For decades, she searched for a 4-leaf clover. She found something even more rare: A 6-leaf one.

MORTON, Ill. — Since childhood, Karen Martos has kept trying to find a four-leaf clover.

On Aug. 3, the 60-year-old finally came across what she’d been looking for — and then some. Beating long odds, she discovered a six-leaf clover.

“You know how they say that a four-leaf clover brings good luck? Well, what does a six-leaf clover bring?” she asked with a chuckle. “Does it go backward?”

Actually, according to clover lore, more leaves mean more bonuses. According to the Tri-County Times of Fenton, Mich., which dug into clover history in 2018, the four clover leaves represent faith, hope, love and luck. A fifth leaf represents money, while a sixth spells longevity.

Where did this foliage folklore get its start? That’s unclear, though Druids in early Ireland carried four-leaf clovers to ward off bad luck.

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Furthermore, in 2008, when reporting on an Alaska man who had collected a world-record 160,000 four-leaf clovers, the Chicago Tribune said the tradition has been in literature for at least a few hundred years. In 1620, the English writer Sir John Melton wrote: “If a man walking in the fields finds any four-leaved grass, he shall, in a small while after, find some good thing.”

The odds of locating such a four-leaf find are as high as 1-in-10,000. After that, the odds skyrocket regarding the discovery of a clover with more leaves. In 2015, a woman in Sperry, Iowa, found a five-leaf clover, a feat the Iowa Hawkeye called one-in-a-million.

But six leaves? Estimates on such a possibility aren't widely known. Whatever the odds, Martos beat them this month.

As a girl, she and her friends often would collect clovers to make bracelets and necklaces. She would search and search for the four-leaf variety, but always came up empty.

For decades afterward, her quest continued. Whenever crossing a yard or field, she’d automatically scan the ground for the elusive, four-leaf treasure.

Earlier this month, she took her Chihuahuas, Daisy and Maverick, into her backyard. They didn’t help with the hunt; they were busy doing their business.

But Martos, as always, ran her eyes over the lawn, pausing at a patch of clover.

“I spotted something unusual,” she said.

She thought it might be a four-leaf clover.

Wrong.

Six leaves.

Martos dashed inside, told her husband and put the clover in a safe place.

It “is now residing in my Bible, to be pressed,” Martos said.

She says the six-leaf clover already has brought good fortune, simply by ending her six-decade search. As a bonus, the discovery occurred during an unusually difficult year.

“It’s nice to get some good news for a change,” she said.

Follow Phil Luciano on Twitter: @LucianoPhil

This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Illinois woman finds rare six-leaf clover after decades-long search