smoking cedarwood oil

[nabraxas]

pasted from Lycaeum

(NOTE: Cedarleaf and Cedarwood are NOT the same plant. Cedarwood is refering to various junipers with cedar-like leaves. Cedarleaf is refering to RED CEDAR and should be left alone)

It is quite amazing just how many plants carry Thujone. Some Junipers carry so much that their essential oils are considered toxic.

Cedarwood Oil, from high quality aroma therapy providers is one of such, generally this is the Mexicana variety, which is considered either toxic or "use with caution".

Cedarwood Oil does, however, so far seems to be an excellent source for thujone, camfor (debateable) and other substances thought to be psychoactive.

Over the last undefined units of time I have been been smoking Cedarwood Oil with some success. Here are my notes.

Cedarwood, var. Mexicana, Oil seems to be a very different type of high than that of similar plants, such as wormwood and sagebrush. The extracted oil by comparison is much more shallow and lasts much shorter duration than crude extractions of Artmesia. Camphor is much greater in Juniper, it anesthises the voice box making deadening it entirely after a few hits, this results in an odd sensation, unable to talk entirely, but does not seem to affect breathing. This lasts about 30-seconds, and wouldn't say it is frightening... just strange.

Over-all, Cedarwood Oil is excellent alone as an antianxiety smoke or with caution taken orally. It is best as a psychedelic when mixed with pot.

When smoked along with pot, it's a very strange experience. It adds a deffinite hallucinogenic edge, but hallucinations are not exactly present beyond swirls, and even they are quite subtle and easily avoided.

Most notably was after smoking a bowl I smoked about 6 drops of cedarwood oil upon the ash. I stepped outside and the desert looked extremely vast, with very pronounced seperation in tone and space. The sky seemed to flicker, followed by dark purple ribbons, similar to the northern lights. But this was all extremely subtle, neither here nor there... If I was not atuned to these experiences, I would have missed them entirely.

Their seems to be something odd about the thinking process, and I have yet to put a finger on in. Because while I am tripping I feel 100% normal. Maybe a little stoned, but not otherworldly... it is only the moment I descend back I realize just how far gone I truely was, and it was my thinking process and how I interprit the exterior that seems different to me.

It is almost like my ego is extended into everything else. Like with most drugs the ego is deadened, and their is that melting sensation, as their is with DXM which I am most familier with.

But the experience here is the oposite of that, like I am fully aware of my surroundings, because I am my surroundings. It is very hard to explain, but I think the result is very similar - integration with the universe.

Still, even this is quite subtle, looking back I can only think that there was something "different" about me then.

One thing it is hard to determine where imagination ends and reality picks up. This is again in the sense of integration between my reality and my world's reality. At one point I sat under a rock formation in the desert and I imagined the primitive people who walked here, soon I was digging a hole in the ground perfecting a digging tool. My girlfriend interupted me, and then I saw a puffy seed blowing against the sand, I tried to pick up the seed, but empathized with it's discontent to be being caught ... it's travles all flashed before me, from it's perspective in emotional rather than visual terms. I decided I must write a book about this little seed.

It is a very emotional trip, and maybe that is part of it. Instead of hallucinating in terms of vision the visions are emotional, far deeper than pictures can describe. It's a good trip, it seems like a good drug to add onto pot.

The only side effect aside from the temporary vocal paralysis is the shits, perhaps a good thing, seems to clean out the system without the use of an enema

One night I smoked a total of nine drops on ash, after getting more stoned that I have been in a very long time.

The trip was bizzare, so strange I cannot even explain what it was like. I remember feeling disapointed while it was happening, kind of dull. But after I realized I was completely gone.

It was kind of a scary trip, but in the way a bad dream is, the kind which are kind of fun. I don't remember much, but there was a zombie rising out of an underground cannal where the water rised a bit and over flood gate. The gates are under a metal grid, and as plain as any memory I still see that horrible thing looking at me. I was certain that the sound of rushing water would forever scare the daylights out of me, but oddly the next day I passed the same gate and only a vague memory. I chuckled at the absurdity of it, at the time it was horrible.

Cedarwood is worthwhile.

[apothecary]

Not gonna let this one die...

Anyone got more info? Interesting topic.

[nabraxas]

found the link on poppies.org.

here's the experience ov the guy who posted the link

"It's been years since my last exotic ethnobotanical exploratory excursion other than my slightly disappointing kratom purchase about a month ago. After reading this post I was like, "what the fuck?" ...."Allright" I says to myself, "why the heck not?" I traipsied into the kitchen and found myself examining the top-shelf in the door of my fridge where I keep essential oils. Luck has it that I had an unopened bottle of "Essential Oil of Cedarwood" right next to the essential oils lime and lavender, and behind the rosemary, tea tree, and jasmine. Now I don't remember buying this. Why would I buy this? The bottle is sort of cute, in a cylindrical amber-glassish kind of way, and it has a -for sale- price tag of $2.95. That must be it.

