I wanna grow cactus

[Richard Drysift]

Looks like cucumbers lol

It does but cactus flesh is much tougher than a cuke. There’s a “ring” that runs through the center of the plant. The texture is sorta like cutting through a pineapple core. On the first try the slicer blade hit this tougher part & it just wouldn’t go through without squeezing it… even with spines cut off the stubs went through my gloves… ow!

How long did that take?

Total yield = 213g dry cactus powder.
A few small pieces did not fully turn to dust and are basically rock hard; thinking I gotta pulverize those with a hammer or something. Maybe they had a bit more moisture content than everything else. One cactus slice apparently wasn’t fully dried and made a messy pulp in the grinder; left it out on cardboard to dry. Started cutting & drying last Friday night and finally finished grinding up around 2am today so that’s like 5 days.

 

[Richard Drysift]

It just doesn’t seem right to post a step-by-step tek for this extraction seeing as how most of the source info I found in another forum. So for the purpose of furthering knowledge and possibly generating interest in cactus extraction I will give a basic overview of this process. This is not my tek nor am I a scientist but do have a basic knowledge of simple chemistry. I have never done this before but from what I understand this is a time tested and simplified way to separate the alkaloids present in any cactus.
We begin by making a base of lye, water, and dried cactus which will quickly break down the plant material. Then a solvent is added; in this case xylene which will absorb the alkaloids along with other things like plant fats and lipids. The mixture is shaken up every few hours and then allowed to rest overnight until it is well separated.
The xylene layer is sucked off and returned to a bottle for salting. 5-7 drops of hydrochloric acid is added to a cup of water and swirled into the bottle along with the infused xylene. The cap is loosened and bottle is placed in the freezer. Once the water is frozen the xylene is poured off into a separate bottle for subsequent salting cycles. The acid water is thawed into a Pyrex dish for evaporation. Salting steps are repeated to get every bit of the goods. The end product is usable as is but you can purify it even further by washing with acetone and filtering through a funnel w/a cotton ball stuffed in the middle. Cleaning eliminates anything other than pure crystal alkaloid for more accurate dosing.

 

[Budz.Bunny]

It does but cactus flesh is much tougher than a cuke. There’s a “ring” that runs through the center of the plant. The texture is sorta like cutting through a pineapple core. On the first try the slicer blade hit this tougher part & it just wouldn’t go through without squeezing it… even with spines cut off the stubs went through my gloves… ow!

Total yield = 213g dry cactus powder.
A few small pieces did not fully turn to dust and are basically rock hard; thinking I gotta pulverize those with a hammer or something. Maybe they had a bit more moisture content than everything else. One cactus slice apparently wasn’t fully dried and made a messy pulp in the grinder; left it out on cardboard to dry. Started cutting & drying last Friday night and finally finished grinding up around 2am today so that’s like 5 days.

No I mean start to finish like how long did it take the cultivate the cacti

 

[Richard Drysift]

No I mean start to finish like how long did it take the cultivate the cacti

Started germination around August 2016 or so; there’s a pic on pg2 of this thread dated July 2017 but they were already going for 10 months at that point. So that’s like 5yrs & 8 months total up to now.

 

[Richard Drysift]

Started extraction last night. There was definite separation in the jugs last time I looked but I think I should’ve used a bit more xylene; it’s a very thin layer. Next step is to suck off the xylene layer floating on top with a turkey baster leaving the lye water behind. That’s all for now…pics are coming

 

[Richard Drysift]

