heres an old post from another board... cacti related, but relates well i think
"
blend cactus
add small amount of water
add sodium hydroxide to solution and stir and mix well in suitable safe container.
leave for a day or two to break down all plant matter, stirring and mixing when chance arises.
**** note this next part is experimental and takes some time but seems to show plenty of potential.
have a container with xylene ready that can accommodate the basified solution as well..so a container say of 3 liters and there is a liter of xylene in it with 2 spare liters for your cactus solution to drop into..
Now the tricky bit...drip from the container of cactus solution drop by drop into the xylene...in other words a sep funnel dripping it slowly into the xylene would be cool or a small hole in the container which allows the solution to drip slowly.
As the basified solution drops into the solution drop by drop you are exposing large amounts of solvent to tiny amounts of basified solution which by rights should pull every bit of alkaloid from the drop straight into the solvent, the rest will sink to the bottom. if collection container is on a magnetic stirrer even better as some slight agitation as the drops hit the moving solvent would certainly be helpful.
This is experimental as i have said, the idea being that you are exposing the mescaline alkaloid in freebase form to solvent in a reversed ratio to other existing teks...it should release it faster into the solvent as opposed to pouring a bottle of xylene on top of basified solution and shaking and stirring hoping that all mesc freebase at some point comes into contact with solvent and is pulled across...this method has generally meant multiple pulls before you get most of it...I've never been satisfied that u actually get it all with multiple pulls and to be honest it's a right pain the ass to have to do multiple pulls and titrate multiple times...there has to be more economical and brainier ways to access these freebase alkaloids we seek."