I did not have any weed to add the oil to, so I grinded up a few stems and added three drops of this essential oil. The smoke was pleasant in a harsh, anesthetised, burning camphor-ish sort of way. I am glad I did not have any grass to smoke it with, because the effects, strangely subtle though not very subtle at all, were very accomodating all by their lonesome. I first noticed an immediate auditory enhancement, I could hear the leaves blowing down the street in an intensely relaxing way. This is also quite a stong anti-anxiety agent. I was in a state of agitation when I smoked it, and the alteration was immediate. Effects are really hard to describe in the usual terms, but I must agree with the original poster that this is an emotionally phychoactive substance.

Effects were pronounced for about 5 minutes, then have slowly tapered over the last half-hour. At the beginning of this post I was in a strange and giddy mood. I can see now how altered this was to normalcy but, like the author stated, I did not know it at the time. This encapsulates what is so very interesting about this plant.....that it does not deaden or dampen the senses so much, but transports or projects the senses somewhere else."

"I do believe it is the thujone that is mainly at work here. Each plant is unique in its composition of essential oils so I think there are a few other factors at work here. There are similarities to wormwood tea or Absinthe, but this is uniquely different than either. Part of the uniqueness of this experience comes down simply to the fact that you are smoking an essential oil that contains camphor. Along with the camphor, I believe, the main constituents that give cedar its undeniable smell help add to this anasthetic reaction in the lungs.

This part is a little disconcerting ... I don't like the fact that I am smoking an essential oil, not to mention one with such an astounding content of thujone. For the first 5-10 minutes or so there in an uncomfortable watery feeling in the lungs, like fliud buildup from a cold, but this clears away pretty quickly. Sucking on a peppermint immediately afterwards helps to mask the taste of cedar, and the menthol in the mint is a strong anasthetic in its own right so helps to mask the uncomfortable feeling of inhaling or smoking camphor. After this clears up I can enjoy the slightly-altered relaxation this experience has to offer. I greatly look forward to smoking this with some herb, or at least immediately following.

For those of you that deem to try this, keep in mind that much of the alteration in consciousness for me is the sedation of a tightly-wound nervous system. For those of you that are more of the Pooh-bear, peaceful cow variety, the effects might hardly be noticeable at all. I look forward to hearing the experiences of others ....."

no other reports yet.

thread here

[Yeti101]

Bump

Came across this whilst using my student access to pillage Planta Medica "The Sedative Effects and Mechanism of Action of Cedrol Inhalation with Behavioral Pharmacological Evaluation" Planta Med 2003; 69: 637-641

Abstract

 

It has been reported that cedarwood oil has sedative effects when inhaled. In this study, we evaluated sedative effects of inhaled cedrol, which is a major component of cedarwood oil. Accumulative spontaneous motor activity was significantly decreased in the cedrol-exposed Wistar rats. Similar results were confirmed in caffeine-treated Wistar rats, spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR), and ddY mice. In addition, exposure to cedrol prolonged pentobarbital-induced sleeping time in Wistar rats. To investigate whether cedrol, which has a very faint aroma, affects the olfactory system, the nasal cavities of Wistar rats were treated with zinc sulfate to reduce olfactory function. Two days later, the pentobarbital-induced sleep time was measured as described above. Compared to intact rats, the sleep prolongation effect was decreased in a lavender-roman chamomile mixed oil exposure positive control group, indicating that olfactory function was impaired. In contrast, prolongation of the sleeping time did not change in the cedrol exposure group. The above findings indicate that cedrol inhalation had marked sedative effects regardless of the animal species or the functional state of the autonomic nerves, suggesting that the mechanism of action is via a pathway other than the olfactory system.

 

 

I haven't read the full text yet, but it looks interesting.

Depending on what kind of oil, Cedrol could be the main active component.

Constituents of various types of Cedarwood oil here: http://ntp-server.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/htdocs...darwood_oil.pdf

[apothecary]

Yeti, you win at life!

Thanks

[PhoenixSon]

bought 12.5 mill bottle,

tried it out

pretty wierd, vision and hearing was sharpened

And i also double the thought that it's bad for the lungz.

Edited May 17, 2008 by spacemonk

[Yeti101]

Cool, but stop for a second while I point out the obvious:

1. There are different types of oil that are marketed as Cedarwood oil and they can contain very different constituents. The study I cited was based on Texas Cedarwood oil which contains cedrol as a major component. Virginian or Atlas oil has less cedrol, but more related compounds. Western Red Cedarwood oil contains no cedrol, but instead a bunch of compounds like Methyl thujate that I have no idea what they might do to you, or even if they are active in the same way that cedrol is.

