According to this paper, the biosynthetic pathway (at least in L. williamsii) is: tyrosine (1), dopa (2) dopamine (3) 3,4,5-trihydroxy-β-phenyethylamine (4), and mescaline (5)

I am not aware of any research involved in adding other compounds as potential substrates for those same enzymes responsible for mescaline biosynthesis in cactus to produce novel compounds, or of feeding more tyrosine or dopamine to increase mescaline production. I'd be curious on our local experts' thoughts on what are the rate-determining steps in that pathway.

I would definately be willing to do some experimenting with this and then send you some samples to test. Tyrosine is widely available, so i think i would start with that then.

Ofcourse it would not realy be definite proof of anything yet, if it would turn out that one of two clones has a much higher percentage of mescaline, but it would be a start. And an interesting thing to experiment with as well.

You could collect a sample from each clone using this paper's methodology of using a biopsy skin punch to get a small amount from near the top of the cact, then we'd have a "before" sample, and then say, the year after in the same season, you could get an "after" sample, after the tyrosine treatment on one clone, and the other untreated cact as control. That would be a pretty good experiment I'd think. Of course doing that over many clones would be ideal but just one comparison would already be very interesting.

The only truly analogous example to the MiPT trick that I can think of here would be to inject the cactus with tyrosine O-ethyl ether (4-ethoxyphenylalanine) in the hope that the cactus will produce escaline for us, and then to use other alkyl groups for other analogues if it does work. The trick would then be producing or otherwise getting hold of this slightly obscure precursor. The synthesis would present a few challenges which I won't go into here!

I seem to recall having heard of the tyrosine injection trick before - or maybe the suggestion there (being some 1970's heads' book) was dopamine. DOPA from Mucuna pruriens would certainly be worth a try as well.

Dopamine is probably better, because closer to the end product.

I mean, it seems reasonable to assume that if you'd inject tyrosine, only a certain percentage of it would be metabolized into mescaline, and the rest would metabolize into other substances. But the closer the injected substance would be to the end product, the less of it would be wasted on other stuff.

But does mucuna pruriens contain enough dopamine?

And i mean, i'm also looking at this from a financial point of view. My gut feeling says that pure tyrosine is probably cheaper, but maybe i'm wrong. If dopamine would be, say, twice as pricey, but would yield three times the amount of mescaline...

Anyway, this is definately going to be a project. Mescaline is an old favorite of mine.

Something else occurred to me. It has often been stated that tryptophan supplementation of psilocybian fungi leads to downregulation of the biosynthetic pathway for psilocin and is therefore counterproductive if enhancement of potency is the goal. I don't know if a similar mechanism would apply with tyrosine supplementation of cacti, but given the low cost of tyrosine it would be easy to find out.

Also, it may be possible to substitute tyramine for dopamine and tyramine could be accessible through the decarboxylation of tyrosine. I think the hydroxylation to the dihydroxy compound occurs preferentially on tyrosine, although this thread seems to suggest otherwise - but it could well be that tyramine supplementation needs to be paired with DOPA supplementation, which rather defies the point.

Maybe most pertinently:

Between the two clones I used, the Trichocereus ''Tig'' strain had much more visual impact than the Trichocereus ''Juuls Giant'' strain.

I used, the Trichocereus ''Sharxx Blue'' strain caused much more nausea than the ''Bogan'' strain. But their effects and strengths were the same in both.

Trichocereus "HELON" strain; It was the worst of the Trichocereus strains I tried. Visual effects were almost absent and very poor. Goliath, again one of the weakest.


It gives a lot more excitement with named clones. For example, can't you share your new experiences with super pedro, psycho0, ss02, pachanoi monstrose, scopulucola X T. Pachanoi, scopulucola and even bruce and eileen?

I would be happy if you share your experiences like me.
Has anyone experienced any of these?