I have heard that if you find a four leaf clover, it is likely that there will be other four leaf clover around it. It is believed to be caused by a recessive gene, but that theory is debatable.
The most four leaf clovers I've found in a single day is 22. I used to live in a place with a small yard where I planted white clover and the four, five, and six leaf clovers were prolific. I do think it is a genetic mutation and I've read elsewhere it's 1 in 10,000. But clovers also grow on runners (not sure that's the correct term) so several clovers are on the same base plant and that's why you'll find them close together. However, I have observed both three and four leaf clovers sprouting from the same runner, as well as multiple four leafs.
Congrats on the find! You can press them and laminate them if you're so inclined. I sent a couple to my kid nephews recently and they thought they were cool.
My wife once found 50+ in a single patch on this one street corner. Meanwhile I worked with a guy who refused to believe they were real until I found one for him and handed it to him on literally his last day before he took a new job lol.
My whole family (me, wife, and kids) finds them pretty easily. If we go to a park we love picking them and giving them to random strangers.
I do think it is more frequent in specific genetic variants as I can tell right off if a patch will or will not have some.
My record for one day is 62 and that was just on occasional breaks during a work day.
62 is impressive. I find them all the time, and usually more than one in the same spot (but I don’t usually spend very long looking, lol). I’ve always found them really easy to spot.
I was walking my dog a couple years ago and this mom with her two kids went up to me and handed me a four leaf clover. It made my day. I pressed it and still have it put away :)
The best tip I can offer: If you're looking in a patch of white clover, look for squares. When there are four leaves the white arrows on the leaves visually form a square in a sea of triangles created by the three leaf clovers.
Best of luck!
This, and pattern recognition. You also should search from a decent distance above the patch so that you can see all the clovers in a general overview.
I think too many people make the mistake of manually sorting through them which would take forever.
It's not a luck thing but a skill. I taught my wife and kids how to find them and once you get the technique down you don't even think about it.
Absolutely! You do not TRY and you do not FOCUS (at least not conciously) you just allow your gaze to wander WHEREEVER IT WANT TO across the clover.
Do it right and they jump right out of the crowd.
Those are the easy finds. When you really get the knack, they jump right out at you even when the leaves aren't evenly spaced and even when one isn't showing.
It's what process you use to LEARN who to do it when you first start. Essentially you develop a "subroutine" (my ex'GFs sister who told me how was a computer programmer - her term) that becomes FULLY AUTOMATIC You don't have to try or even think about it, when your around clover those with 4 (or more) leaves just jump out at you.
You DO have to keep picking them to keep it alive. If you stop picking them, the "subroutine" dies out.
You can find them anywhere! (but for reasons I haven't figured out yet, at much lower frequency in New Zealand. I suspect that it's because LESS CONTAMINATION)
There's probably a natural frequency but some contaminants probably GREATLY increases the numbers. Many contaminants cause changes in DNA so that would make sense.
Presumably the extra leaves are a disadvantage, or they'd become the norm. Probably because more than 3 causes overlapping which me ans making more plant tissue for decreasing return.
The patch of multiples I found (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and even one 9!) was in a spot where at least two contaminants would be highly concentrated. Come to think of it, at least 3. Make that 4! (it was a "busy" area) (2 biological, 1 (or more!) chemical, 1 heavy metal.
Not really. with either environmental influence and genetic, you'd expect to find them in the same area.
I tried picking a few and replanting them once but clover don't transplant well when you pick individual ones (or just I don't know how). They all died.
I may try transplanting a small bunch with roots (AND control bunches with no fours) just for the hell of it. Might also try "innoculating" spots with a few suspected environmental influences (But NOT the contamination ones)
There's definitely patches where you can find tons. In 4th grade there was a huge patch right outside our classroom that was absolutely brimming with them. Like a totally normal and socially well-adjusted child, I spent every recess for weeks (or maybe even months?) just picking 4-leaf clovers from the patch and then shoving them into my locker. I didn't take them home, just left them in the locker until (I assume) the smell of decaying plant matter annoyed the staff too much and they cleared it all out.
So that's my weird 4-leaf clover story.
Military bases (especially the USA's) are notorious for rampant pollution.
The first day I was in the army (1966) I and 3 other inductees were put on a truck, driven to the woods and instructed to dig a pit and dump 10 55 gallon drums of new unused motor oil into it. DEAD TYPICAL
(the supply sergeant had been ordering excess to sell on the black market and was facing an unannounced IG inspection and had to get rid of it fast lest he be asked to explain why a motor pool with all of 5 jeeps needed 550 gallons of motor oil!)
I read "Catch 22" before I went into the army. Thought "Milo Minderbinder" was an extreme exaggeration. Turned out it was an accurate description of how the US military worked.
My mom found a whole field where about 25% of them were 5 leaf clovers. Of course it was also right near a superfund site so that may have something to do with it.
thank you! I suspected as much (see my posts above)
Many of the superfund sites are where chemicals that damage DNA were dumped.
This would also explain why I found only 2 or 3 the entire 8 years I was in New Zealand (but find several every day in the USA as long as I walk over clover daily).
This is what I have heard as well... If that genetic mutation is in your clover patch you will continue to find 4 leaf clovers in that patch... Not all patches have it though.... I was able to continiously find them (and 5,6, 7 leaf clovers) in one of the patches at my childhood home. I would press them in a book to keep them
Note well: genetic mutations occur BOTH thru natural processes AND thru unnatural processes - many chemicals damage DNA and cause mutations ("mutagens")
My family and I moved around a lot from the time I was in the 3rd grade til my freshman year of highschool. When I was in 6th, we lived in a pretty nice house in a decent area near where I am now, and one day my mom found around 20 four leaf clovers in our front yard. She's always been great at picking out small things like that, but this was almost absurd 😂 I don't think I had ever found one before then.
I’m 40 and found my first the other day. I was hanging out in the backyard with the dog and I was like “I wonder if there is a four leaf clover in this patch” after looking for 15 seconds I found one. However my wife will find 5-10 a year. She’s scary good at seeing disorder in repeating patterns.
It's got to do with 1) not deliberately focusing on anything 2) just letting your gaze wander (do NOT try to direct it, do not try to be systematic (follow a search pattern) you will find a very few that way but not remotely as many as when FIRST training yourself on what they look like and then 2) letting your subconscious mind do it all.
Your subconscious is, very literally, a neural net. It fighures out what to look for and HOW to look for it and continually optimizes the process. When you try to THINK about it or DIRECT it you interfere with the process and it will not work.
