Ishmael Fleishman

I have been enjoying raw cacao and I have become interested in Cacao. Cacao is one of the mostly widely used psychoactive plants in the world. However like tobacco it has been appropriated and debased. I have given up coffee it caused to much anxiety and sleep issue and their was a definite addictive craving for coffee. The first two weeks after coffee was a sleepy daze. Raw cacao in massive 50g dosage can be stimulating however it is a far more pleasant not as jittery. My experimentation has made me interested in the nuances. Specifically I am interest in the difference between Ceremonial Cacao Vs Cacao Nibs Vs Raw Cacao powder. Their is allot of marketing in this space. So I am not sure what is actual. But as far I understand you have the cacao bean, you break it up you should have nibs. Cacao powder is made by pulverizing the cacao nibs to powder. If you keep grinding the nibs into turns into Cacao Paste or Ceremonial Cacao Paste. Is it that simple? Just like peanuts turn into peanut powder and then emulsifies into peanut butter. I see mention of "Ceremonial Cacao has not been defatted and is minimally processed under low temperatures to maximize its health benefits". I know that any mechanical grinding cooks anything through simple friction. I know that the claim of raw is questionable. However is their any real difference beyond the level of processing and marketing? I know that Dutch process cocoa is defatted and treated with alkaline chemicals. Changing the alkaloids and bitterness in the process. Changes in this process account for difference between Hershey chocolate and say Cadbury. Hershey has a very unique taste profile.

Yes heavy metal contamination is a big problem with cacao and chocolate - especially with the stuff from Peru and Ghana because of the soil. Oddly enough it is NEVER mentioned in the hype. However I think its a plant problem just like Rice has very high levels of chromium, cadmium, arsenic, and lead. Thanks for the info on Criollo and Forastero types I will have a look at finding a Criollo source for my cacao.

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I have been reading up on Syriab Rue and MAOI. The history of MAOI's in medicine is interesting and their use an an effective anti-depressant in the 1950's/60's caught my attention. However their is such a strong message that are dangerous with the risk of having a hypertensive crisis make their use unattractive. Now with MAOI's the general advise is to avoid Tyramine rich foods. However - this video argues that Tyramine is not a real concern. Because Tiramine is a product of Putrefaction of foods - this is why cheese, cured meats, wine, beer, and sauerkraut, contain Tyramine have been recommended to be avoided. However it is argued that this is no longer a major concern because modern food production limits the production of Tyramine. As for the dangerous - 14 deaths in 1.5 million were recorded from patient using MAOI's in the 1960's This is 0.00093333333333333% of patients. When normal portions of Tyramine rich foods are eaten they should not pose any risk of hypertensive crisis. Now I think about ayahuasca and the Dieta. In a hot and humid environment of the Amazon. Putrefaction of food is a real problem and the production of Tyramine could be a problem. This makes sense as to why the dieta for ayahuasca avoids specific foods. My question is are we the victim of an old wives tails around the dangers of MAOI's or worse an orchestrated scare campaign? Do you know anyone directly who had a negative effect from the administration of an MAOI's in any of its forms and what was the outcome?

Nexus is interesting and I try to read it at times however its focus on extractions and chemistry is not my thing. I start reading something and within a sentence I need a dictionary, Wikipedia and duckduckgo. I am more into the culture, history and the spirit of the plant. Also the site is just so visually painful to look at.

What are people thoughts about possible interactions between Cocoa and harmala considering that Cocoa is a source of caffeine and Phenethylamine. Also it looks like cocoa is a powerful MAO-B inhibitor. However

Thank you so much for the explanation - There is surprisingly little information on effects and use of straight harmaline.

