Hey everybody. This plant is native to my area and grows prolifically at former Native American sites, where it usually co-occurs along side massive numbers of Callicarpa America aka the American Beautyberry bush and a handful of passiflora species, as well as other medicinal plants which I'm not yet familiar with.

To prepare a simple yaupon tea, I roast the leaves and stems in the oven at 275 F for one hour, then boil for 30 min or so.

Lately I've become interested in Black Drink. I've been reading a book called, "Black Drink, a Native American tea." I'm about half way through. Each chapter is written by a different researcher. A botanist, taxonomists, ethnobotanist, and so on. It contains more info on the subject than I thought existed. For instance, Ilex Vomatoria is not closely related to other N. American holly. It closer to Yerba Mate and other carribean and South American hollies. In other words, it's a fully tropical species growing in N America, usually near human habitation. Also, southeastern Indians had contact with Meso-America. Meso-American images have been found on containers and cups used to drink Black Drink, at a site near Natchez MS.

Last night I drank an ayahuasca analog brew of desmanthus, rue and passiflora, along with a small amount of Callicarpa Americana, and got to thinking about black drink. Perhaps what we know about black drink is only half of the story. Perhaps Black Drink was a compound brew like ayahuasca and Yaupon played the same role as the Vine.

Caffiene has mao inhibiting properties. "Caffeine has been used as a scaffold for the design of inhibitors of monoamine oxidase (MAO) A and B. Substitution at the C8 position with a variety of moieties yields structures with high MAO inhibition potencies."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/23850513/

Perhaps admixtures are key to understanding Black Drink. Perhaps such admixtures contained tryptamines. Southeastern Indians used this brew for pretty much all of the same reasons that shamans in Amazonia use ayahuasca. A decoction containing caffiene only could not account for divination, entering trances, communicating with ancestors and so on. According to the book they used admixtures and scientists basically have zero knowledge of what they were.

I'd like to hear your thoughts on this

I know one thing - over do it on the yaupon, and a purge will be in order. It grows around here as well. I've dabbled - also adding some to an admixture.

The other night I added some beautyberry bark to the yaupon.
They're always growing together. This produced a very interesting effect. Euphoric.

Just Googled beautyberry. It grows all over the place - including my yard. I assume we live in a similar region.

I had not researched the berry; but you make me curious.

Beautyberry is a pharmacy in one plant. Just like Syrian Rue.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih....pmc/articles/PMC2760847/

Theres a national park near me which contains old Native American settlements. This is where I find yaupon, beautyberry, passiflora, etc all growing together. Even papaya grows here. Basically these areas are full of useful plants. Perhaps there's a reason they planted them together. These plants must be the offspring of groves the Indians planted.

http://www.jstor.org/dis...3&sid=21104736938541

I should also note that I used quite a bit of P. Incarnata in that tea. So there's multiple ways the pharmacology of that tea could've worked.

Yaupon is a wonderful plant and fantastic caffeine source!! It grows all around my state and, quite frankly, little compares to a cup of yaupon tea with some lemon balm, various mints, ginseng, and licorice root for taste. It has a good taste and can get me quite caffeinated.

Alas, I have not taken "Black Drink". I have never exceeded 5 grams of dried Yaupon leaf in one cup of tea (BTW 5 grams of dried leaves can be very strong depending on the alkaloid content of the plant-i'd strongly recommend starting slow and working your way up). My journeys on ayahuasca have shown me the healing power of regurgitation and purgation of evils/toxins/meals from one's body and I do not wish to consume purgatives for the time being.

Judging from the times I took far too much caffeine (most taken at once was 1300mg administered over the course of a night which ended in intense projectile vomiting and instant rejection of all food and water for the next 24 hours, resulting in dehydration and discomfort) I wouldn't want to touch this black drink with a ten foot clown pole. A caffeine overdose is a terrible terror to endure and is not fun or enlightening in the slightest, IME. If you are intent on taking a purgative i'd suggest ayahuasca or san pedro tea-those entheos do the trick and don't make you deathly ill for a day or two afterward.

I wish you well in your research with the Black Drink and would like to learn from your experiences.

All the best,
-Godsmacker

Have you used the stems of the yaupon as well? The best purgative I've found is LSA (from store-bought seeds) + harmalas. Far more purgative than ayahuasca IMO.

I totally agree with you about purging. There's something to it. I've purged some scary stuff, like what appeared to be blood, but I felt so good after, I decided I had nothing to fear. And I used to do anything to avoid it.