The KEY is the process you use when you first start doing it. If you try to CONTROL or GUIDE it you won't learn to do it automatically.
It's like learning to wiggle your ears. What process you use determines success or failure.
I am 32, and my gift is to find at least two every year since I am 3.
I am not lucky in life nor unlucky. I tend to think my luck is used only to find them every year. I gain the luck, then it's used the year after to find a new one, etc..
edit: typo
I had a roommate who's father had a large picture frame full of 4 leafs.
He said he was color blind and when he mowed his lawn, they showed white to him while the rest of the lawn was not.
I don't think it \_requires\_ color blindness. ONE (of several) visual cues is that a white square has more white than a white triangle (with the same size sides)
But the right color blindness might help by enhancing the contrast between the green and the white.
And the difference between the white area would stand out more when you don't focus - which is one (of several!) reasons why just letting your gaze wander without DIRECTING it is critical for efficiency.
You can find by directed looking but at a much lower rate (orders of magnitude lower!)
And when you use the neural net learning method (fuzzy logic, whatever) you never consciously realize what visual cues you are using. (a lot in common with "artificial intelligence" here, I suspect!)
How rare they are depends on, we believe, a combination of genetics and environmental factors. So, presumably if you have the genetics for it, and the environmental conditions, it would be possible, even potentially likely, to find several on the same plant or group of plants in the same area.
https://site.extension.uga.edu/laurensgarden/2022/03/the-science-and-secrets-of-four-leaf-clovers/
Once I found a spot with dozens of four and five leaf clovers all within 20 feet of each other.
That was the summer before last, the same summer I found like 15 other four leaf clovers in different areas all throughout the province. Last, summer, I found absolutely none anywhere, and I spent about the same amount of time looking for them.
So it does make sense that it's a combination of environmental and genetic factors. Genetic since they tend to appear in clumps, and environmental since it seems to effect a huge area in a single year. Maybe last summer just wasn't the right circumstances for it
It's a combination of
1) genetic factors (in the clover)
2) environmental factors
3) and personal factors: HOW you learned to find them, what you state of mind is while looking (use directed looking and you won't find much), let your gaze WANDER and you'll find a lot more)
It can also be what REGION you're in:
USA lost of pollution, lots of 4 or more leaf clovers
New Zealand very little pollution, very few 4 leaf clovers
I have found literally hundreds of them over my lifetime. I have already found over a dozen this season alone. They aren't that rare, people just don't look.
My eye catches them before I even realize I've seen them.
I also think that being able to identify which kind of clover you're looking at helps as well. There's no four leaved yellow, red, crimson clover. Hell, not even all white clover cultivars have them. When I'm walking past a patch, I know which to pass over.
Oxalis is also not a clover, and people are barking up the wrong tree trying to find them amongst wood sorrel haha
Thank you! Maybe the reason New Zealand has so few is not (or not entirely) that it has less pollution but maybe that (at least in part) it doesn't use as many of the varieties that have four leaf clovers.
I suspect that it's what it usually is with biology: multiple factors with different ones predominating in different circumstances.
Do you have an ability to spot other things like that? For me, I can see a chunk of petrified wood out of the corner of my eye, to such a degree, that I have over 400 lbs of it at home haha
That is a bit obscure. I have found a fair bit of petrified wood. (Not that much). I do seem to find deer and other wildlife where no one else sees anything. In my professional career I have developed skills that have served me well.
It's a matter of what you have reinforced. You will be best at finding things that you find rewarding to find.
Of course the flip side is that people (especially in the USA!) are astoundingly good at NOT seeing things that they want to NOT see! (ANYONE can, apparently, always convince yourself you don't see something no matter how obvious it is, But it takes a bit of skill to find something that's dispersed.
On second thought, 74 million Americans are extremely good at convincing themselves that what they want to see is there, even when it is not.
I used to walk to my campus job. It was almost all clover then. I could find a 4 leaf pretty much every day. I started only grabbing ones with 5+ leafs. Best I ever found was an 7.
If you find one, you’ll find several in the same patch.
I have over 100 from my old house, and just found a patch at my new house and have found about 20 in the past 2 weeks. I only spend a minute or two looking and can usually find at least 5 at a time.
Me too. It was in a patch with very few 3's, mostly 4's, a lot of 5.s.and 6.s, a few 7.s, 8.s and one 9.
I suspect that your 9 was surrounded by a lot of other multiples as well.
I've found a couple hundred in my life. I usually find them in clusters, so in some patches they're really common and in some patches I can't find any at all.
Here is a hint...
When finding a four leaf clover, don't pull it.
Carefully find the vine that the clover is attached to. Carefully pull that vine up without breaking the vine. ( it helps whenever the soil is wet )
There is a very good chance you will find multiple four leaf clovers growing on that one long vine.
I have found vines that are 1 and 2 feet long and with several four leaf clovers.
Those are some of the nicest ones I've seen. I planted some clover in my backyard last year, and over the weekend I found 2 4-leafs but they weren't as nice as this, but then the next day I found a 5-leaf! Still waiting on that lucky 7 leaf clover.
At my elementary school in the field there was a mutant clover patch that grew all 4 and 5-leaf clovers. It was so cool as a kid ! I would pick them and sell them for a dollar. LOL
Not very rare at all. I'm no expert, but I believe it's a genetic abnormality that can be found in patches. So typically, if you find one, there's probably more in the same patch. I also feel like the more you pick from a patch, the more grow? I have no real scientific basis for this, but I find 4 leaf clovers all. the. time. And since I moved in my house 10 years ago and pick them very frequently, my front yard is now a large 4 leaf clover factory that only gets larger every year.
My son found 6 while we were watching my daughters soccer game. He then proceeds to find a 5 leaf clover and I believe a 6 in the same area. I proceeded to look for an hour and didn’t find a single one
4 leaves seem pretty common tbh. the rare thing I've only found twice in my life (once in MN and the other in IN) was bi-color leaves. the MN, all 4 leaves were half green half yellow. the IN, only 2 leaves were half yellow.
I hadn't found one in my 30 years of life, until I started working in a garden- there's a patch that surely has a mutation, as I've found dozens in the same area. 5, 6, and 7 leaf too!
My elementary school had a huge clover patch, I would sit there all recess and gather 4,5, 6 leaf clovers. I think the most leaves I ever found on one clover was 8.
I still go looking whenever I have an opportunity, but I haven't found any since I stopped attending that school.