So it looks like harmala is a MAO-A inhibitor. I am not a chemist so my grasp on these things is crude. Harmala is an MAO-A is a monoamine oxidase enzyme Inhibitor only. Not a MAO-B. Beyond this I do not understand much. So the Dr. claims are semi -true in part because modern pharmaceutical MAOI's are more targeted not only because less Tyramine in our foods. I started to dig on drug interactions and this the list I came up with: Beta-blockers > I have taken them in the past to reduce he ephedra > cold & flu tablets > diet pills > Ephedrine stimulants > I do not like stimulants and have even cut out tea and coffee amphetamines > this includes the Mescaline (3,4,5-trimethoxyphenethylamine) & San Pedro pharmaceutical MAOIs rasagiline for Parkinson disease; Amifampridine for muscle disease Anticholinergic drugs Corticosteroids > this would be a concern because GP's inject like they are handing out candy > GP suggested an injection to me today. SSRIs Serotonin-Norepinephrine Reuptake Inhibitors (SNRIs) Triptans > migraine or cluster headaches Tricyclic Antidepressants BuSpar (buspirone) Eskalith (lithium) Desyrel (trazodone) Analgesics like Codeine, Fentanyl, Tramadol > I was in hospital two months ago for surgery and got Fentanyl & panadeine forte Antibiotic/Antiretroviral Drugs like Zyvox (linezolid) & Norvir (ritonavir) Dietary Supplements like St. John’s Wort & Ginseng Other Drugs That Affect Serotonin - Amphetamines - Cocaine and LSD and Mescaline https://www.drugs.com/npp/syrian-rue.html https://www.verywellmind.com/medications-and-serotonin-syndrome-2584342 However honestly with a good measure of caution and sense you should easily avoid most of these interactions. Oddly enough my interest in MAOI's are not is its psychotropic effects but rather things like Pancreatic islet cell proliferation. The more I read about harmala the more I would love to get it from my GP. For the moment I am just burning it as incense as a cleanser. The funny thing is that it is not a sweet smell like roses and sandalwood. Its more akin to really good BBQ - tempted to use it in the BBQ smoker. It also reminds me of the smell that a room gets from tobacco smoking. Not the tobacco smell but maybe its the harmala I am smelling. I am also very familiar with this Syrian Rue incense smell. I have encountered it many times up and down Sydney Road in Melbourne. Keeps the evil eye away.

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Last Winter I planted Trichocereus Pachanoi seeds. After a year of slow growth most are 3 cm long. Over the last year they have grown indoors using takeaway tek then re-potted into a large terracotta pot and has been living outside. I live in Victoria and it does get to 0ºc a few times over winter and it can sit at 6ºc to 12ºc for long periods. Now with winter coming around - I am wondering if I should move them indoors? I have a sunny bedroom and am thinking of taking the Trichocereus Pachanoi inside. Secondly should I mist or water these seedlings and how often over winter? Or should I just let them dry out.

