Hey Titus glad you made it through the experience with Phalaris Brachystachys alright.
Phalaris is no joke!
Since Phalaris seedlings (especially ones that have not been clipped before) can contain cyanogenic glycosides, I'm wondering if you boiled the grass at all? Cyanogenic glycosides can be harmful if consumed, but are easily destroyed by boiling water.
Are you sure what you grew/drank was Brachystachys and not Aquatica?
I'd have to plant a few grams of seeds to get 35g of foliage in a month from Brachystachys but I'm not saying it's impossible.

N-methyltyramine and Hordenine(phenethylamines) have been found in Australia's Phalaris Aquatica such as the SIROLAN cultivar whose seeds are now spread across the world. Tyramine chemicals can interact negatively with MAOI like Syrian Rue but I don't think this has been studied in depth with humans. N-methyl tyramine can increase heartrate, cause nausea and other symptoms, though, N-methytyramine was found to not be the cause of Phalaris staggers in animals. High levels of hordenine with the MAOI can also have effects on heartrate/headache/nausea but I'm curious about that since many shamans drink Trichocereus cactus & Banisteriopsis vine together. The "Holdfast" cultivar of Aquatica was developed to contain little to no n-methyltyramine and contains mostly tryptamines(not much) & hordenine. So even though N-methyltyramine wasn't causing Phalaris staggers, CSIRO managed to let the Phalaris spirit hack their minds and create a lovely winter/summer active species to bless the world. I imagine your 2nd and 3rd clippings will have more alkaloids if you keep watering with seaweed extract/kelp meal, but hopefully boost the alkaloids you want. If your plants are that potent maybe consider working in the 5-10g range since the first regrowth will be strongest but provide less fresh material. One of my first Phalaris Brachystachys experiences 9 years ago was only using 8 grams of fresh regrowth and that laid me out for hours with beautiful visuals and insights. Phalaris alkaloids can be highly variable so one day you may get a mild high, the next experience you may have your entire belief system restructured. Best of luck on your grass journey.


https://www.academia.edu...udden_death_in_ruminants

Yeah, I'm pretty much certain it was brachystachys. I collected a couple grams of seed (maybe around 5g, I never weighed how much I had), and planted them all together in a single pot, which was maybe 50-60cm deep, so the density of plants was very high but they would have had plenty of root space (at least vertically). I had grown some aquatica cv. australian two years ago, but as far as I can remember, I managed to kill all my aquatica plants through neglect and none of them ever went to seed, so I don't think any of the foliage I harvested for the brew recently could have been aquatica. I certainly remember the plants that I harvested seed from being grown from seed that I bought as phalaris brachystachys, and this seems to add up as all my brachystachys plants completely died after they had gone to seed (which would make sense as brachystachys is an annual, while aquatica is not).


I think I brought the brew to a heavy boil first and then added the grass clippings, and then gave it around half a minute or so before turning down the heat to medium/medium-low and covering the pot. In any case I didn't vigorously boil the material for a long period of time.

Another quick thing I'd like to ask fellow Nexians who are doing bioassaying is there a reason why not smoke the extracted material, instead of drinking it with harmalas?

Hey Chimp!

I also suspect the cyanogenic glycosides, along with the tyramines. Good to know that boiling takes care of the glycosides. I was very surprised to see that brachy caused the same side effects as aquatica for Titus. Brachy is not supposed to have tyramines, but probably has glycosides. And he didn't properly boil down and concentrate the brew. I actually think the glycosides are responsible for a lot of the side effects.

Anyhow, even boiled down aquatica brews were not side effect free for me, with the same unconsciousness and heart rate problem. Boiling perhaps diminishes but does not completely clean the glycoside toxicity, or perhaps a very thorough hours long boil is necessary.

Chimp, what is your reference for that boiling eliminates glycoside toxicity? And could you share what you know about the glycosides in general?

In Trout's notes, it is said that half of the total alkaloids are lost with drying, however it is also said that 1) the bufotenine concentration is higher when fresh (no info on DMT) and 2) the outcome of drying depends on strain.