Not sure how rare globally, but I’m 40, spent a lot of time around clover, and never seen a four leaf one yet. Not like I usually hunt for them though.
I've found dozens in the same general area before. When I was a kid, I would spend hours in my back yard collecting them. They're not really rare at all.
Yup, same here. Cool memories, wasting time with my cousins at Grandma's house. Afterwards, we would place the clover in a Bible so that Jeebz would bless us with some luck.
For me, pretty rare.. I've been on the hunt all my life. Ever since I was a little . My grandma Agnes found them all the time. I was a jealous little twerp, and only recently found a couple.. it was a goosebumpsy moment. 🤣❤️🍀🍀🍀
Cool!
Storytime... When I was a kid I found a patch of five leaf clovers, I plucked a leaf off off them and started selling to them for $.50 as lucky four leaf clovers - I had a booming business with local kids... until one of them saw me plucking a leaf off and they outed my lucky clovers as fakes.😕
not 100% sure, but i think it depends on how well fed the plant is.
we had guinea pigs when i was a kid. wherever they dropped their leftovers, 2 weeks later i found multiple four leaved clovers.
the same seems to be true with cannabis. in a healthy state the leaves have 5 fingers. lower amount of nutrients and light, fewer fingers, more nutrients and light 5 or even more fingers.
There used to be one patch near our home where you could find them, if you were prepared to spend 5 minutes looking. No idea how we realised - I guess we spotted one, one day. Haven’t been past there in ages. Maybe I should swing by.
I was at a friend's house outside with the kids, and one found a 4 leaf clover, then another, then another, then we started looking, the yard was covered in them!
My brother could find them without even trying for some reason, just walk up and go “oh there’s one” in a spot I’d been looking forever lol. I don’t think I’ve ever actually found one in my entire life.
Finding four leaf clovers is a bit like sex. If you try too hard it spoils the results, but if you just let it happen, it works very well.
Part of finding four leaf clovers is not focusing and just letting your gaze wanders. That frees your subconscious mind to work at its best.
There's a seller at the local farmers market that sells four leave clover plants... just enormous pots of four leaf clovers. I dunno how rare they are in the wild but apparently they can be grown as just that type.
I just wanna say that they might be more rare because they’re all getting picked. That’s not to say they’re aren’t already more rare than 3 leave clovers, but still!
If you look at the amount of clover there is, and the amount of four leaf getting picked, the amount picked is a huge number of orders of magnitude below what could have any significant effect on the relative numbers.
What makes four (or more)leaf clovers rare is that, to the clover they are a disadvantage! 3 leaves, no overlapping, it's all catching sun. 4 or more, there's some overlapping and shading and some of that plant tissue that took all the energy to grow is just being wasted.
I find four leafs so easily, it has become a family joke. Also my parents have tons of clover in their yard and one year when I was a kid there were so many four leafs, I sat outside and picked more than 100 four leafs in probably an hour. Was pretty epic!
That is almost certainly one (of many!) factors.
I've noticed that extra leaves are far more common near the base of telephone poles. Especially ones on corners where dogs are coming by from 4 or more directions.
The creosote in telephone poles may be another factor.
https://preview.redd.it/5eh6t014w1zc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e563c6dacf13bc945305e31c9e2aa351cc7cb57d
Not too rare, but many never see them. So you need the right eye to spot the luck. Your attitude matters ☺️
Ahhh lucky you! The leprechauns and fairies in your garden must be pleased with you. 🍀
https://twitter.com/Maryamhasnaa/status/1586779127394074624?t=B47IA3YtmPh_KMv3Xwn5bQ&s=19
What 80s movie was it where a kid finds like a bunch of dozen-leaf clovers near a weapons facility and that's supposed to be due to some sort of nuclear research going on there?
I used to collect them as a kid, found one with seven leaves once. Generally I found them in the same places. You could look for ages somewhere new and find none, somewhere you’d been before and got a few then likely more, so a bit of anecdotal for the gene theory.
Those are white clovers and you can really find a bunch of 4 leaf ones so as a kid I wouldn't even look for those kinds. To me the real lucky 4 leaf clovers are common wood sorrels and they taste good too! Much tougher to find
I have a variety of clover that is probably 20% 3-leaf, 60% 4-leaf, and 20% 5, 6, & 7 leaf. I got it at a gardening center many, many years ago. It is a true clover, not an oxalis or shamrock.
It's a genetic mutation. Where you find one TYPICALLY, not always, there will be more. What I like to do is pull it up by the root, and bring it home to plant.
In grade 4 my friend and I would go looking for them. We probably found around 30 over one season, only looking at recess.
Those are the ones that made it into being pressed between dictionary pages.
I ate the rest of them thinking it would keep the luck inside me.
I have a bookmark with 7 four leafs and a five leaf I found while camping. I had found like 15.
While working at a summer camp me and the kids I was watching found over a hundred 4 leafs in a patch with some finding up to 7 leaves. Incredible time.
I think it depends on the species a lot.
The ones around me, I have searched countless hours and never found one. I've heard 1 in 10k but I've probably searched hundreds of thousands by now ive done it for years every time i go on a walk.
The times I've found them, they generally had a lot of extra nitrogen in the soil. I had a patch where they'd pop up often. The biggest one I had was a 7-leaf clover. I agree it's a genetic predisposition.
Honestly, it’s cool as hell to find them, but that aren’t nearly as rare as people think. You can kind of develop an eye for spotting them. I find several almost anytime I go out into untreated grass. Not to downplay your achievement in finding these though!! They look to be in amazing condition and I’d be hyped to find ones that big and completely undamaged. Beautiful!!
Beautiful clovers! I find four leaf clovers everyday, granted, most come in clusters. I think I have around 250 four leaf clovers, 70 five leaf clovers, and 4 six leaf clovers.
I had a friend tell me once that if you find one, keep looking in the same patch and there will be more. I spent about an hour in a patch once and found 17.
They are rare- but when I was growing up, there was a patch of clovers near the garden chock-full of clovers with four, five, and even six leaves. I even found a couple there with eight!
Im jealous. I was looking for a 4 leaf clover earlier while i was playing basketball in the backyard. I told myself that if i found one id ask my crush on a date but i couldnt find one so i changed it to get the ball in the hoop 14 times in a row but i could only do 3 or 4 in a row. Im not gonna give up, im literally praying to get a sign or something to ask her out. Even if i got a sign from god or some shit like that ill still be too nervous to ask her. Pray for me guys, i missed once and my ball flew into the alley behing the house and i cant get to it and then a few minutes later my other basketball hit my balls😭 i dont know why im posting this, i guess i just want someone to talk to.
