OK, first acacia-based ayahuasca (FORMOSAHUASCA) trial completed. Has been a deep experience, but extremely horrifying during the prolonged entry stage.

The brew:

1) around 1/2 tbsp whole Syrian rue seeds, ground into powder and steeped in 3 washes of boiling water (no cooking, no evaporation);

2) around 3 tbsp ground Acacia confusa root bark, also steeped in 3 washes of boiling water (no cooking, no evaporation); ONLY around 1/2 of the acacia brew was consumed (around 1.5 tbsp of the plant material), resulting in an extremely strong experience.

The rue was consumed first, followed 30 minutes later by around 1/3 of the acacia brew, followed 30 more minutes later by a few more gulps of the acacia brew (overall, around 1/2 of the prepared acacia brew was used).

What ensued was a prolonged horrifying entry phase, which felt like dying many times over, not being sure anymore what being alive, sane or human means, or when this experience started, or when it is going to end. After a lot of suffering, and passing through an exquisitely sensuous erotic episode, this cleared into an extremely blissful state of peace and harmony, which gradually descended into the usual consciousness at around 3.5 hour time mark from the first acacia brew ingestion.

A deep experience I would say, but certainly not one I would repeat often. And all of this with only around 1.5 tbsp of the acacia root bark powder. No idea whether my batch of acacia is unusually potent, or I am unusually sensitive. Also, it's quite harsh on me. As I said, I've never really had a difficult experience with psilocybin, mescaline or LSA (all from natural sources), but these acacia voyages bring a lot of horror, among other things. Please stay safe!

reminds swim of his rue and MHRB over dose. SWIM ingested 30gms of root bark in a cold water infusion and 1/2 tbsp of rue. SWIM feels rue is a really harsh one. It might be much gentler working with some caapi or perhaps even try working with less acacia. Finding your more comfortable range.
The sessions tend to get uncomfortable and nightmarish like that when the intoxication and disorientation becomes overwhelming. You body releases all of these stress hormones to try to compensate but that just makes the experience worse.
I really dont think it is the acacia that is causing the horror, perhaps just the level of dosage and your inexperience with ayahuasca analogs. they have a much different learning curve, and they all can be really horrible at times. I know some people who work with traditional healers who say that if it is not horrible then it isnt ayahuasca! Which is why swim leans to changa ; )

From what you told earlier i expected that this would be potent stuff, but a full blown aya trip on 1.5 tbsp is extraordinary. And also that it is so short acting.

Where did you obtain this stuff?

He got it in taiwan.

in this the author suggests 15 grams...
http://www.scribd.com/do...Brewing-Asian-Ayahuasca-

Sure, I'll work with smaller doses in future trials.


The duration of the rue+acacia combination seems normal for ayahuasca analogs (3.5 hours with an afterglow). The duration of the pure acacia brew seems a little longer than smoked DMT.

It's interesting that, at the doses that have worked for me, the rue+acacia combination is not even difficult to drink. (And I did not have to cook it for hours, just made a hot water infusion.)


From a herbal store in Taiwan. It also seems to be available online. And there is a group in Taiwan that has apparently used it a lot. I've assembled everything I know about the acacia, together with some links, at DMT-Nexus Wiki:
https://wiki.dmt-nexus.me/Acacia_confusa


I do not have a scale. And I do not see much of a point about weighting plant material in any case (depends on residual water content, potency, etc). I've just ground a small batch of my root bark and mixed it thoroughly, so now I have a standardized powder and can work with it. At least, one can get the relative doses on my different trials.


I am sure I've used much less than 15 grams.

I've actually talked to the author of that write-up before my trials. He seems to be affiliated with the Taiwanese ayahuasca group I've linked at the bottom of the Acacia confusa page on DMT-Nexus Wiki.

He said that what he had used was probably the stem bark and not the root bark, but he wasn't sure about that.

PS: Incidentally, Syrian rue is also used as a medicine in the North-West of China (Xinjiang). The Chinese name is 骆驼篷子. Can be purchased in China very cheap, and, at least theoretically, is supposed to be food grade (and for human consumption).

I am also interested in trying Tribulus terrestris (白蒺藜, a very common Chinese medicine) for MAOI.

You know, since I moved to China, I feel I should give my experiments some regional flavor.

we really need more research done on tribulus. SWIM is working on developing it with a smokable changa mix. using a 10x evaporated extract.

