I'm concerned by all the news on the european front about MHRB. I don't think it will be very long now before its getting caught up in US customs as well and have decided to grow my own DMT containing plants. Unfortunately mimosa hostilis can't survive where i live, so it seems that d. illinoensis is the next best thing.

Does anybody have experience growing this? I have read that its quite easy and pretty much takes care of itsself. I assume that harvesting in about 3 years, in the dry season would be best for alkaloid content. How are yeilds? I have heard .6-.7% and I have also heard as low as .2%, but I figure with a field of bundleflowers it wouldn't make much of a difference.

Thanks inn advance for the help

Wikipedia gives it between 0 and .34%. SWIM actually has a bunch of seeds on the way, hopefully they will have some genetic diversity, as she wants to use TLC to choose the seeds with higher yields.

It also has the gramine problem of the grasses for us to figure out.

That's the first I've heard about the gramine problem. I read somewhere that an A/B with several defats worked fine. Maybe stressing it by letting it get real thirsty before harvest will increase yield. Thats what I've heard of folks doing with mimosa.

Is gramine definately in d. Illinoensis? I have never, until just now, heard of it being a problem with this plant. A guy over on the shroomery said he extracts from it all the time and didn't mention it.

I have never heard about gramine issues with D. illinoenis, though I have heard that the yields can be pretty pathetic.

I was advised to go in search of D. Leptobolus, but the seeds for this species seem to be quite difficult to source compared to illinoensis.

According to Thompson et al. 1987 (J. Agric. Food Chem 35(3):361-365), gramine is present in "low concentrations" in the root bark of Desmanthus illinoensis. The same paper also reports that NMT is present in the root bark at roughly one-third the concentration that DMT is.

Wikipedia cites Chemotaxonomie Der Pflanzen: Band 11b-1 as well on the gramine content, though it doesn't give concentrations either.

Edit: This very interesting article on Bundleflower as a food source ("Illinois bundleflower has been called our most important native legume" tested seeds and clippings without finding toxic levels of any alkaloids.

If you live in the midwest US, then this plant should be very easy to grow. Or you could go out and look for established wild populations. It can often be weedy but is considered beneficial as it fixes nitrogen from the air. I have read that dry weather stresses this plant into making more alkaloids as you mentioned. I have also heard of someone claiming that the foliage right before it dies contains amounts of tryptamines that are worth extracting.

I have never extracted from this plant, but there is an area near me where it grows prodigiously and SWIM will be experimenting with it soon. SWIM plans on doing extractions at different times through out the year in order to find the best time to harvest it. In fact SWIM should probably go out and get some soon before the new growth occurs.

I have 26 of them going right now..all a few inches tall..they are so easy to grow...though they dont seem the best source from what I have read. I also have some mimosa hostilis going just just sprouted, and phalaris, and I plan on getting acacia obtusifolia and a few others..

Expecting to have to do lots of defats in working with the bundleflower, but hopefully it will be more consistent in content than the grasses (but we'll just have to see). In an area that gets freezes outside, do you think the hostilis and obtusifolia will get big enough to use, fractal?

What are the odds that seedlings would have a higher alkaloid content than mature plants (like the grasses)?

They will be indoor until large enough to go outside for the summer.then indoor all winter and outdoor all summer..my salvias get huge this way so I think I will pull it off somehow..they are indoor right now and all doing quite well..Once they are large enough I plan on putting them in bog pots..I would rather have an apartment full of plants than not anyway.

Obtusifolia can apparently handle even -6 for short periods, and with it being temperate here and not getting that low often I think it should be okay..usually its like above zero all winter and its very hot in the summer..humidty is fine since this is all rainforest, and obtusifolia has actives in the leaves even so I dont have to worry about growing big roots.