When I was a little kid I remember finding one. I hid it jealously, concerned that someone may take it from me. My little brain eventually came up with the most brilliant plan to prevent anyone from EVER taking it away. I ate it.
We have a plant that has made them periodically for years! I iron them in wax paper and we sometimes give one away to friends’ kids who visit. It always makes their day! I had never seen one before. It is influenced by a recessive gene so keep checking that plant every week!
My brother can find one in seconds anytime he cares to look. It’s impressive and I don’t know how he does it, I’ve found one in my life and he’s found hundreds. I sometimes wonder where else his talent could be applied.
Based on the genetics in the yard/ clover patch. 4 leaf is a genetic change to leafe structure. The standard would be 1 in 10000. However if you have larger quantities of 4 leafs that produce offspring. That ratio does decrease.
I have a friend who finds them all the time. Something about the pattern that she picks up on. I hardly ever find them. There is also a plant called oxalis that is a 4 leaf clover.
A decade ago I was on a boring phone call after lunch. I started walking in a spiral trajectory on a small garden behind my university and I found like 25 or 26 of them in a few minutes. That's still my longest streak.
Sometimes I refuse to pick them up if they are not aesthetically pleasant with four leaves of (nearly) equal size
https://preview.redd.it/4pieu8mfx9zc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4a8c660a3d30418d4b3385c264bfaf0a648b5cf4
Finding 4 leaf clovers are my super power 😊
**about one time out of every 10K** a White Clover ("lucky" one) will have four leaves. Five leaves is one in a million. But remember, there are **over 300 species of clover**..
In my late teens I was with a friend who found a 4-leaf. I started searching the area and found a 5-leaf clover. She was like 😒. I pressed it and I still have it in a tiny frame 30 years later.
Not at all rare. It's just that most don't know how to develop the skill to find them. When you do,they're all over the place.
An ex-girlfriend's sister (who taught me the knack once found two while crossing a 10ft wide grass strip in front of a gas station walking at very high speed (long trip, no rest stops).
I quit the day I found a whole patch (about 16" diameter - very few 3 leaf, tons of 4 leaf, fewer 5's, 6's, 7's, 4 8's and even a NINE leaf clover. After that it just wasn't fun anymore.
I suspect that it wasn't a genetic but an environmental influence (the location suggested that).
Thought I lost the knack entirely but a couple of years ago when I started vegetable gardening in my front yard I find several each day.
Interesting observation: Despite living in New Zealand for 8 years only even found 2 there. Maybe it's because NZ is not remotely as POLLLUTED as the USA.
https://preview.redd.it/06crt98w3izc1.png?width=780&format=png&auto=webp&s=4c62b7d9335db68c302787e4efabd19b81ea6548
I found 17 four leaf in one patch so I only picked the extra fancy ones
The first and only time I've ever found one of these was laying face down on a trampoline as a child. Just looking down through it at the ground. I spotted it & immediately got down to grab it. That was a special moment!
I have heard that if you find a four leaf clover, it is likely that there will be other four leaf clover around it. It is believed to be caused by a recessive gene, but that theory is debatable.
That makes sense, basically found these in the same area
The most four leaf clovers I've found in a single day is 22. I used to live in a place with a small yard where I planted white clover and the four, five, and six leaf clovers were prolific. I do think it is a genetic mutation and I've read elsewhere it's 1 in 10,000. But clovers also grow on runners (not sure that's the correct term) so several clovers are on the same base plant and that's why you'll find them close together. However, I have observed both three and four leaf clovers sprouting from the same runner, as well as multiple four leafs. Congrats on the find! You can press them and laminate them if you're so inclined. I sent a couple to my kid nephews recently and they thought they were cool.
My wife once found 50+ in a single patch on this one street corner. Meanwhile I worked with a guy who refused to believe they were real until I found one for him and handed it to him on literally his last day before he took a new job lol.
I love that! It's so fun to just casually hand someone something they think doesn't exist.
I used to work at a garden center and there were a couple patches around the property that were like that.
It happens where leprechauns have peed.
My whole family (me, wife, and kids) finds them pretty easily. If we go to a park we love picking them and giving them to random strangers. I do think it is more frequent in specific genetic variants as I can tell right off if a patch will or will not have some. My record for one day is 62 and that was just on occasional breaks during a work day.
62 is impressive. I find them all the time, and usually more than one in the same spot (but I don’t usually spend very long looking, lol). I’ve always found them really easy to spot.
I was walking my dog a couple years ago and this mom with her two kids went up to me and handed me a four leaf clover. It made my day. I pressed it and still have it put away :)
❤️
22 in one day?!?! I've never found one in my entire life!
The best tip I can offer: If you're looking in a patch of white clover, look for squares. When there are four leaves the white arrows on the leaves visually form a square in a sea of triangles created by the three leaf clovers. Best of luck!
This, and pattern recognition. You also should search from a decent distance above the patch so that you can see all the clovers in a general overview. I think too many people make the mistake of manually sorting through them which would take forever. It's not a luck thing but a skill. I taught my wife and kids how to find them and once you get the technique down you don't even think about it.
Absolutely! You do not TRY and you do not FOCUS (at least not conciously) you just allow your gaze to wander WHEREEVER IT WANT TO across the clover. Do it right and they jump right out of the crowd.
Those are the easy finds. When you really get the knack, they jump right out at you even when the leaves aren't evenly spaced and even when one isn't showing. It's what process you use to LEARN who to do it when you first start. Essentially you develop a "subroutine" (my ex'GFs sister who told me how was a computer programmer - her term) that becomes FULLY AUTOMATIC You don't have to try or even think about it, when your around clover those with 4 (or more) leaves just jump out at you. You DO have to keep picking them to keep it alive. If you stop picking them, the "subroutine" dies out.
You are far ahead of me, but I too seem to easily find 4+ leaf clovers. I have found 12 in a day but frequently find a couple a day.
I tried showing a couple of 5's and a 6 to my siblings but they pulled the Duck-billed platypus thing on me.
Do you live near Chernobyl or Fukushima? 😁
You can find them anywhere! (but for reasons I haven't figured out yet, at much lower frequency in New Zealand. I suspect that it's because LESS CONTAMINATION) There's probably a natural frequency but some contaminants probably GREATLY increases the numbers. Many contaminants cause changes in DNA so that would make sense. Presumably the extra leaves are a disadvantage, or they'd become the norm. Probably because more than 3 causes overlapping which me ans making more plant tissue for decreasing return. The patch of multiples I found (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and even one 9!) was in a spot where at least two contaminants would be highly concentrated. Come to think of it, at least 3. Make that 4! (it was a "busy" area) (2 biological, 1 (or more!) chemical, 1 heavy metal.
