Drugs from Plants

The following listing comes from information gathered through the Haight-Ashbury Journal of Psychedelic Drugs (later titled H-A J. of Psychoactive Drugs) and some personal interviews. Notes on the drug experiences follow the listing.

* WARNING * WARNING * WARNING *

Publication of this list is intended for education, and ingestion of many, if not all, of the plants described is not recommended. Things that should concern anyone who might consider such an action should include: toxicity levels of the plant in question, research on long- and short-term side-effects, the type of experience encountered in use of the drug, purity of the plant (eg, most morning-glory seeds are sprayed with pesticides, mainly at the request of the gov't to discourage personal use), to start with.

A listing marked by a ? indicates that the plant may have either a psychedelic effect or narcotic, and that there is insufficient evidence to determine which class it belongs to (the plant listings were obtained largely from the examination of their mood-altering use in other cultures, which tends to fall into either narcotic or entheogenic action). I haven't had time to track the legal status of these plants, but most are undoubtedly legal, although a few aren't, and some of the regulations are really screwy (One can own a San Pedro Cactus, but there's a law against its ingestion, I believe).

Those that I do know are illegal, are marked with an asterisk. There may be some spelling errors, the info is somewhat dated, and some plants are known under several names (I list the others with aka). The use of a quote mark indicates repitition of genus or specie above (or, parenthetically, repetition of the genus or specie outside the parentheses), dependent on position in the Genus and specie listing. Finally, I substitute the word "entheogen" and "entheogenic" for "psychedelic". The latter has poor connotations, as while as being etymologically incorrect. "Entheogenic" connotes transcendence, release of the "God within" or of the "human potential", take your pick.

sp. = species
var. = variety

Plant Family	Genus and Species
Acanthaceae	Justicia Pectoralis var. stenophylla
Aizoaceae	Mesembryanthemum expansum?
Aizoaceae	tortuosum?
Apocynaceae	Alstonia venenata?
Araceae	Acora calama (-us)?
Ariocarpus retusus?
Homalomena sp.
Cactaceae	Anhalonium lewinii (and williamsii, more popularly known as Lophophora williamsii, Peyote)*
Ariocarpus fissuratus
Coryphantha compacta
Coryphantha macromeris
Coryphantha palmerii
Echinocereus salm-dyckianus?
Echinocereus troglochidiatus?
Epithelantha micromeris
Lophophora diffusa
Mammilaria craigii
Mammilaria grahamii var. oliviae
Mammilaria senilis
Campanulaceae	Lobelia tupa?
Compositae	Calea zacatechichi
Convolvulacea	Ipomoeae vioacea (Morning Glory, known under the following names: Heavenly Blues, Pearly Gates, Wedding Bells, Blue Star and Summer Skies)
Coriariaceae	Coriaria thymifolia
Desfontainaceae	Desfontainia spinosa
Ericaceae	Gaultheria?
Euphorbiaceae	Alchornea floribunda
Elaeophorbia drupiferia
Gomortegaceae	Gomortega keule?
Labatiae	Coleus blumei?
Labatiae pumila?
Lagochilus inebrians?
Leguminosae	Anadenanthera colubrina var. Cebil
Leguminosae peregrina	Piptadenia colubrina
Aragullus besey?
Caesulpinia sepiaria
Canavalia maritima?
Cytisus canariensis
Erythrina coralloides?
Erythrina flabelliformis?
Mimosa hostilis
Mimosa verrucosa?
Mucuna pruriens?
Piptadenia macrocarpa (aka var. of Anad. col.?)
Sophora secundiflora (I know I've heard it before, I don't remember where... *?)
Lythyroceae	Heimia salicifolia?
Malpighiaceae	Banisteriopsis caapi
Malpighiaceae cabrerana
Malpighiaceae inebrians
Malpighiaceae rusbyana
Mascagnia glandulifera
Mascagnia psilophulla var. antifebrilis?
Moraceae	Cannabis sativa*
Cannabis ondica*
Olmedioperbea sclerophylla
Helicostylis pedunculata
Helicostylis fomentosa
Myristicaceae	Myristica fragrans?
Iryanthera macrophylla
Solanaceae WARNING! Many plants of the Solanaceae family in general, and the Datura genus in particular, are potentially dangerous, and should be handled with care and treated with respect.	Atropa belladonna Brugmansia x insignis Brugmansia versicolor Brunfelsia chiricaspi Brunfelsia grandiflora Cestrum laevigatum Datura aurea Datura candida Datura ceratocaula Datura discolor Datura dolichocarpa Datura inoxia (aka, Datura meteloides)
Solanaceae kymatocarpa
Solanaceae metel
Solanaceae pruinosa?
Solanaceae quercifolia?
Solanaceae reburra
Solanaceae sanguinea
Solanaceae stramonium
Solanaceae suaveolens
Solanaceae vulcanicola
Solanaceae wrightii
Hyoscyamus niger
Iochroma fuchsioides
Juanulloa ochracea?
Latua pubiflora
Mandragora officinarum (-is)
Markea fornicarum
Methysticodendron amesianum
Nicotiana rustica
Zingiberaceae	Kaempferia galanga?

