"We could probably go outside right now here in California — or really, wherever you are at in North America — and we could easily find a new species of mushroom or fungus that hasn’t been described."

Said the mycologist Mandie Quark, quoted in "The Mushroom Hunters Can’t Stop Finding Mysterious Fungi/For years, mycologists and hobbyists alike have been using DNA sequencing on foraged fungi" (NYT)(free access link).

Recent years have brought an explosion in sequencing, Ms. Quark said. More than 21,000 samples have already been sequenced this year, she said, up from 5,600 in 2022. “We will probably end the year with over 40,000,” she said.... Some of these organisms, living as a network of threads hidden in the soil, may not have sent up a fruiting body in years. But after a drenching rain in Southern California, collectors might encounter mushrooms that have not been seen for decades, Ms. Quark said....