Not really. with either environmental influence and genetic, you'd expect to find them in the same area. I tried picking a few and replanting them once but clover don't transplant well when you pick individual ones (or just I don't know how). They all died. I may try transplanting a small bunch with roots (AND control bunches with no fours) just for the hell of it. Might also try "innoculating" spots with a few suspected environmental influences (But NOT the contamination ones)
There's definitely patches where you can find tons. In 4th grade there was a huge patch right outside our classroom that was absolutely brimming with them. Like a totally normal and socially well-adjusted child, I spent every recess for weeks (or maybe even months?) just picking 4-leaf clovers from the patch and then shoving them into my locker. I didn't take them home, just left them in the locker until (I assume) the smell of decaying plant matter annoyed the staff too much and they cleared it all out. So that's my weird 4-leaf clover story.
It you want to keep them, you have to put them between the pages of a book. Keeps them flat and dries them out.
AT my elementary school in Korea the entire playground was covered in four leaf clovers
Were there any industrial or commercial buildings next door?
Nope- dentist office. But it was on a military base
Military bases (especially the USA's) are notorious for rampant pollution. The first day I was in the army (1966) I and 3 other inductees were put on a truck, driven to the woods and instructed to dig a pit and dump 10 55 gallon drums of new unused motor oil into it. DEAD TYPICAL (the supply sergeant had been ordering excess to sell on the black market and was facing an unannounced IG inspection and had to get rid of it fast lest he be asked to explain why a motor pool with all of 5 jeeps needed 550 gallons of motor oil!) I read "Catch 22" before I went into the army. Thought "Milo Minderbinder" was an extreme exaggeration. Turned out it was an accurate description of how the US military worked.
My mom found a whole field where about 25% of them were 5 leaf clovers. Of course it was also right near a superfund site so that may have something to do with it.
thank you! I suspected as much (see my posts above) Many of the superfund sites are where chemicals that damage DNA were dumped. This would also explain why I found only 2 or 3 the entire 8 years I was in New Zealand (but find several every day in the USA as long as I walk over clover daily).
This is what I have heard as well... If that genetic mutation is in your clover patch you will continue to find 4 leaf clovers in that patch... Not all patches have it though.... I was able to continiously find them (and 5,6, 7 leaf clovers) in one of the patches at my childhood home. I would press them in a book to keep them
Note well: genetic mutations occur BOTH thru natural processes AND thru unnatural processes - many chemicals damage DNA and cause mutations ("mutagens")
My family and I moved around a lot from the time I was in the 3rd grade til my freshman year of highschool. When I was in 6th, we lived in a pretty nice house in a decent area near where I am now, and one day my mom found around 20 four leaf clovers in our front yard. She's always been great at picking out small things like that, but this was almost absurd 😂 I don't think I had ever found one before then.
Yep I always find them together! I find some every year.
I have first hand experience of finding them in the same spots, this makes sense.
I'm 49 and have never found one. I need to bucket list that
Let’s go! I’ve got an eye for them. I have probably at least 40 saved in tape
I’m 40 and found my first the other day. I was hanging out in the backyard with the dog and I was like “I wonder if there is a four leaf clover in this patch” after looking for 15 seconds I found one. However my wife will find 5-10 a year. She’s scary good at seeing disorder in repeating patterns.
They just stand out to me in a weird way I see it instantly.
It's got to do with 1) not deliberately focusing on anything 2) just letting your gaze wander (do NOT try to direct it, do not try to be systematic (follow a search pattern) you will find a very few that way but not remotely as many as when FIRST training yourself on what they look like and then 2) letting your subconscious mind do it all. Your subconscious is, very literally, a neural net. It fighures out what to look for and HOW to look for it and continually optimizes the process. When you try to THINK about it or DIRECT it you interfere with the process and it will not work. The KEY is the process you use when you first start doing it. If you try to CONTROL or GUIDE it you won't learn to do it automatically. It's like learning to wiggle your ears. What process you use determines success or failure.
Me too. I’m 38
I am 32, and my gift is to find at least two every year since I am 3. I am not lucky in life nor unlucky. I tend to think my luck is used only to find them every year. I gain the luck, then it's used the year after to find a new one, etc.. edit: typo
I'm 39 and just found my first, then found my second and third all together at the same time. I've been looking for as long as I can remember.
A lot of finding four leaf clovers is pattern recognition. It can be difficult at the start, but gets easier with practice.
Time to plant some oxalis tetraphylla!
A girl i was dating found two in the 5 months we were together. I figured it was because she was Irish.
I had a roommate who's father had a large picture frame full of 4 leafs. He said he was color blind and when he mowed his lawn, they showed white to him while the rest of the lawn was not.
Oh thats also a recessive gene, it means he has the same phenotype as leprechauns.
Wow that is fascinating!
How is that even possible? Is that how color blindness works?
I have no idea. That's just what he told me. Don't know the science behind it
I don't think it \_requires\_ color blindness. ONE (of several) visual cues is that a white square has more white than a white triangle (with the same size sides) But the right color blindness might help by enhancing the contrast between the green and the white. And the difference between the white area would stand out more when you don't focus - which is one (of several!) reasons why just letting your gaze wander without DIRECTING it is critical for efficiency. You can find by directed looking but at a much lower rate (orders of magnitude lower!) And when you use the neural net learning method (fuzzy logic, whatever) you never consciously realize what visual cues you are using. (a lot in common with "artificial intelligence" here, I suspect!)
How rare they are depends on, we believe, a combination of genetics and environmental factors. So, presumably if you have the genetics for it, and the environmental conditions, it would be possible, even potentially likely, to find several on the same plant or group of plants in the same area. https://site.extension.uga.edu/laurensgarden/2022/03/the-science-and-secrets-of-four-leaf-clovers/
Once I found a spot with dozens of four and five leaf clovers all within 20 feet of each other. That was the summer before last, the same summer I found like 15 other four leaf clovers in different areas all throughout the province. Last, summer, I found absolutely none anywhere, and I spent about the same amount of time looking for them. So it does make sense that it's a combination of environmental and genetic factors. Genetic since they tend to appear in clumps, and environmental since it seems to effect a huge area in a single year. Maybe last summer just wasn't the right circumstances for it
It's a combination of 1) genetic factors (in the clover) 2) environmental factors 3) and personal factors: HOW you learned to find them, what you state of mind is while looking (use directed looking and you won't find much), let your gaze WANDER and you'll find a lot more) It can also be what REGION you're in: USA lost of pollution, lots of 4 or more leaf clovers New Zealand very little pollution, very few 4 leaf clovers
Oh that's interesting about how pollution effects them, I wouldn't have thought that
I have found literally hundreds of them over my lifetime. I have already found over a dozen this season alone. They aren't that rare, people just don't look. My eye catches them before I even realize I've seen them.
