Has anyone else noticed that invertebrates love to dream?...or so it seems!

Last year a morning glory introduced spider mites to my beloved salvias...last summer was spent in a desperate battle against the sap-sucking little buggers, but the most astounding example was the mystery of who/what was munching large chunk out of the Salvia's leaves. Late one night, after some intensive detective work, I discovered the culprit: a monstrous yellow slug was treking in from the garden, up the steps, through the cat-flap, past a whole collection of other plants (non-entheogenic but nevertheless tasty), 10 meters through the kitchen and across the living room to have dinner in my little indoor bay window garden!!!

I previously believed that psychoactive plants produced these active compounds (among other reaons) as an insect/pest deterrent, but now I'm starting to think that this is an old gardener's myth...because they don't seem to work - in fact I would go so far to say that insects and other invertebrate pests (e.g. slugs) LOVE psychoactive plants and will go out of their way to feast on these delicacies...the burning question is WHY??*

There was also an article in the newspapers a while ago featuring an interview with a chap who was involved in planting a medicinal herb garden (including plants like henbane etc.) in Scotland and said that the garden was a magnet for critters.

I have a feeling that us humans are not the only ones who are interested in exploring consciousness



*The whole thing was made more bizarre by the long-running joke I had with my then-boyfriend about him being a slug shaman (i.e. a shaman who works with the great slug spirit)

Interesting AND funny, though I have little to offer other than one year I had a patch poppies in my garden and it was a battle with slugs and aphids to keep them off my plants, though the rest of the garden was almost untouched...strange indeed.

Just a theory, but it could just be that with your psychoactive plants being very exotic to your region, critters are all the more curious. If a plant has no natural ecological niche in an area it's more likely to attract a lot attention from local predators interested in new things to munch on.

Pests are also attracted to ailing an underdeveloped plants too, so that might be a factor.

My plants were thriving til the critters came along...although fortunately the winter seems to have seen 'em off and the Salviaa are growing like crazy at the moment

The entheo-botanical garden is actually the Dilston Physic garden UK. Here's what they had to say (from their website Dilston Physic Garden)

"One of the more popular courses ,‘Plants of the gods’, explores the shamanic uses of such plants. Many of these shamanic herbs are subject to slug and snail destruction as if the molluscs are some kind of ‘trip’. The ‘opium den’, under construction as a zone filled with Papaver somniferum and other poppy speciesis consequently struggling to exist."

The snails and slugs loved my Papaver Somniferem too...:evil:

Slugs loved my syrian rue too. However at the time they were all eaten they were still small, only a few cm, and very young and presumably very tasty for the slugs.


Kind regards,

The Traveler