So as with anything else this will be a learning experience. The xylene layer was very thin but is fully separated from the aqueous layer; it just kinda floats on top. Any agitation sorta makes it into a mess again and you have to wait for it to settle again to keep working it. Trying to use a turkey baster with a 1/4” clear fish tank tube inserted into the hole to suck off the xylene. This way you can slowly suck it up with the turkey baster ball and pinch the end so it doesn’t flow back down. Managed to get a portion of it but most is still in sitting in the bottles. Added 2 pints xylene total to the mix but only pulled back out about 3 shot glasses so far…
At some point it seemed like I could not get any more of the xylene up into the tube without sucking up the cactus “snot” layer along with it. What I think I’m going to have to do is end up with at least some of that snot in my xylene bottle and then filter out the tiny chunks with a steel mesh sifting screen. If I then freeze it only the lye water should become solid; then I could pour off the xylene and continue with salting. Just trying to get all goodies here…
The 2-3 oz or so of clean xylene that I did pull up was mixed 1.5 cups of water w/ 5 drops of HCL added in. The acid water was then frozen. The xylene will not freeze so it was then poured right back into the extraction bottle. The frozen acid water is still thawing out and will next be evaporated; there are already visible “needles” forming in the ice. This acid water will then be evaporated hopefully leaving behind mescaline crystal in the dish. Pics are coming soon

 

[Cannabinoid Froyd]

Curious why you chose this cacti over Peyote?

If you are in an area with native Peyote, you might be able to speak with a medicine man. I worked with a Navajo Medicine Man in the early 2000's. He'd usually take off for New Mexico a week every 2 months or so. He would also make special run for anyone who was in need. I wish I could remember how he prepared it as there is most certainly a proper way to cure them and make teas. He was a super awesome person and at one time had prepared some peyote for my back issues. Tastes like you are chewing on asprin. Works well though.

 

[alphapinene]

Native lophs in the US only grow in a sliver of southern texas. gotta go to mexico, or look into the NAC where they can legally grow and harvest.. anyway they take 5-8+ years if not more to mature enough and be big enough. grafted specimens usually don't have as much alkaloids as natural-hard grown plants. They're also endangered due to poachers overharvesting...trichs are much faster and easier...plus would you really wanna harvest plants that you have been growing for 5-8+ years? it's a special plant that almost becomes a pet

 

[Cannabinoid Froyd]

Native lophs in the US only grow in a sliver of southern texas. gotta go to mexico, or look into the NAC where they can legally grow and harvest.. anyway they take 5-8+ years if not more to mature enough and be big enough. grafted specimens usually don't have as much alkaloids as natural-hard grown plants. They're also endangered due to poachers overharvesting...trichs are much faster and easier...plus would you really wanna harvest a plant that you have been growing for 5-8+ years? it's a special plant that almost becomes a pet

If I was growing just one cacti, no I would not want to take it. If I had a plot with hundreds, not so much then.

Crazy how long they take to mature. Have you had a chance to try Peyote?

 

[alphapinene]

If I was growing just one cacti, no I would not want to take it. If I had a plot with hundreds, not so much then.

Crazy how long they take to mature. Have you had a chance to try Peyote?

Yeah that makes sense, I wish I had a loph farm! I guess i'm looking at it from a collectors perspective..It really is but that's what makes them so awesome. That and they're very appealing to the eyes, i love how they follow the fibonacci sequence in regards to their rib formation. They're also self-fertile which is cool as the offspring are identical clones. I have not but I would love too!

 

[Cannabinoid Froyd]

Yeah that makes sense, I wish I had a loph farm! I guess i'm looking at it from a collectors perspective..It really is but that's what makes them so awesome. That and they're very appealing to the eyes, i love how they follow the fibonacci sequence in regards to their rib formation. They're also self-fertile which is cool as the offspring are identical clones. I have not but I would love too!

If you ever do get a cured button, just take it easy. A small pinky nail wide sliver every 45min was plenty for me. I've watched people eat whole buttons, puke and trip ballz but it didn't look overly fun.

 

[alphapinene]

If you ever do get a cured button, just take it easy. A small pinky nail wide sliver every 45min was plenty for me. I've watched people eat whole buttons, puke and trip ballz but it didn't look overly fun.

haha yeah I've heard it's a pretty intense and LONG experience when you've ingested a decent amount..I think i'll just stick to the occasional psilocybin trip..that's more my speed

 

[Richard Drysift]

Curious why you chose this cacti over Peyote?

