Crabgrass DMT
Answered by: Richard Alan Miller
Question from: William Sidoli
Posted on: July 01, 2007
I listened to your interview on Radio Orbit with Mike Hagan which I found very enjoyable and interesting.
My ears pricked up when you mentioned that you can get DMT from crabgrass, as I have not yet explored this area but would like to.
Could you tell me which particular species of crabgrass you referred to (I couldn’t quite tell from the audio)?
Also you mentioned doing chromatography on the grass using spray paint -- what result should I be looking for.
Finally, how long should the Crabgrass be titrated using lemon juice?
A BIG thank you for puting this information out there.
Isn’t Mike Hagen something special? I really liked working with him, and hope to become a long-standing friend. He has that quality about him and his work. I was very impressed, and have since met some of the other listeners who are loyal to his show. He seems to garner a higher level of demographics, all smart and educated.
When I worked Navy Intel, we called N, N-DMT (brain chemistry analog) "telepathine," and our studies were held as "classified" in anesthesiology at the University of Washington, ca. 1971. The following is a list of natural products where this specific form of DMT often be found in natural products. Alkaloids reported as (mg) per (100g) raw dried plant, and as percent of total plant source weight:
Acacia bark : 0.71% NN-DMT
Acacia maidenii bark : 0.36% NN-DMT
Acacia simplicifolia bark : 0.86% NN-DMT
Mimosa hostilis root (bark): 0.57% NN-DMT
Virola shoots & flowers : 0.44% NN-DMT
Desmanthus illinoensis root (bark): 0.34% NN-DMT
Pilocarpus organensis: 1.06% 5-MeO-DMT
Phalaris tuberose : 0.10% NN-DMT; 0.022% 5-MeO-DMT; 0.005% 5-OH-DMT
Phalaris arundinacea (’net gossip): 0.060% NN-DMT; ?? 5-MeO-DMT
Psychotria species (averaged, from Jonathan Ott): 0.200% NN-DMT
Phalaris your various genus for crabgrass. It was "Trout," editor of Ethnogen Review who once said to me "You know, some plants are not really plants, but delivery systems from God." The spray paint element was referring to a cheap and dirty way to set up thin-layer chromatography. Thin-layer chromatography will determine which species is which, by gross overviews of the levels of each chemistry. 5-MeO is also known as DIMI, and not what most seek (brain chemistry analogs).
Simple titration can be done by boiling the grass in water, and adding a bunch of lemons. That is for those "weekend shamans" wandering the woods. More precision, of course, is required to produce a high-end crystal, similar to that grown for Terence McKenna (before he died). That specific single crystal was more than 5 pounds, enough to turn on most of North America..
One of the very best protocols on how to do a more precise and detailed form of extraction can be found at
http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/dmt/extraction_guide1/dmt_extraction_guide1.shtml
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with "God", a "Higher Power", or "Ultimate Reality"?
Specific concerns regarding QT's tek, detailed below, were sent to Erowid on behalf of the community at The DMT Nexus, who note: "Time and time again, people have come to The DMT Nexus or other web forums because they were following QT's tek and it either didn't work or they ran into serious issues trying to follow it. Our largest concerns with QT's tek are related to health and safety. Throughout the tek, comments on safely handling chemicals are scant. If we've learned one thing, it's that people doing extractions by following a tek as though it's a recipe often are not sticklers for proper handling and safety. Following the tek as it is written could lead to serious bodily harm, it may not successfully extract DMT, and even if some DMT is obtained, there is a strong possibility of it being contaminated with toxic substances." Erowid is grateful to be able to share the detailed commentary and harm-reduction efforts of The DMT Nexus folks. -- The Erowid Crew, February 4, 2011
Health and Safety Concerns
1) The tek recommends using hydrochloric acid without appropriate guidance on safe handling. While it also mentions other acids, HCl is specifically recommended. However, weaker acids like citric acid or vinegar are preferable alternatives because they can be handled more safely and are readily available at grocery stores.
