Rare Hawaiian mushroom can induce spontaneous orgasms in women with its smell

Calling Domino’s! Extra mushrooms, please! — A bright orange mushroom which appears to only grow on Hawaiian lava flows that are between 600 and 1,000 years old, induces orgasms in women when they smell it.

The fungus, an unnamed Dictyophora species, was described by scientsists John C. Holliday and Noah Soule in a 2001 journal article published in the International Journal of Medicinal Mushrooms. They claim the fungus has a reputation as a “potent female aphrodisiac when smelled.”

The Independent reports

Interested to find out whether it lived up to its reputation, the two conducted a test on volunteers.

As the journal says: “Indeed, nearly half of the female test subjects experienced spontaneous orgasms while smelling this mushroom.”

The two hypothesised that the hormone-like compounds presents in the fungus’s spores may be similar to the human neurotransmitters released during sexual encounters.

However, the mushroom’s somewhat “fetid” smell did not have the same orgasmic effect on male test subjects.