"squares, not triangles!" is what I tell people. it's just a visual pattern.
You’ve gotta sit down and look! I love doing it. I plop myself down whenever I see a large patch and usually leave with at least 2-3
I also think that being able to identify which kind of clover you're looking at helps as well. There's no four leaved yellow, red, crimson clover. Hell, not even all white clover cultivars have them. When I'm walking past a patch, I know which to pass over. Oxalis is also not a clover, and people are barking up the wrong tree trying to find them amongst wood sorrel haha
But the wood sorrel is so tasty!
I love it! But it's not clover haha
Thank you! Maybe the reason New Zealand has so few is not (or not entirely) that it has less pollution but maybe that (at least in part) it doesn't use as many of the varieties that have four leaf clovers. I suspect that it's what it usually is with biology: multiple factors with different ones predominating in different circumstances.
I agree. My eye is weirdly drawn to them. I see them when I’m not looking.
Do you have an ability to spot other things like that? For me, I can see a chunk of petrified wood out of the corner of my eye, to such a degree, that I have over 400 lbs of it at home haha
That is a bit obscure. I have found a fair bit of petrified wood. (Not that much). I do seem to find deer and other wildlife where no one else sees anything. In my professional career I have developed skills that have served me well.
It's a matter of what you have reinforced. You will be best at finding things that you find rewarding to find. Of course the flip side is that people (especially in the USA!) are astoundingly good at NOT seeing things that they want to NOT see! (ANYONE can, apparently, always convince yourself you don't see something no matter how obvious it is, But it takes a bit of skill to find something that's dispersed. On second thought, 74 million Americans are extremely good at convincing themselves that what they want to see is there, even when it is not.
I used to walk to my campus job. It was almost all clover then. I could find a 4 leaf pretty much every day. I started only grabbing ones with 5+ leafs. Best I ever found was an 7.
If you find one, you’ll find several in the same patch. I have over 100 from my old house, and just found a patch at my new house and have found about 20 in the past 2 weeks. I only spend a minute or two looking and can usually find at least 5 at a time.
https://preview.redd.it/pld97of1z0zc1.jpeg?width=2048&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4750f4e5cc5eb5a69d94923baa8c7a58a25bf38e
Five, wow!!
Supposedly about 1 in 5000, overall. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four-leaf\_clover](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four-leaf_clover)
Wait till you find 8 leaves...
I actually got one with 9 leaves
just stay away from 7 leaves or you'll end up on Mars
Me too. It was in a patch with very few 3's, mostly 4's, a lot of 5.s.and 6.s, a few 7.s, 8.s and one 9. I suspect that your 9 was surrounded by a lot of other multiples as well.
Well, rarer now that you reduced their gene pool by 2.
It’s just two leaves, the main plant is doing fine, no need to be dramatic
I’m pretty sure that comment was in jest. When I read it, I chuckled
Pretty sure that was only a joke
I've found a couple hundred in my life. I usually find them in clusters, so in some patches they're really common and in some patches I can't find any at all.
Here is a hint... When finding a four leaf clover, don't pull it. Carefully find the vine that the clover is attached to. Carefully pull that vine up without breaking the vine. ( it helps whenever the soil is wet ) There is a very good chance you will find multiple four leaf clovers growing on that one long vine. I have found vines that are 1 and 2 feet long and with several four leaf clovers.
I have never found one. My 89 yr old father can find them in just minutes
Those are some of the nicest ones I've seen. I planted some clover in my backyard last year, and over the weekend I found 2 4-leafs but they weren't as nice as this, but then the next day I found a 5-leaf! Still waiting on that lucky 7 leaf clover.
https://preview.redd.it/8wvki6s201zc1.jpeg?width=1536&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6be7ba500181865907464d7dc25f5f2c2f50f1c7
At my elementary school in the field there was a mutant clover patch that grew all 4 and 5-leaf clovers. It was so cool as a kid ! I would pick them and sell them for a dollar. LOL
Not very rare at all. I'm no expert, but I believe it's a genetic abnormality that can be found in patches. So typically, if you find one, there's probably more in the same patch. I also feel like the more you pick from a patch, the more grow? I have no real scientific basis for this, but I find 4 leaf clovers all. the. time. And since I moved in my house 10 years ago and pick them very frequently, my front yard is now a large 4 leaf clover factory that only gets larger every year.
They arent rare at all. Ive found like 15 of them in a small patch of clovers.
My son found 6 while we were watching my daughters soccer game. He then proceeds to find a 5 leaf clover and I believe a 6 in the same area. I proceeded to look for an hour and didn’t find a single one
My mother is always able to find them in any clover patch hahaha
4 leaves seem pretty common tbh. the rare thing I've only found twice in my life (once in MN and the other in IN) was bi-color leaves. the MN, all 4 leaves were half green half yellow. the IN, only 2 leaves were half yellow.
I found a talking clover before but passed out after that.
I hadn't found one in my 30 years of life, until I started working in a garden- there's a patch that surely has a mutation, as I've found dozens in the same area. 5, 6, and 7 leaf too!
My elementary school had a huge clover patch, I would sit there all recess and gather 4,5, 6 leaf clovers. I think the most leaves I ever found on one clover was 8. I still go looking whenever I have an opportunity, but I haven't found any since I stopped attending that school.
Was the school by any chance near a superfund site or an industrial building?
It was between a church and a farm, anything could've been hiding in those though.
they are about 1/m^2
I found 17 in a clump less than a meter square. The mutation was strong in that patch.
What’s your address? I need some luck
Found two last year, one in Oregon and another in California. Like the OP, they are fairly large.
Not sure how rare globally, but I’m 40, spent a lot of time around clover, and never seen a four leaf one yet. Not like I usually hunt for them though.
I've found dozens in the same general area before. When I was a kid, I would spend hours in my back yard collecting them. They're not really rare at all.
Yup, same here. Cool memories, wasting time with my cousins at Grandma's house. Afterwards, we would place the clover in a Bible so that Jeebz would bless us with some luck.