2. Any substance that is active in vapour form is not necessarily safe to take internally. You would not ( and should not) put amyl nitrite in a capsule and swallow it, so until you know better, you should not put an oil containing something (maybe cedrol, maybe methyl thujate) down your throat. I have no idea what the oral toxicity of cedrol is, but its Dermal Toxicity(LD50) is listed as: Skin-Rabbit >5.00 gm/kg (whatever that means) and I have no idea what the toxicity of Methyl Thujate is.

So please be careful!

(Sorry if this rant was unnecessarily obvious and over-protective, I mean well really.)

[MindExpansion]

Dermal toxicity would be toxicity when applied to the skin so ld50 (death in 50% of trials) when cedrol is applied to the skin of a rabbit was over 5mg of cedrol per kg of rabbit body weight. You probably knew most of that but i couldnt tell what you meant you didnt understand

Peace,

Mind

[Yeti101]

Yeah I figured the >5gm/kg of bunny.

What I didn't figure was how that relates to human subjects. I weigh 80kg. How sick will I be if rub more than 400 grams of cedrol on my skin? OK so given that at best that would require being aggressively covered in cedarwood oil and that's not so likely, but the point is that we don't know how toxic this is internally. Even if it isn't systemically toxic, it would almost certainly irritate the throat and gastric system. I think this is indicated in the MSDS, which lists the oral LD50 in rats as 5 grams per kilo for the cedarwood oil http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/englishhtml/c1617.htm How much can a human injest before they are in danger?

If anyone has a better reference for cedrol or methyl thujate toxicity now would be the time to pipe up.

Anyway, sorry for rattling on, just be careful.

[MindExpansion]

The big problem with most of our LD50's being based on animals is that humans certainly dont necessarily respond in the same manner. I think they now use toxic doses more commonly now (TD50) because I believe they can test this on humans in some cases, even then though...hmmm oral ld50 in rats = 5g/kg, but dermal ld50 in rabbits is also 5g/kg, that is interesting, perhaps it indicates that rabbits are more sensitive to cedarwood oil than rabbits, as i would expect (and this is not based on any facts, just my thought) that dermal ld50's would typically be higher than oral ones, but then again i suppose it all depends on what chemical we are talking about and i know little about cedarwood oil.

Be safe,

Peace,

Mind

[catfish]

can we have some binomials to go on?

Thuja is a genus i think its cedar or arborvitae

[Yeti101]

can we have some binomials to go on?

Virginia Cedarwood oil comes from Juniperus virginiana

Texas - Juniperus ashei or mexicana

Western - Thuja plicata (Western redcedar)

Chinese - Cupressus funebris

Kenyan or East African - Juniperus procea

Moroccan or Atlas - Cedrus atlantica

The link I posted earlier has more information on what's in the different oils. It's hard to get an accurate ID of what is being sold here in Aus. I've not seen any Texan, but there is both Virginia and Western around (and the Chinese too I suspect).

[catfish]

i would think that a an "officinalis" species name would indicate the species of trade, in the older sense

the species of commerce

not sure if theres a Thuja officinalis though..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Searc...fulltext=Search

nope

white cedar is very aromatic but i cannot remember the binomial

its known as "arborvitae" around here and as an "arb" in the plant trade

well here is an interesting article

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thuja

footnote 11 is especially interesting

remember that "thujone" is derived from the genus nomial "Thuja"

sorry to use wikipedia so much but its relatively useful as far as non-disputed knowledge is concerned

[Yeti101]

True, some Thuja sp do contain thujone. But according to the reference I found : http://ntp-server.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/htdocs...darwood_oil.pdf

none of the oils commonly marketed as Cedarwood oil contain thujone. Admittedly they have related compounds such as

methyl thujate: 5,5-dimethyl-1,3,6-cycloheptatriene-1-methylcarboxylate and thujic acid: 5,5-dimethyl-1,3,6-cycloheptatriene-1-carboxylic acid, but these are not thujone: (1S-(1-,4-,5-alpha))4-methyl-1-propan-2-yl-bicyclo[3.1.0]hexan-3-one.

So if Western Red Cedarwood is effective, it's because of those compounds, but I can't find much on them other than they could make very effective insect repellents. Anyway, I don't think that all Thuja sp contain thujone as such.

Incidentally, Juniperus occidentalis the Western Juniper also yields a cedrol rich oil from its wood. http://juniper.oregonstate.edu/bibliograph...WfbLG_kurth.pdf

What was the point again? I forget