This cactus is extraordinary in bloom, but the ecstasy is short: the flowers open up at night, and then some time during the following day they close up and die. But before the flowers perish, the bees have had a bacchanalian feast on the nectar, rolling around in the pollen like they’ve gone mad with joy. It’s quite the spectacle.
As far as I can gather, this particular night-blooming cereus is a so-called San Pedro — Trichocereus macrogonus var. pachanoi, or some such. The San Pedro also goes by other names, for instance Huachuma, Achuma, Aguacolla, and Giganton.
If I was to consume some of it and then have a mystical experience, I might get a better understanding as to whether this is in fact a San Pedro. Say for instance I went through a bit of post-consumption ego-dissolution. Something spiritual-like. Something groovy.
Because, you see, the San Pedro cactus is an entheogen, in other words a plant which contains psychoactive substances and which have been used throughout history in sacred contexts.
According to famed ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes and his colleagues, Trichocereus pachanoi is rich in mescaline: up to 2% of the dried material and 0.12% of the fresh material.
(It was an experience with mescaline that lead Aldous Huxley to write his celebrated philosophical essay The Doors of Perception.)
Referring to how shamans in the Andes describe the ritual use of the San Pedro cactus, Schultes and his colleagues write:
The use of T. pachanoi appears to be primarily for divination, diagnosis of disease, and to make oneself owner of another identity.
They also reason that the cactus represents “one of the most ancient magic plants of South America.”
But around our parts, because of the consciousness-altering effect they might have on you, certain plants are illegal to eat. And the San Pedro cactus is one of those plants. Thus, if I was to test this cactus on myself in order to find out if it is indeed a San Pedro, I might be a criminal in the eye of the justice system.
So alas, I will probably never know.
Bibliography
- Bohn, A. et al. “Altered States of Consciousness During Ceremonial San Pedro Use.” The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion, 33:4, 309-331, 2002.
- Hundley, Jessica, et al. Plant Magick. Taschen GmbH, 2022.
- Schultes, Richard Evans, et al. Plants of the Gods : Their Sacred, Healing, and Hallucinogenic Powers. Rev. and expanded ed. Healing Arts Press, 2001.