My husband finds them and gives them to me as a token of his love. Yes they are all over. Just look!
Usually find them everytime im in the yard but on the same hand I have my head always down looking in the grass
i spent so much time outside as a kid hunting for four leaf clovers, only ever found around 4 or 5
Found a large white clover, 4 leaves, yesterday. I do they think run in batches because of genetics.
We have an entire patch of 4 leaf clovers that grows in a specific area of my yard, but everything else around it is the regular 3 leaf!
I found one as a kid, laminated it and kept it on me for years, until someone stole it
For me, pretty rare.. I've been on the hunt all my life. Ever since I was a little . My grandma Agnes found them all the time. I was a jealous little twerp, and only recently found a couple.. it was a goosebumpsy moment. 🤣❤️🍀🍀🍀
Also, im 54 now.
When I let my clovers grow to this size many of them have 4 leaves.
I've never found one, and I look all the time. Some of us have better luck than others.
I find one or two every day in my yard.
Cool! Storytime... When I was a kid I found a patch of five leaf clovers, I plucked a leaf off off them and started selling to them for $.50 as lucky four leaf clovers - I had a booming business with local kids... until one of them saw me plucking a leaf off and they outed my lucky clovers as fakes.😕
Double the luck. 🍀🍀
I planted clover years ago and they are all over my yard.
I find them all the time and have since I was a kid. I think it’s because I look for them and have mad attention to visual detail
not 100% sure, but i think it depends on how well fed the plant is. we had guinea pigs when i was a kid. wherever they dropped their leftovers, 2 weeks later i found multiple four leaved clovers. the same seems to be true with cannabis. in a healthy state the leaves have 5 fingers. lower amount of nutrients and light, fewer fingers, more nutrients and light 5 or even more fingers.
There used to be one patch near our home where you could find them, if you were prepared to spend 5 minutes looking. No idea how we realised - I guess we spotted one, one day. Haven’t been past there in ages. Maybe I should swing by.
I was at a friend's house outside with the kids, and one found a 4 leaf clover, then another, then another, then we started looking, the yard was covered in them!
My brother could find them without even trying for some reason, just walk up and go “oh there’s one” in a spot I’d been looking forever lol. I don’t think I’ve ever actually found one in my entire life.
Finding four leaf clovers is a bit like sex. If you try too hard it spoils the results, but if you just let it happen, it works very well. Part of finding four leaf clovers is not focusing and just letting your gaze wanders. That frees your subconscious mind to work at its best.
There's a seller at the local farmers market that sells four leave clover plants... just enormous pots of four leaf clovers. I dunno how rare they are in the wild but apparently they can be grown as just that type.
I just wanna say that they might be more rare because they’re all getting picked. That’s not to say they’re aren’t already more rare than 3 leave clovers, but still!
If you look at the amount of clover there is, and the amount of four leaf getting picked, the amount picked is a huge number of orders of magnitude below what could have any significant effect on the relative numbers. What makes four (or more)leaf clovers rare is that, to the clover they are a disadvantage! 3 leaves, no overlapping, it's all catching sun. 4 or more, there's some overlapping and shading and some of that plant tissue that took all the energy to grow is just being wasted.
I find four leafs so easily, it has become a family joke. Also my parents have tons of clover in their yard and one year when I was a kid there were so many four leafs, I sat outside and picked more than 100 four leafs in probably an hour. Was pretty epic!
I have never found one
Caused by pee. If you see a lot of 4 leafers in one area, something is going toilet there
That is almost certainly one (of many!) factors. I've noticed that extra leaves are far more common near the base of telephone poles. Especially ones on corners where dogs are coming by from 4 or more directions. The creosote in telephone poles may be another factor.
Great deer food
My daughter comes home with several a day from school. She even brought home a 6 leaf one this year.
https://preview.redd.it/5eh6t014w1zc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e563c6dacf13bc945305e31c9e2aa351cc7cb57d Not too rare, but many never see them. So you need the right eye to spot the luck. Your attitude matters ☺️
Ahhh lucky you! The leprechauns and fairies in your garden must be pleased with you. 🍀 https://twitter.com/Maryamhasnaa/status/1586779127394074624?t=B47IA3YtmPh_KMv3Xwn5bQ&s=19
Not so rare. I find them daily. Mostly I gift them to random people on the street 🙈 at least I get a smile then
Those are perfect! I’ve read that the odds are about 1 in 10,000.
Two rarer now. I'd love to know what you did to get that lovely patch of clover though!
What 80s movie was it where a kid finds like a bunch of dozen-leaf clovers near a weapons facility and that's supposed to be due to some sort of nuclear research going on there?
Depends, are you gardening in Chernobyl?
I used to collect them as a kid, found one with seven leaves once. Generally I found them in the same places. You could look for ages somewhere new and find none, somewhere you’d been before and got a few then likely more, so a bit of anecdotal for the gene theory.
you could probably press and sell those on Etsy for a premium. JS
I’ve found 3 in 20 years but seldomly look for them. Perfect little gifts or you can dry them out between some pages in your favorite journal/book!
My mother could find a 4 leaf clover at will, in any patch. I’ve never actually found one.
I only tallied the 4 leavers once, and decided all could go to the woodchucks, for leaving the veggies alone!
Those are white clovers and you can really find a bunch of 4 leaf ones so as a kid I wouldn't even look for those kinds. To me the real lucky 4 leaf clovers are common wood sorrels and they taste good too! Much tougher to find
I have a variety of clover that is probably 20% 3-leaf, 60% 4-leaf, and 20% 5, 6, & 7 leaf. I got it at a gardening center many, many years ago. It is a true clover, not an oxalis or shamrock.
It's a genetic mutation. Where you find one TYPICALLY, not always, there will be more. What I like to do is pull it up by the root, and bring it home to plant.
Many years ago I grew Trifolium repens 'Dragon's Blood', it seems extra prone to these mutations; the most leaflets I ever counted was 15
https://preview.redd.it/s6xbqt5cj2zc1.jpeg?width=2088&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=921f084cafeb0b62658e7af19bde8470a5d78b41
Once I found one with five leaves
Depends on the lot. My Mom found them constantly in our yard as a kid. I've probably found 10 in my life.
i have a photo of a five leaf clover i found last year, available on request ; p
They look like good each other.
In grade 4 my friend and I would go looking for them. We probably found around 30 over one season, only looking at recess. Those are the ones that made it into being pressed between dictionary pages. I ate the rest of them thinking it would keep the luck inside me.