This post will digress from purely plant questions but touch on the broader anthropological and ethnobotanical questions. I have been devouring the Plants of the Gods: Hallucinogens, Healing, Culture and Conservation podcast Mark Plotkin, Ph.D. so I have been going down a rabbit hole. Allot of this post is vague as I have so little information to work from and is kind of why I am asking. I have been reading up on San Pedro shamanism. One interesting idea that has sparked my interest is Admixtures plants added into the San Pedro brew to modulate the experience, healing and needs of the patients. This idea of adjuncts seems to connected to Dietas, and that the Admixtures do not need to be psychoactive per se but infuse the brew with the spirit of the object. Now that standard gringo neo-shamanic brew is fairly simple - de-thorn, peel leather skin, chop cactus boil with some source acid and your done. The impression I have gotten is that no curandero would use such a basic recipe, and that each tradition has their own secret sauce of Admixtures plants and even crystals, stones, human and animal remains and other holy objects. However I have heard, seen and read about the following: Tobacco: This has two benefits is said to add more focus to the experience keeping you on the road and not letting you get distracted by things like visuals. Tobacco is also a major spirit protective plant. However its addition to the brew would need to be tightly controlled. I think Tobacco would help to increase purging. Tobacco also seems to used a liquid snuff consistently by San Pedro curandero. Datura: This was one of the first ones I ever heard off and it was insinuated to be a practice associate with shamanic abuse and witchcraft. However its addition seems to be widespread - especially with a patients with complex needs. My guess is that it would be used to increase "hyperactive effects and ability to cause stark and dream-like hallucinations." - YES it is dangerous but not impossible if you have single source of Datura you know its potency and dose slowly. So often you watch a curandero prepare a San Pedro brew in his garden and their you can see a Datura in the background. I doubt it is just decoration. Powdered bones from powerful shamans: Self evident as to why. Powdered bones from animals: Self evident as to why. Crystals: are socked in the water to draw the power of crystal into the brew. Lime Fruit: This helps with the extraction but it is said to alter the experience how was not explained. Yawar panga (Aristolochia didyma) - used as a purgative for drug addiction treatment Cacao - I have not heard of as an adjunct but I would not be surprised if added since it is an ancient master plant of Peru. Rose Juice, a plant linked to Femininity (and for Christian curanderos to the Virgin Mary), which works on the opening of the heart and removes thorns from emotional wounds. Then found this list at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cimora Then looked up a bunch of these in Garden Of Eden by Snu-Voogelbreinder - who has detailed notes on many of these plants and there relationship to San Pedro. The only one I could not anything on is Isotoma longiflora. Going back to the Dieta - an idea floated by a gringo shaman was the San Pedro may not be the active component rather that the San Pedro makes you sensitive enough to the adjunct so that you can learn from the adjunct not only from the San Pedro. So in theory chamomile could be an adjunct. Now I have heard of neo-shamanic retreats were gringos come and have some Aya, then smoke weed, drop a few mushrooms and finish their day of traditional shamanic healing with some Bufotenin. Then they discover that they are God and they stick a feather in their nose. It seems common to use cannabis to come down from phenethylamine amongst gringos. Personally could not think of anything worse as I do not like cannabis. In a related topic - I was watching the anthropologist Stacy Schaefer give a talk about her time with the Wixarika Nation (Huichol) and peyote. She mentions four plants used by the Wixarika to modify the peyote experience. It illustrated the same modulation effect across two distinct cultures using Peyote and San Pedro. Smoked Nicotiane Rustica - for focus reduces the feeling of being drunk on the peyote a plant called maxa kwaxi a type of barrel cactus - this reduces the intensity of the peyote experience "you don't get so high" Ariocarpus retusus - what it does she does not explain - however based on Garden Of Eden by Snu-Voogelbreinder - "A. retusus is regarded by the Huichol as a ‘false peyote’ that produces evil and undesirable effects. When on their annual peyote hunt, the Huichol believe that to any who had not properly purified themselves at the start of the pilgrimage by admitting all of their sexual encounters outside of marriage" Mahonia trifoliolata - elevates and raises you up to the god eye view. - Personally this plant looks cool to grow it make a yellow die and make tiny sour fruit. QUESTION - have you any knowledge on this topic - do you know of any adjuncts used with San Pedro or Peyote and why? At the very least it would be beneficial for us not to think of just a singular reductionist isolated compound or singular plant but to start to think of the synergistic relationships between different plants.

They did not want upset their other paying customers. Business as usual, nothing to see. Keep moving along.

This is what you get with people setting themselves up as healers when they do not have the training and experience to do so - a two week residential program will never teach you anything and you are delusional to think that you have the skills to cope with crisis and the real skill is managing the crises that is certain arrive. In a culture were expertise and experience is given short thrift in the quest for money, status and influence. Such things are bound to happen. Such people are playing into the hands of those in power giving them the justification to criminalize all things until a commercially patented product can be sold to the plebeians.

From An Encyclopedia of Shamanism Volume 2 By Christina Pratt Wachuma cimora admixtures Brugmansia aurea Brugmansia sanguinea Neoraimondia arequipensis Iresine herbstii Euphorbia tithymaloides isotoma longiflora (I have seen this one mention in other sources but a search find no such species) Plan to make up a detailed list of Wachuma cimora admixtures with notes.

I found these 3 pages on the Spanish Wikipedia and ran them trough the translator: https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singada This is interesting because they are adding sand pedro to the singada https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curanderismo_norteño https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purga_de_tabaco Then found these videos about the life of the peruvian healer Eduardo Calderón Palomino are widely used in university-level anthropology courses. On the second video you can see him walk past a Brugmansia.

How does the 4 datura stramonium modulate the experience? I found this on Wiki - this means that a fatal dose would be 100 seeds so a mere 4 seeds should be safe. However Wiki also says This means 4 strong seeds could get you in trouble if the potency of the seeds is 20 times normal and you had a low body weight. Probably best not given to children or dainty woman. However the risk must be manageable - otherwise the practice of using datura would have died out. Thanks learned a new word - never through that the brew itself would have a name Totally - you spirit must become connected to the plant teacher.