And 3) aquatica and arundinacea are mentioned but brachystachys is not.

I actually believe the cyanogenic glycosides are also diminished with drying.

Appleseed mentions that early growth aquatica has (higher?) cyanogenic glycosides.



Early growth brachystachys could as well be the same.

Not recommending to anyone to drink it without lots of research and careful planning but if you do mix Phalaris grass with MAOI, be safe as possible!
The Phalaris grass is a plant teacher and I hope to gain a deeper connection with plants and nature by appreciating the pure plant process and not dissecting every unfamiliar compound in it. The alkaloids and other chemicals in Phalaris are still lacking research and bioassays over the years have suggested they may be more synergistic than hazardous when ingested.
Same reason some prefer to drink cactus tea instead of HCL in capsules, because the plant has a lot more to offer than just 1 alkaloid.

It is also noted that while enzymes may degrade Phalaris alkaloids while drying, the 5-MeO-DMT to DMT ratio increases pretty substantially in strains where 5-MeO pathways occur.
Since Phalaris Arundinacea contains 5-MeO-NMT, I'm wondering how this works itself out in the drying process or if the 5-MeO compounds quickly degrade after peaking.

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Yeah, I'm pretty much certain it was brachystachys. I collected a couple grams of seed (maybe around 5g, I never weighed how much I had), and planted them all together in a single pot, which was maybe 50-60cm deep, so the density of plants was very high but they would have had plenty of root space (at least vertically). I had grown some aquatica cv. australian two years ago, but as far as I can remember, I managed to kill all my aquatica plants through neglect and none of them ever went to seed, so I don't think any of the foliage I harvested for the brew recently could have been aquatica. I certainly remember the plants that I harvested seed from being grown from seed that I bought as phalaris brachystachys, and this seems to add up as all my brachystachys plants completely died after they had gone to seed (which would make sense as brachystachys is an annual, while aquatica is not).

@titus
Are you able to snap some pictures of the plant's stem, foliage, seeds and flowers/seedheads?
I'm interested in what this Brachystachys looks like, because usually Brachystachys is pretty clean with its tryptamine alkaloid content in my experience. It'd help to have more insight in to potential side-effects from even the perceivably "clean" strains.

I'm working on crossing high alkaloid Aquatica seeds with seeds from low tyramine, low alkaloid plants that don't go dormant in Summer and Winter so can offer strong clean clones that are very hardy. I have some plants that took me 4 years of crossing genetics to produce, now just gotta TLC & Bioassay some extracts to see if I pulled it off. Not sure if any of you has grown AQ1 Aquatica clones but that tends to be a variety that doesn't produce much biomass or handle much stress compared to other cultivars, in my growing experience. So ideally the plants I have that are monstrous in height/foliage production will have decent alkaloid content if I follow the correct steps of scheduled clippings and fertilization in the optimal season.

It is quite beautiful that probably the most potent Phalaris species(brachystachys) is also the smallest and produces the least amount of grass yield. I would love to be able to share plants that are huge in size and yummy alkaloids so no one every gets nausea or increased heart rate with the grass.

Golden stuff people, keep it up.

I'm about to go hunting some wild Phalaris this month and ID-ing them. Am gonna be purchasing an erlich kit to test for alkaloids, my friend will want to bioassay this but I will review it a few times to see what is the safest form - as well as try to figure out if vaping without a maoi would be safer.

Then I will send it to endlessness for further testing and hope to see some full spec results


Think this year will be golden for us phalaris enthusiasts.

Anyone can confirm

Phalaris is hermaphrodite, meaning one plant can reproduce itself, so we should be able to makehybrid seeds with the same quality genetics and alkaloids?

Phalaris plants are bisexual, all with bisexual spikelets; with hermaphrodite florets. The spikelets of sexually distinct forms on the same plant (rarely), or all alike in sexuality; hermaphrodite, or hermaphrodite and sterile (clusters of one fertile and several deformed-sterile in P. paradoxa and P. coerulescens). Plants outbreeding and inbreeding.

