shamans and san pedro

[trucha]

As there was no evaluation just a repeating of the shamans' beliefs taken on faith, one can't read too much into this.

Still its interesting to ponder.

Check out

Carod-Artal, F.J. & C.B. Vázquez-Cabrera (2006) "Mescalina y ritual del cactus de san Pedro: evidencias arqueológicas y etnogr&aacuteficas en el norte de Perú." ["MESCALINE AND THE SAN PEDRO CACTUS RITUAL: ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND ETHNOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE IN NORTHERN PERU"] Revista de Neurología. 42: 489-498. At PubMed

Among the claims it makes for selection criteria used by shamanic practioners to get the very best San Pedro are:

Storing the cuttings for a year after harvest, ideally harvested until after the plants have turned yellow.

Harvesting plants from high altitudes or regions where jaguars and boas occur.

Harvesting plants with short spines.

Long spined pachanois were thought undesirable by comparison.

Perhaps this is why the longer spined pachanois are so easily encountered in Peru today?

An interesting comment was suggesting wild plants were preferred as the domestic plants were more hallucinogenic.

My Spanish is very poor so take all that with a grain of salt.

Edited January 18, 2009 by trucha

[t st tantra]

recently saw a couple cuts of pachanoi left in full sun at 41C for a day.....the exposed side turned that totally dry yellow colour on the skin.......flesh underneath had partly liquified and ran out when the skin broke as a clear amber liquid......but most surprising were the light brown crystalish stuff which had oozed through the skin,some dryng close to white.....i'm told it had a very tasty bitterness........

t s t .

[Inyan]

Long spines considered undesirable... now I think we can take that with a grain of salt personally as the shaman is going to want to work with material that is the easiest to work with. Dried for over a year, I might be inclined to put some stock in this comment based purely on subjective experience.

[Auxin]

I have heard at least two anecdotal reports that allowing live trich cuts to age in a shaded area for several months seemed to increase the qualitative potency. If thats from synthesis of more alkaloids, transformation of existing alkaloids, or just some transformation of the mucilage, or such, which can effect speed and completeness of extraction is anybody's guess at this point. Assuming its true and replicable.

I still wonder if some of the alkaloids act as an auxin precursor reserve. Cacti must grow roots fast when rains come, it sure would be handy to have a stockpile of rooting related hormone precursors stockpiled for when root growth is needed on a moments notice, when a cactus is thirsty maby it makes more mescaline so it can somehow use 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenylacetic acid to help with the frantic orgy of root growth. If someone were tissue culturing cacti it would be interesting to compare IAA with a IAA + 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenylacetic acid mix to see if one is better at making roots form and grow.

[Inyan]

I have heard at least two anecdotal reports that allowing live trich cuts to age in a shaded area for several months seemed to increase the qualitative potency. If thats from synthesis of more alkaloids, transformation of existing alkaloids, or just some transformation of the mucilage, or such, which can effect speed and completeness of extraction is anybody's guess at this point. Assuming its true and replicable.

I still wonder if some of the alkaloids act as an auxin precursor reserve. Cacti must grow roots fast when rains come, it sure would be handy to have a stockpile of rooting related hormone precursors stockpiled for when root growth is needed on a moments notice, when a cactus is thirsty maby it makes more mescaline so it can somehow use 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenylacetic acid to help with the frantic orgy of root growth. If someone were tissue culturing cacti it would be interesting to compare IAA with a IAA + 3,4,5-trimethoxyphenylacetic acid mix to see if one is better at making roots form and grow.

Qualitative or quantitative?

[M S Smith]

As there was no evaluation just a repeating of the shamans' beliefs taken on faith, one can't read too much into this.

Still its interesting to ponder.

Check out

Carod-Artal, F.J. & C.B. Vázquez-Cabrera (2006) "Mescalina y ritual del cactus de san Pedro: evidencias arqueológicas y etnogr&aacuteficas en el norte de Perú." ["MESCALINE AND THE SAN PEDRO CACTUS RITUAL: ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND ETHNOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE IN NORTHERN PERU"] Revista de Neurología. 42: 489-498. At PubMed

Among the claims it makes for selection criteria used by shamanic practioners to get the very best San Pedro are:

Storing the cuttings for a year after harvest, ideally harvested until after the plants have turned yellow.

Harvesting plants from high altitudes or regions where jaguars and boas occur.

Harvesting plants with short spines.

Long spined pachanois were thought undesirable by comparison.

Perhaps this is why the longer spined pachanois are so easily encountered in Peru today?

