Cactus: Why not redose every time?

[Flickering]

The potency of specimens varies greatly, so you usually can't be sure whether you're in for a mellow ride or a rollercoaster. I'd think the logical solution would be to take less than the full dose, say 15 inches of cactus, and if it's not as strong as you'd like by the third hour, take another x inches.

Of course, re-ingesting when you're already tripping isn't nice. I only have experience with reducing it to tea, usually a larger quantity than necessary, and I wouldn't want to have to choke that stuff down again. I'm going to try reducing 24 inches to powder with a coffee grinder soon (or something less expensive - any recommendations?) and I'm thinking of doing exactly what I said above; I want a strong trip, but I'll be in public so I'd rather it wasn't 'breakthrough', something in the realm of 450 - 550mLs would be ideal. I figure powder shouldn't be that bad if it's frozen and followed immediately with strong orange and mango juice + sugar + lemon.

So, as far as guaging strength goes, I don't see why you wouldn't redose every time to be safe? Unless you don't mind getting spontaneously blasted into outer space, which is viable too.

 

[donvliet]

depending on how fast tolerance builds up with mescaline, it might work (never tried redosing with this one myself). With lsd tolerance builds up fast, making it difficult to redose. Worth a try I guess.

 

[donvliet]

Or you could do an extraction. Makes it easier to gauge your dose, and reduces nausea. And you don't have to eat/drink the cactus/goo.

 

[Mitchi]

If you make an alcohol extract, then you'll have this little hard ball of concentrated cacti. It would be much easier for you to handle in public

What about testing your cacti a week before? Just take a very small dose and get a fell for how potent it is?

 

[Ismene]

Two problems
1) The question of whether redosing works. With acid or mushrooms etc it doesn't.

2) Whether you want to deal with the gagging and nausea all over again a few hours after you've got over the first bout of gagging and nausea ingesting the first dose.

 

[Flickering]

Good points. Personally the only nausea I get from cacti comes from having too much stuff in my stomach; the more it's boiled down, the better. As for redosing, it seems to vary. I spent my last acid trip with a guy who redosed three times, once at +45 minutes, again at +8 hours, and again at +14 hours. He tripped all day and night.

 

[Fieldy]

^ it is possible to re-dose. Please don't dismiss the experience of others!

 

[Ismene]

^ it is possible to re-dose. Please don't dismiss the experience of others!

Sure it's possible to re-dose, the question we're debating is what effect you get from the re-dose and whether it's worth the candle. Presumably we all agree the dose you take after 8 hours is nowhere near the first dose?

 

[thoughtsUnThought]

Re-dosing on LSD has always worked fine for me, but I'm very sensitive and aware of subtle changes n consciousness. It is certainly not as intense, but that's not because the trip is much less, rather once my ego has been crushed the new trip is simply less alien.

San Pedro though, I've had even better results of re-dosing. I used to drnk an extra cup of sludge in the middle of the exp if i wanted to step it up a notch. Seemed like the mescaline was better for re-dosing than the acid, my cactus extra-cups were pretty overwhelming.

 

[huolesoh]

yes of course you'll 'lose some of the potency' if you re-dose - it will be weaker - but this is a psychedelic experience we're talking about, and cactus is not horrendously expensive - so go with how things feels

the method i use, since this is the kind of thing you can do this with; is to randomly select a quantity that 'feels right' and chow down. but yes i see what you mean about no idea how strong it's going to be, but that's the fun part !

of course any sensory enhancing drug makes eating cactus difficult
i'd assume eating cactus when you're a little drunk, mehico style, as a friend in italy said she did, as oppose to when you're stoned and you can tell every foul tiny motherfucking vinegary alkaloid, could be a good idea

 

[Help?!?!]

This is why you extract. It contains sixty trillion advantages over not. You have to do just as much work IMO thats more aggravating because its a stupid guessing game/etc. Extracts just seem like a lot of work but their really not very much at all.

 

[Flickering]

Christ. I say this every time it doesn't work, and this is the third time, but you're right. Extraction is the only way to go and I need to get off my lazy ass and learn how to do it. I just spent the better part of two days preparing 21 inches, got it down to three small cups, and slammed them down. And the first thing that struck me as a bit off was that it didn't taste bad at all. Now I KNOW the cactus was potent when I bought it, the bitterness was STRONG, so how did I manage to destroy the mescaline content in the process of preparing it? Somehow, I must have managed... so there goes a whole lot of time, a whole lot of cash (they're expensive over here) and a whole lot of expectation.

... unless mescaline is not what causes the bitter taste, but some other alkaloid. This seems distinctly possible. Because as I said, I can't think when I would have destroyed the mescaline, it's hardy stuff. Furthermore, 500mLs throughout three cups really should not make that much of a difference to the flavour, so I only assume that it's mescaline I'm tasting. The lack of nausea, however, indicates this is wishful thinking, especially because I ate a big meal four hours ago (planned to dose in the morning; decided spontaneously to do it at night).

I suppose I'll have to wait and see. If I don't feel anything in the next 45 minutes, there's no trip. Actually though I think I'm starting to feel something now, might just be my imagination, but if not I've discovered a cactus recipe that takes the bite out of the taste. That, or the peyote shamans were right and the pure of heart don't taste the bitterness. Me! Pure of heart! HAHAHAHA!

 

[TangerinO]

Well tell us how it goes in the morning I guess

 

[Flickering]

Nausea, slight body load, slightest psychedelic effects. There might have been 100mg of mescaline in that tea. There was supposed to be 6fucking00. Fuck redosing, scull it all, I'm now of the opinion that it's better to have too much than too little.

 

[thoughtsUnThought]

The inefficiency of extract is the loss of potency from my exp. I did the ethanol raw tar extract, and it worked,and one time i did an a/b to yield hydrochloride mesc. No matter how much I would pull alkaloids the potency would never be nearly as strong as eating cactus. With the ethanol, out see the alcohol turn green, and I re-washed until it was nearly clear. Still, it took close to 2x to get desired effects. And honestly, perhaps there's some other components which go unextracted, but really the depth to the exp is not here from my exp. I cukd get consistent +++ and some ++++s with 30-40g powder. But if i extracted the fuck out of the same material I would need 60-80 gs comparably of extract. I can't speak for te hydrochkir extract as much though, just did that once. But the pull was nowhere as near significant when it came to clean alkaloid weight compared t how far the cavtus woukd've brought me in full form. My exps are comparable to middle-upper end mg dosing according to charts, but when I extracted crystals I was greatly surprised how little mgs came through....maybe there's a significant loss or something...

 

[donvliet]

I did an a/b extraction a few years back. I had enough cactus to get an expected yield of about 5 grams of HCL. I ended up with only about 2 grams, but the potency was good. 200 mg was a solid ++ and even produced a ++++ in my brother once. He was a psy-virgin and it was beautiful to see him have a full blown life changing, mind blowing experience. It wasn't overly intense but it did it's magic alright.

I used a tech very similar to this one: http://www.andy-beeler.com/ . I didn't have any lab experience, except for some highschool chem, so I took the time to study and research the tech so I understood what I was doing and what the dangers were. I took a lot of care and a lot of time to get it right and it payed off. If you're going to make the effort, use enough cactus.