What is the likely cause of this yellowing along the line of the Areole in this San Pedro - is it variegation or lack of nitrogen or other?

It is basically winter now and it is a fresh cutting been given to me by a friend and has no roots. Will feeding it nitrogen now really help or will it just remain yellow until it gets some roots of its own.

Hi- I am looking for Trichocereus pach. 'Yowie' and Trichocereus bridgesii 'Eileen' to add to my collection - happy to pay.

This is a Coup d'état masterfully executed by and for the 1%.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAvIljbIAY4 A summary is that this is a non-starter the TGA's approval is essentially worthless at this point. This decision has come from lobbying - more negative ideas are insinuated about behind the scene dealings That this decision breaks the process for approval - approval follows research & consultation NOT approval follows lobbying There are zero trained psychiatrists currently available in Australia There are no certified training programs to train them The panel all agreed that the psychiatrist to be effective must have had several psychedelic experiences before they dose others. However, to do so the psychiatrist would need to access psychedelics illegally - they would have to break the law to get effective training in psychedelic-assisted therapy. The projected cost is $20,000 per session WTF Each session will need to go before an ethics committee and be part of a research program - therefore if your condition is not part of the current research program you will NOT have access The patient will need to have used and failed every conventional treatment before they will be able to apply for treatment The announcement has seen a growth in underground sitters who are increasing prices ALL psychedelics remain illegal and anyone who is not an authorized prescriber will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law This announcement might kill further researchers as researchers will have little incentive now Vested commercial interests will arise from this announcement and they will actively lobby to resist the legalization Ibogaine is schedule 4 in Australia - interesting !!!! It could be used as an alternative psychedelic with fewer restrictions Best quotes "psychiatry has its beginning in shamanism" & "the war on drugs is going strong it is just now more profitable" & "Carefully designed to help as few people as possible"

I spoke to a crisis worker who works mostly in the hospital settings - she had heard about the announcement and said that people will be pulling down their pants in public and raping people on the street now that medical psychedelics have been made legal. - She is a lunatic nut job herself but that is another story. What absolute fucking bullshit - but it just goes to show how much stupidity and misinformation there exists about medically sanctioned psychedelic-assisted therapy. Just imagine - A patient who seeks help and enquires about psychedelic-assisted therapy only to be told that this treatment will turn them into a pedophile rapist waving their dick around in public. This is going to be an uphill battle. That could very quickly come to an end if we get another Johnny Howard in power. Then I am reading these reports about Ketamine and its unregulated off-label growth in the US. Just waiting for the backslash.

Wanting, seeking Mitragyna Speciosa - open to buy or trade or donation

It is interesting how knowledge of this decision has spread in the community. I spoke to the following: A young GP, who is very up-to-date and open to medical cannabis and supportive of psychedelics as a treatment option. A week after the announcement of the decision he was unaware of the TGA decision. In his words, the "TGA will not tell GPs about this because a GP will NOT be able to prescribe the medication". I think this will seriously restrict medication adoption. If GPs do not know about it as an option then how can patients be made aware of psychedelics as an option - so they can refer to a suitable psychiatrist? A youngish secondary teacher knew of the announcement but did not understand any of the details. A 15-year-old - who was well aware of the announcement and even had an opinion on the merits of psilocybin vs MDMA for the treatment of psychiatric conditions. I honestly feel that psychedelics will go the same way as medical cannabis. When medical cannabis was made available, it was extremely expensive and highly restricted, and very hidden. Now 8 years later it is slowly getting cheaper and more accepted - still, stupid people abound, GPs refuse to prescribe it, and the police hate it. These people continue to fight against its legalization and continue to demonize these medical treatments. Moving forward the fight is about the total decriminalization, legalization, and rescheduling of all these substances. Be grateful for small steps.

I got these cacti from an online seller but I forgot what it was. Can people identify? A few notes - It has a few double spines for each areole and the spines are yellow to light brown in color. Most are single-spined areoles. It is throwing some major new ribs going from a 6 to a 9 rib. It was cut from a very mature 15year old mother plant. The seller stripped the spines before shipping and it has been a year now and they are slowly growing back. The spines are soft and break off easily. I am fairly certain that it is not a PC pachanoi - But I cannot tell the difference between peruvianus vs bridgesii.