Seed is Always going to be variable but yes you can cross strong alkaloid strains together and get more potent plants from their seeds. You'll notice how seed collected from stunted plants often creates small slower growing plants.

Since there are multiple tryptamines(NMT, DMT, 5-HO-DMT, 5-MeO-DMT, 5-MeO-NMT) and alkaloid phenotypes(tryptamine/DMT/5MEODMT, hordenine, gramine) in the Phalaris Arundinacea complex, TLC is useful but still needs more analysis if you're noticing anything but energetic or entheogenic effects. Smoking wild extracts is best option in beginning work with those types before consuming the tea. Tea should also be administered as just the grass first to detect any oral activity without added MAOI. There can be small to larger amounts of potent beta-carbolines(2-Methyl-1,2,3,4Tetrahydrobetacarboline), potentially hordenine or gramine that will be active by themselves.
In my experience Phalaris tea can occasionally be stimulating but I haven't had any issues with heart-rate, nausea or negative symptoms associated with the least popular constituents in the grass.
I also tend to just lay down and put music on if anything starts to get too wobbly.

Perfect time to ID everything is from Late April to June in the Northern Hemisphere since they are all about to reach their anthesis then go to seed. Check rivers, forest entrances, wetlands, areas disturbed by humans, ponds/swamps, streambanks, and beachfronts.

Phalaris Arundinacea opens its flower fully from the middle of May to early June so will look similar to many other grasses(Calamagrostis Canadensis, Dactylis Glomerata).

Thanks for singing Chimp!

A bit more clear look and it seems to me that boiling down has never eliminated toxicity for me if it was present. Simmering and not using seedlings seem to be important, and Titus broke both of these rules in his last trial. It could be that in seedling phase brachystachys exhibits the same side effects with other species and clears out in later stages.

I never really had any of the toxic effects I read on here with phalaris even though I tried brachys, truncata and paradoxa. I had the unsettling energy surge and heart race but nothing to raise concern. Roasted harmala seeds gave a significantly less potent experience and was much shorter. I just made a brew from acacia farnessiana bark a d will be trying it very soon on its own then with harmalas.

I think harvesting regime is important. 2nd and 3rd regrowth after first clipping will be cleaner in my experience. What is your usual Harmala dosing?

I can relate, have not had concerning issues with my Phalaris brews.
Just like Phalaris, Acacia Farnesiana has been found to contain different tryptamines and phenethylamines in varying concentrations. Are you drinking the Farnesiana by itself or with MAOI?

What is everyone's ideal Phalaris/MAOI brew time?

I have had pleasant experiences with multiple Phalaris species by simmering the Peganum/Elaeagnus/Hippophae etc. with the grass and straining at least 3 washes
over the course of 8-24 hours.
Any of the weaker teas came from quick 1.5 hour cooks but also the plant, season and other environmental factors come into play.

Ssm, unsettling energy surge and heart racing could describe part of a regular tryptamine effect, but if it persists for a long time it is not normal. When it is intense it feels very dangerous.

Chimp z, I have so far brewed the plants separately and have only tried one or two quick simmers with the grass. And I was boiling in the beginning...

I am curious about your use of elaeagnus. In my experience it is not an maoi-a. Though you are probably using the American species and it might have maoi-a activity. Do you ever mix different maoi plants?

I intend to drink the tree bark on its own first then with harmalas. I thought of using a coffee grinder for the bark but it's too fibrous I'm afraid it will roast my grinder.

So I just tried to shred it with my hands to thin hair as best as I could. I freeze and thawed it 4 times and boiled twice for 30 mins each with vinegar. It's in my freezer waiting for when I get free time.

The bark has the same smell like acacia Karoo ..it's a strong unsavoury smell. Don't know how to describe it.

I did want to risk booking too low of a dose so I used something like 30 grams for the boil.



I will be