I only use the leaves of Yaupon when making my teas and haven't started messing with the stems yet. Recently I decided to make my own black drink (just for laughs and giggles). I harvested approximately 30 grams of fresh Yaupon leaves, steeped them in luke warm water (300ml) overnight, strained the water to give me a dirt black looking concoction. I have only taken small sips of this black drink, and find it to be very very energizing (think of a superstrong cup of coffee with reduced jitters). Over the course of a couple days I drank the black drink as a caffeine source and was pleased by its energizing properties. I think that this plant is better used as an energy drink than as a psychedelic/purgative IMO. The brackish and thick taste wasn't very pleasing, but may go well with some sugar and mints. I have however thought of adding small quantities of black drink to other smoothies and various naturally-infused products for taste and caffeination and find it to be a very helpful and underutilized plant ally in my life.

I also notice a lack of jitters. I wonder if like mate, it contains theobromine, which would account for the euphoric effects I notice. I've found the stems work nicely as well. Yaupon and mate are both important allies to me as well.

I plan to experiment with ayahuasca, consisting of the vine and yaupon as the only admixture. I recently drank the vine for the first time and have many ideas as a result.

i imagine there is theobromide in ilex vomitoria.
i've recently started making tea every other day,
by toasting leaves in a pot and pouring water on,
and simmering a few minutes. It's very delicious.
The stimulation is different than just caffeine...

That 'black drink' kind of makes me think of this time when i went to jail,
some prisoners would drink many packets of instant coffee to get buzd.

....ALso, i just found this interesting about the spiny needle ilex....

"The infusions made from holly bark are often used as tranquilizers.
They are famous for a certain calming effect that reduces the crises of hysteria and
epilepsy, if the water extract is administered in doses of two cups a day."

It is tasty. IMO better than coffee by a long shot.

Yup, theobromine does occur in I. vomitoria.
According to the data in a paper titled 'Nitrogen fertilizer and gender effects on the secondary metabolism of yaupon (Ilex vomitoria)' there is 4 to 5 times as much caffeine versus theobromine in unfertilized plants, but fertilization makes the concentration of both alkaloids skyrocket and they end up at nearly equal concentrations.
Feed your plants a bit of dilute hippie pee and not only will they be far more potent, but less coffee-like as well.

Thanks auxin. I'll be doing that for sure.

Auxin, yesterday I fertilized my yaupon. How long should I wait before harvesting?

Hm, so that is cool, thanks for the info! i had figured that fertilizers were bad.
Well now those hollies surrounding the catholic churches are more appealing!

Also i'd noticed some other entheogens planted around catholic church yards.
For example juniper trees... i cannot recall them but iam sure there are more!

Good question. At least a week, I'd expect.
The aforementioned study didnt test for that, they just fertilized for 12 weeks straight and then tested. Presumably so the effect of the fertilizing would equilibrate and theyd get a tight little group of data points.

In a week harvest 2 weeks worth and fertilize again, then 2 weeks later harvest more perhaps?

Thanks. It's growing in a pot with miracle grow potting mix so maybe that was already helping as well. It's pretty small though.

Btw, the other day I went to the beach on a barrier island. This place was basically ground zero for the bp disaster. I expected that much of the marsh along the last few miles of the road leading to the island would be open water by now, considering the rate of coastal land loss and the damage from crude oil. Im happy to report that Black Mangrove has invaded the areas of salt marsh which were disappearing fastest. Their range has also moved north and they're growing into 15-20 foot trees now, a few years ago they would only grow into small bushes due to freezes and were very sparse, now they're are well developed mangrove forests growing in the most sensitive places. They looked quite happy. This is the first evidence of climate change that I've seen in my life, with my own eyes. From what I've read, mangrove forests take more carbon from the air than any other type forest. Nature knows what it's doing.

Anyway, I found some mini yaupon growing in a dune shrub type environment. I made a decoction with some leaves and stems. I poured about a oz into a shot glass and added 13 crushed oluliuqui seeds, let them soak then drank the seed mush and all, followed by the rest of the yaupon. Idk how much effect the oluliuqui had but the effects were euphoric and psychedelic. I could almost make out the geometric grid with my eyes closed.

I'm starting to think that black drink may have been used as a trance inducing agent. It's very easy for me to enter a dream state with this plant, even without the oluliuqui.

I've noticed this as well. My city is probably 80% catholic so we have lots of Catholic Churches. Some of them are centuries old with well developed gardens. Most seem to have hollies. In fact the first hollies I noticed were savannah hollies growing at a church. Can't find much on this species.