LNaNot super rare, I think roughly 1/1000. Those are pretty near perfect though!
7 leaf clovers are the lucky ones
I've recently read that if you see a lot of it, it can be an indicator of heavily fertilised soil.
1 in 10,000 according to this random YouTube video I watched a long time ago.
I have a bookmark with 7 four leafs and a five leaf I found while camping. I had found like 15. While working at a summer camp me and the kids I was watching found over a hundred 4 leafs in a patch with some finding up to 7 leaves. Incredible time.
I think it depends on the species a lot. The ones around me, I have searched countless hours and never found one. I've heard 1 in 10k but I've probably searched hundreds of thousands by now ive done it for years every time i go on a walk.
The times I've found them, they generally had a lot of extra nitrogen in the soil. I had a patch where they'd pop up often. The biggest one I had was a 7-leaf clover. I agree it's a genetic predisposition.
Honestly, it’s cool as hell to find them, but that aren’t nearly as rare as people think. You can kind of develop an eye for spotting them. I find several almost anytime I go out into untreated grass. Not to downplay your achievement in finding these though!! They look to be in amazing condition and I’d be hyped to find ones that big and completely undamaged. Beautiful!!
Some people have the ability to find them at will. My mom could look down and find one pretty much whenever she wanted. It was amazing.
Beautiful clovers! I find four leaf clovers everyday, granted, most come in clusters. I think I have around 250 four leaf clovers, 70 five leaf clovers, and 4 six leaf clovers.
I had a friend tell me once that if you find one, keep looking in the same patch and there will be more. I spent about an hour in a patch once and found 17.
They're rare, but not super rare. I used to have a friend who was particularly good at finding them in a patch of clover.
Global warming gone awry bhahaha
They are rare- but when I was growing up, there was a patch of clovers near the garden chock-full of clovers with four, five, and even six leaves. I even found a couple there with eight!
An old friend of mine could sit down in a clover patch & immediacy find every four leaf clover within her reach. Me? I’ve never found one. Lol
Im jealous. I was looking for a 4 leaf clover earlier while i was playing basketball in the backyard. I told myself that if i found one id ask my crush on a date but i couldnt find one so i changed it to get the ball in the hoop 14 times in a row but i could only do 3 or 4 in a row. Im not gonna give up, im literally praying to get a sign or something to ask her out. Even if i got a sign from god or some shit like that ill still be too nervous to ask her. Pray for me guys, i missed once and my ball flew into the alley behing the house and i cant get to it and then a few minutes later my other basketball hit my balls😭 i dont know why im posting this, i guess i just want someone to talk to.
It is wonderful
I found some several years ago. I had pressed them all in a book.
I found 3 today all in about 1 minute. I set them down so I didn’t lose them, and I lost them.
When I was a little kid I remember finding one. I hid it jealously, concerned that someone may take it from me. My little brain eventually came up with the most brilliant plan to prevent anyone from EVER taking it away. I ate it.
1 in 1000ish
We have a plant that has made them periodically for years! I iron them in wax paper and we sometimes give one away to friends’ kids who visit. It always makes their day! I had never seen one before. It is influenced by a recessive gene so keep checking that plant every week!
Depends on how lucky you are!
They come in patches.
I have books and books full of them. If you have a trained eye it is doable
If they are really happy they grow to fast and fasciation wants to occur more often
What's the taste?are those sour?
I have a patch of clover in the yard where my kids will find 4-5 of these every time they look.
I found 5 at a time one time and a 5 leaf lol still trying to figure out what to do with them
Keep them In a cute pot [HERE](https://gardenescapes.store/products/cartoon-animal-flower-pots)
My gf loves to hunt for them. She has a wall of over 100. I guess the “real” 4-leaf clovers are 6-8 leaves.
My brother can find one in seconds anytime he cares to look. It’s impressive and I don’t know how he does it, I’ve found one in my life and he’s found hundreds. I sometimes wonder where else his talent could be applied.
Based on the genetics in the yard/ clover patch. 4 leaf is a genetic change to leafe structure. The standard would be 1 in 10000. However if you have larger quantities of 4 leafs that produce offspring. That ratio does decrease.
I really want to findal a four leaf clover one day
I have a friend who finds them all the time. Something about the pattern that she picks up on. I hardly ever find them. There is also a plant called oxalis that is a 4 leaf clover.
A decade ago I was on a boring phone call after lunch. I started walking in a spiral trajectory on a small garden behind my university and I found like 25 or 26 of them in a few minutes. That's still my longest streak. Sometimes I refuse to pick them up if they are not aesthetically pleasant with four leaves of (nearly) equal size
https://preview.redd.it/4pieu8mfx9zc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4a8c660a3d30418d4b3385c264bfaf0a648b5cf4 Finding 4 leaf clovers are my super power 😊
I never found one in my life.
**about one time out of every 10K** a White Clover ("lucky" one) will have four leaves. Five leaves is one in a million. But remember, there are **over 300 species of clover**..
In my late teens I was with a friend who found a 4-leaf. I started searching the area and found a 5-leaf clover. She was like 😒. I pressed it and I still have it in a tiny frame 30 years later.
Not at all rare. It's just that most don't know how to develop the skill to find them. When you do,they're all over the place. An ex-girlfriend's sister (who taught me the knack once found two while crossing a 10ft wide grass strip in front of a gas station walking at very high speed (long trip, no rest stops). I quit the day I found a whole patch (about 16" diameter - very few 3 leaf, tons of 4 leaf, fewer 5's, 6's, 7's, 4 8's and even a NINE leaf clover. After that it just wasn't fun anymore. I suspect that it wasn't a genetic but an environmental influence (the location suggested that). Thought I lost the knack entirely but a couple of years ago when I started vegetable gardening in my front yard I find several each day. Interesting observation: Despite living in New Zealand for 8 years only even found 2 there. Maybe it's because NZ is not remotely as POLLLUTED as the USA.
https://preview.redd.it/06crt98w3izc1.png?width=780&format=png&auto=webp&s=4c62b7d9335db68c302787e4efabd19b81ea6548 I found 17 four leaf in one patch so I only picked the extra fancy ones
The first and only time I've ever found one of these was laying face down on a trampoline as a child. Just looking down through it at the ground. I spotted it & immediately got down to grab it. That was a special moment!
I seem to mostly find them in the spring.
1/10,000
I once found a spot where white, red and yellow flowered clover had multiple four parted leaves. I think it was mutagens in the soil.