I bought my tribulus from the same Taiwanese herbal shop where I was buying the acacia root (the cost was around US$5 for 600g of dried tribulus fruits).

I intend to brew and drink it alone and see if it produces any noticeable effect. Syrian rue has a rather strong effect on me by itself (making me feel tired and very dreamy and, of course, unplesantly nauseous at larger doses, around 1tbsp of whole seeds, ground and brewed).

I used to add ground tribulus to my morning cereal before (that one was purchased from an English herbal supplement store). I couldn't notice too much effect at that time, but I think the taste is quite pleasant.

SWIM has heard that a cold water infusion will allow you to get the harmalas possibly with out the other unwanted compounds.
the ayahuasca forum has a thread on it...
http://forums.ayahuasca....t=tribulus&start=15
http://forums.ayahuasca....6&highlight=tribulus

Well, from what I read, it seems that tribulus has a much better overall safety profile than the rue, for example (and then I hear about people swallowing ground rue seeds in gel caps). So, I am not sure how much one should be concerned about that point... I'll check again what's the normative preparation of tribulus in Chinese traditional medicine (my herbalist vendors seemed to suggest brewing).

mindbody, I've done two Manske extractions on peganum harmala without grindings the seeds, and they were both successful extractions, resulting in what would be the expected % range of harmalas.

Maybe you could hot brew the seeds without grinding them into a powder and see if the psychoactive effects are retained while the body load/death feelings are diminished or absent.

According to a paper somewhere online, the harmala alkaloids are supposedly contained wholly within the husks. My Manske extractions seem to support this statement.


Oh, and by the way, dried tribulus berries are damn difficult to powder. They are ridiculously strong. I put them in my magic bullet grinder and quit after twenty seconds or so, because I thought they were going to tear it up! They actually created a few sparks! I then wrapped them in a t-shirt and hammered them against concrete, but they just put holes through t-shirt and whatever powder was created was leaking through the holes. It was messy and not worth the trouble. I have several pounds of tribulus berries sitting in my freezer, unused.

I don't think it can be due to the rue. The overall feel of this ayahuasca session was extremely similar to the first ingestion of pure acacia brew I reported in this thread (it just lasted much longer and was a little bit softer, perhaps, which is still enormously strong, given that the dose was less than 1/3 of the pure acacia dose).

Also, I wouldn't say that the body load was high in any simple sense (nausea, whatever). It was about the usual mind state completely dissolving in a storm of ideas and images and the body control becoming quite limited. It's actually not that dissimilar to many descriptions of ayahuasca effects, but still rather horrifying to go through at the dose I've taken.


Oh, that would have made a nice skit for some American TV comedy show...

Perhaps one should soak the fruits first and let them rehydrate...

I see, I see.

Keep it in mind though, as an experiment for future rue brews, whatever the admixture(s).

I made a tribulus decoction a few hours ago by just boiling the whole fruits for 20-25 minutes. It works fine. It hit me that I had made it in this way once before, but had forgotten about it, only remembering the aggravation of the first time.

I have a hard time with the aftertaste on the tongue...mlaahh. I don't think I could drink a more concentrated, boiled down version.

I do like it's nourishing, calming properties though.

Thank you for this usefull information dimitrius.

SWIM's in also in a region where it grows natively.

Can you elaborate a bit on how you brewed it. Did you use any acid or just plain water? Any guesstimate on how many grams you used?

The first two times, I did something along the lines of traditional ayahuasca (boiling the root bark powder in 5 washes, then combining them and reducing on low heat).

Then I thought: why could this be necessary for a finely ground powder?! So I just steeped the powder three times in boiling water, combined and drank the resulting infusion. The effect, as I said, was tremendously strong.


Plain bottled drinking water (not tap water, not distilled). No vinegar (I am actually wondering if vinegar is added just to improve extraction efficiency, or it has any impact on psychoactivity).


No, but I still don't see how that would be useful. Just keep in mind that a handful of root bark chips can be A LOT (the people brewing it in Taiwan suggested "a big handful for 2 doses", and they may even have been using stem bark and not root bark; my suggestion would be much less than that, if combined with MAOI). So just start low and determine the potency of your material.

FRONT PAGE OF REALITY SANDWICH = WIN

http://www.realitysandwi...hedelic_root_discovered

Great! I hope the information will spread, I hope more bioassays will be performed, and I hope everybody will be very careful!!!