes used dangerous spells.
Superstition and folklore aside, science tells us that the actual probability of finding a four-leaf clover is 1 in 5,000although as we have seen, changes in the climate or the land can change that percentage.