An interesting comment was suggesting wild plants were preferred as the domestic plants were more hallucinogenic.

My Spanish is very poor so take all that with a grain of salt.

All the information should be taken with a grain of salt if only that the paper probably only covers only a limited range of the ritual use of T. pachanoi. Certainly what is described in the paper may be prevalent in certain areas of northern Peru, but this doesn't mean it is the practive throughout northern Peru, much less in Cuzco or Bolivia, places Trichocereus are also sold for apparent shamanic use...unless they are there for Gringos, something that could be a clear possibility.

~Michael~

Edited January 18, 2009 by M S Smith

[Garbage]

Short spines are kinder on your alpaca as you travel to market.

Now that would always be true.

[Inyan]

I like that Garbage. Laughing, seriously though... you do have to take those things into consideration. There is a madness to many things that seem doubtful and that madness sometimes stems from the fact that the reason is not the reason it is being related to in such a manner. There is another hidden reason, such as you suggest Garbage. I'm not saying this is the case here, just that it could be the case. Take wakinyan, winyan, inyan... all have stone hidden in their meaning. Stone boy... much is often related in shamanic traditions that doesn't seem like they should be related in shamanic traditions and especially so where medicine/pejuta is concerned. The stone/inyan however is prevalent in many ceremonies whether it is hidden in the 7 stones of the water drum of the peyote ceremony...

http://store.canyonrecords.com/index.php?a...p;ref=peyote_cd

You can listen to some peyote songs from various tribes via the above if you'd like without purchasing the songs....

Or more blatantly seen in the inipi/sweat lodge ceremony. There is most generally a reason and that reason may not be clear as it is not meant to be understood in the way it is presented at all times.

In short, some things are misleading... but they are true for another reason or they are important for another reason and in fact are not true in the literal sense or any other sense for that matter. Confused? Well that is my take on these statements as presented and my take may be grossly wrong or right on key.

Edited January 18, 2009 by Inyan

[Auxin]

 

 

Qualitative or quantitative?

In both reports I remember it was said that the cactus 'felt more potent' than an equal sized piece from the same plant at the same time but taken without aging, no quantification of alkaloids and no research into gram weight equivalents of fresh dried vs. aged dried material. So not much more valid than a rumor, lol. Edited January 18, 2009 by Auxin

[Teotzlcoatl]

I have heard at least two anecdotal reports that allowing live trich cuts to age in a shaded area for several months seemed to increase the qualitative potency.

I thought that it was already widely accepted that leaving your harvested cuttings out to lay around for awhile makes them more potent...

I need to write an article "Trichocereus- From Seed to the Experience" including all these little steps...

[Garbage]

Plus of course they had no antibiotics,whilst being impaled on spines is more of a nuisance than a threat to life it would only take the loss of an eye to change the behaviour of those hearing of it.

15ft of falling limb impales harvesting shaman,brainpan pierced,horrible death...

If you are growing a fence you want the fastgrowing long spined version.

Here if you wanted a hedge to keep things out or in you may choose Quickthorn.

For intoxication purposes there was no need to develop hawthorn for larger haws for fermenting as the apple was used for Cider.

Thus i feel that ancient Andean folk probably during the course of several thousnd years of civilisation likely developed several varieties of Trichocereus for different purposes.

It maybe that where the trichocereus were found the Andeans believed they also could live,maybe it was more central to the development of the Inca empire than is reasonable to assume.

I still want to know if some Inca left south America to finally settle in Mexico and create the Aztec empire,the story of the eagle on the cactus and all that.

The Christians turned up looking for people who believed a Jew was crucified by the Romans,so stranger things do happen.

Edited January 18, 2009 by Garbage

[Inyan]

Where would we be without the ability to quantify chemical compositions. Shamanism as we know it may never have come to be without the help of such quantifications. Seriously, there is a subjective quantitative, if you will entertain such, as well as a subjective qualitative difference in many sacraments. The experience was qualitatively different or quantitatively different... food for thought at any rate whether you choose to agree, remain neutral or disagree.

[Chiral]

Where would we be without the ability to quantify chemical compositions. Shamanism as we know it may never have come to be without the help of such quantifications. Seriously, there is a subjective quantitative, if you will entertain such, as well as a subjective qualitative difference in many sacraments. The experience was qualitatively different or quantitatively different... food for thought at any rate whether you choose to agree, remain neutral or disagree.

Try saying that when your pissed....

H.

[Garbage]

Whatever happened to the mescaline sequestering snails?