Jochen Gartz - Magic Mushrooms Around the ... - preterhuman.net

isolated from fruiting bodies that originated
elsewhere. In Hawaii, the extent of adverse
reactions was also limited to a few panic
reactions observed in recreational users who had
ingested mushrooms of the species Panaeolus
cyanescens. In 1972, an apparent fatality was
definitely not caused by ingestion of
mushrooms, but instead was most likely the
consequence of a heroin overdose, as reported
by J. Allen, who has researched this incident
extensively.
The legislatures in North America and
Hawaii do not pay very much attention to the
usage of psychoactive mushrooms. The
identification of species is often quite difficult,
so that police enforcement activities primarily
target misdemeanors such as parking violations
and the willful destruction of fences around
pastures. The latter is not uncommon during
attempts to force entry into areas where
Psilocybe semilanceata can be found.
In December 1979, the High Court of
British Columbia ruled that the Canadian
Narcotics law prohibits psilocybin only in its
pure form, whereas mushrooms containing the
alkaloid as a natural ingredient are exempt from
the law. This decision seems both realistic and
reasonable, considering the substantial,
uncontrollable spread of these mushrooms and
an ongoing battle against truly addictive drugs
that requires all available efforts and resources.
Even though the extent of prosecution of
drug law violators in Canada and the U.S. varies
from state to state, psilocybin-containing mushrooms
are only a minor factor in the overall "war
on drugs". In California, however, mushroom
cultures are illegal, as well as spore prints (!)
from the Psilocybe species. Spore prints,
however, are impossible to control. Psilocybe
cubensis is common across the South, and
Panaeolus subbalteatus grows across the
Southwestern U.S., where the mushrooms are
used extensively. By one estimate, there were
100,000 "Magic Mushroom People" in the state
of California alone, a number likely to be much
higher today. The demand created by this
growing market is probably being met through
cultivation of Psilocybe cubensis. These users
ingest psychotropic mushrooms as a form of
recreation, or incorporate them in the ritual
practice of natural mysticism. Other users prefer
mushrooms as an aid to meditation or to attain
communication with the realm of the divine.
Regardless of motivation, users tend to lead
secluded, self-sufficient lives in close proximity
with Nature. Across North America, the total
number of magic mushroom consumers is likely
close to one million, quite possibly higher.
By the early 1980s, prominent experts in
the field had estimated that the number of
hallucinogenic mushroom users in the United
States outnumbered LSD users for the first time,
a trend that went hand in hand with a rise in
environmental awareness. In this context it is
interesting to note that the Drug Abuse Warning
Network (DAWN), which collects data from
throughout the United States, documented only
31 cases of clinical interventions for usage of
psilocybin-containing mushrooms in 1982. In
some of these cases, the mushrooms were used in
combination with other substances, confusing the
pharmacological picture. In comparison, LSD
was involved 1,498 times, while marijuana was
cited in 5,295 cases. It should be noted that the
high number of marijuana cases cited appears
inflated and suspect, in light of data from other
studies.
It is interesting to note that T. Leary's
psilocybin experiments during the early 1960s
provoked severe reactions of a moralistic-puritan
nature, while medical reports about prolonged
psychoses and other such side effects did not
appear until the "LSD era" some years later.
North America's mushrooms offer many
opportunities for additional taxonomic work and
many more still remain to be discovered. To
illustrate, a new mushrooms species was recently
reported from Oregon. The mushroom, Psilocybe
azurescens Stamets & Gartz is unusually large
and very potent due to its high psilocybin
content. North America's rich mycoflora,
particularly in regions of wet climates in the
eastern and midwestern United States is wide
open for further research efforts that may well
yield valuable and amazing new results.
As early as 1909, Murrill described
"Inocybe infida", a mushroom with "narcotic"
effects from New York. In 1911, Ford named
"Inocybe infelix" as a species that also caused
strange effects, without inducing symptoms of
muscarine poisoning. These descriptions
immediately bring to mind the psilocybinproducing
fibreheads, even though visionary
experiences are not expressly mentioned.
In the future, we should expect an
increase in usage of local, psychoactive species
from locations across the U.S. and Canada.