If you are in an area with native Peyote, you might be able to speak with a medicine man. I worked with a Navajo Medicine Man in the early 2000's. He'd usually take off for New Mexico a week every 2 months or so. He would also make special run for anyone who was in need. I wish I could remember how he prepared it as there is most certainly a proper way to cure them and make teas. He was a super awesome person and at one time had prepared some peyote for my back issues. Tastes like you are chewing on asprin. Works well though.

Well I chose this cactus in particular because it is a fast growing variety; grew this on my windowsill. Here in New England natives run casinos; the many lost tribes were broken and dispersed long long ago. I actually do know a dude who is a self proclaimed medicine man but honestly …guy is a total douche. Besides, I am something of a celestial shaman myself. No peyote that I know of growing around these parts but that may change in the not too distant future.
Would like to grow some williamsii cactus in due time but I’m trying to see if I even like the alkaloids in this one first. I know they take several years to grow and many more to bloom. Trying not to puke here; my thinking is that it is the plant material that must cause most of the stomach discomfort. If I completely isolate the alkaloid crystal it is my sincere hope that we won’t have to purge while trippin ballz.

 

[Richard Drysift]

Probably not enough to trip ballz but this is result of 2 salting cycles…

 

[Richard Drysift]

So the challenge was and remains how to get the xylene layer into the extraction bottle without sucking up a bunch of cactus snot along with it…..

As you can see the yellowish top layer of xylene sorta floats on top; as you draw it up a little more xylene oozes up to the top. I added a total of 2 pints of xylene; 1 to each of the bottles full of lye/cactus. So far I have collected more than half of it; still struggling to get the rest. It is a frikkin pain in the ass but a few modifications to this tek I recently made are helpful:
The biggest upgrade was to add a hose clamp to the ball end of my turkey baster for better suction…
Used a super long piece of fish tank tube in conjunction with the turkey baster so I can pinch off the tube once the xylene mixture is up inside it making transfers to the extraction bottle much easier
When I say xylene mixture I mean that lye water and cactus snot is being sucked up along with the xylene…. So to separate it I have been freezing the bottle and pouring off the xylene; the water/cactus will freeze but xylene will not. It has been a very time consuming process but I’m nearing the end and excited to see how much more alkaloid I can pull

 

[blueberrymilkshake]

A large syringe with a blunt tip might help get the last bit. Transferring the liquid to a container thats tall and narrow would increase the height of the xylene layer, making it more accessible as well.

Big fan of the thread btw.

 

[Thundercat]

Tall narrow container was my thought as well.

 

[Richard Drysift]

Thought about both of these options but last night after several beers I had a revelation… why not just freeze both of the big bottles and then pour off the last of the xylene? Worked ok…Still ended up with a little bit of cactus sludge in the other bottle so that is currently in the freezer separating…the middle part of the big bottle was still slushy even after 7 hrs in the deep freezer but feeling confident that I got mostly all the goods from the snot layer.
Once all the xylene is finally in a single bottle I will mix in some water w/HCL which binds to the alkaloids and becomes crystallized. Then the bottle is frozen again to separate from the solvent. After evaporation the “salt” left over should be mostly mescaline…. Stay tuned for the next chapter in this continuing saga..

 

[hotrodharley]

If you ever do get a cured button, just take it easy. A small pinky nail wide sliver every 45min was plenty for me. I've watched people eat whole buttons, puke and trip ballz but it didn't look overly fun.

Dry it or not, blend it up and do it in an enema. No puking. Fast trip. You still get the metallic taste though.

 

[Richard Drysift]

No cactus juice enemas for me; that’s why I m busting my balls here trying to separate just the pure alkaloid. The 4th salting cycle is currently thawing; evaporation step is next.
So far we only have about a .5g of mescaline collected. The results of this salting will determine if I do another one or toss all this shit out and go back to growing shrooms; after all it’s the season. I have learned through this project that my young home grown bridgessii cactus probably was not as active with mescaline as originally assumed. Must be why everyone tries extracting from more mature cuttings. Still has been an intriguing adventure so far even if we barely have enough for a couple doses. Gonna try our hand at growing some peyote (Lophomora Williamsii) from seed in the not too distant future.