Junkies In Silicon Valley?

GQ did an article (sorry, issue not to hand) about Silicon Valley and use of entheogens. One of the wiser things mentioned in the article is the use of a "co-pilot" to help guide the trip. The idea was the use of entheogens to release creativity, not for joyriding on the sensations (well... maybe a little, grin). But it's stupid to have such an experience alone, as it not only wastes a potentially valuable state of mind, but also subjects the hardware to possible termination. If one wishes to have an entheogenic experience, set and setting, guidance are all important. I would particularly recommend reading Masters' and Houston's book, The Varieties of Psychedelic Experience among others. "Co-piloting"'s been around for a while, you ought to be able to dig up quite a bit of material on it. Experience helps, but the primary requisite is the ability to engage in storytelling, and to be as non-threatening as possible.

Mind Your Mind

The Gestalt Assassins seem intent on outlawing (they'd call it "main-streaming") experience, both natural and unnatural, except, of course, for Pop Kultur. Psycho-fusion is outlawed, and the mediocracy rules. Its bad enough to try legislating morality, but their actions, such as the restriction on the use of stevia extract as a natural sweetener, and the continued prohibition of pot, peyote and the like, take it a step further... they're outlawing Nature. Think about it.

Miscellaneous

Myristica fragrans comes from nutmeg, it has been used by students, prisoners, poor people, and some just generally curious people. The level at which effects occur, however, is sufficiently toxic to give one pounding headaches, hyper-rhythmia, a general toxic response in the body (aches, etc.) and has a delay time of about five hours. Further, depending on individual body chemistry, these effects may be heightened or near non-existent (rare) and the "psychedelic" experience may, or may not occur, and with variations in intensity. Not at all recommended. I hope this will give you some respect for the plants.

The Banisteriopsis genus is used in mixtures used for divinations, &c. by various Indian tribes of Brasil. You may have, at one time or another, heard references to yage or yaje (pronounced ya-HAY), cohoba, or ayahuasca. This is it. Banisteriopsis caapi (the one mainly used) contains a family of alkaloids called harmalines (once, curiously enough, thought to be a substance, telepathine, as the visions did seem to be psychically-linked, in prophecy, clairvoyance, etc.). And Di-Methyl Tryptamine (DMT aka "The businessman's trip", a psychic three-martini meltdown) is suspected as well, though I am not sure if it is in caapi per se, and not rusbyana. The stuff is usually ingested as a snuff, because the tryptamine family cannot be absorbed into the bloodstream through the stomach and passes through quite harmlessly.

Alternately, there are brews of the stuff containing other plants that seem to act as carriers for the tryptamines. But because the preparation of plants and number of materials used is quite complicated, it can be difficult to ascertain the separate actions of the plant materials. To top that, mixes change from one region to another. Make of it what you will.

Coleus I have tried myself. It's a mint, but had a particularly odious taste (to me), and requires a good number of leaves, fresh, as the active chemical loses its potency as the plant dries out. It's also a common house plant with spade shaped leaves and a bright patch of fluorescent color emanating out from the leaf's center (I've mainly seen blue and pink). My experience was a "night-time" trip -- visual distortions were largely kept to unilluminated space. Some time distortion, but not much overall effect on the functioning of the brain. No real amplification of emotional feedback or other effects you get with the more notorious entheogens.