2) While the tek mentions the health hazards of working with dichloromethane (DCM), it fails to note the flammability hazards of naphtha and ether. It likewise does not mention the intoxication hazards from the fumes, which necessitate minimizing contact and using them in a well-ventilated and spark-free area (and some fans that one might use for ventilation could have the potential of creating sparks).
3) The tek describes a method for obtaining ether from starting fluid. This method will generally not obtain pure ether. Unless the extractor has a good working knowledge of chemistry and has consulted the Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) for the specific starter fluid, this could easily lead to very unhealthy contaminants in one's end product. The tek specifically mentions Coleman fuel, Zippo lighter fluid, and Ronsonol, all of which have been reported to contain non-volatile contaminants. Particularly since the tek instructs the extractor to obtain the final product by evaporation, this seriously needs to be addressed to prevent people from unwittingly smoking harmful contaminants.
4) No health and safety warnings are provided with regard to chloroform, which may be carcinogenic and can have other negative health effects if not handled properly.
5) Suggesting that people employ ziploc bags as separatory funnels is hazardous in a couple of ways. Such bags are not made from high-density polyethylene (HDPE), a plastic known to have a high resistance to chemical solvents. Ziploc bags contain plasticizers (additives that increase flexibility, and that have been implicated in adverse effects on health when consumed), which would likely leach into naphtha; and since the naphtha is being evaporated, these plasticizers will end up in the extracted DMT. While the tek does suggest making sure that the solvent used doesn't melt the bag, this ignores the likelihood that it may leach harmful contaminants. (The suggestion to use a "turkey baster" may present a similar problem, depending on what type of plastic it is constructed from.) Furthermore, there's a very good chance of spilling caustic chemicals if the ziploc bag fails to work as anticipated.
6) The tek calls for "warm naphtha" on multiple occasions, but makes no mention of how to go about safely warming this flamable solvent. If unwary extractors were to heat it on a gas stove, they could easily find themselves with a fireball in their face!
7) The tek does not present sufficient safety warnings regarding lye (sodium hydroxide). "Take proper precautions" is not specific enough advice. When working with lye, one should wear shatter-resistant anti-fog safety goggles, chemical-resistant (nitrile) safety gloves, a vapor/fluid-resistant face mask, and a polyethylene safety apron, to prevent blindness and chemical burns. One should also have an acid such as vinegar on-hand to neutralize any possible lye spills.
8) The tek recommends obtaining the DMT by evaporating-off the naphtha. Before it was widely known that purification could be performed via freeze-precipitation, this might have been excusable, if not for the fact that many of the tek's recommended varieties of naphtha include non-volatile contaminants, and the tek suggests employing non-HDPE plastics. Considering the processes recommended in the tek, any DMT obtained by evaporation is reasonably likely to be tainted with harmful contaminants and would not be safe to consume. The tek acknowledges that the product will be impure, but provides no information on purifying it. Indeed, it explicitly seems to recommend consuming it, impurities and all. And "Don't worry about weighing it" is bad advice, plain and simple.
Technical Errors
1) Incorrect terminology is used in step 3. One is not converting the DMT to a salt; it's already a salt in the plant material. And, of course, the ions dissociate when salts dissolve. The step might be more appropriately titled "Dissolving DMT Cations in Water", or at least "Dissolving Salts of DMT".
2) Incorrect terminology is used in step 8. One is not unhooking the DMT salts (they're in solution, so they aren't really hooked together at all). One is actually deprotonating the DMT cations to generate the free-base.
3) QT suggests that ammonia is typically used to basify, and that this tek's use of lye is a departure from the norm. However, ammonia is not an effective base for Mimosa tenuiflora [= M. hostilis] root-bark (MHRB). All one will get is a stubborn emulsion.
4) The recommended pH after adding the base is too low; pH 9 is not high enough. With MHRB in particular there are serious emulsion issues at pH 9; but even ignoring that, pH 9 is only 0.32 above the pKa (-log10 acid dissociation constant) of DMT--not terribly efficient.
5) The tek states that it is ideal to extract an alkaloid at its pKa. This not necessarily true. At its pKa, half of the alkaloid is protonated and the other half unprotonated. In ideal conditions (i.e., assuming infinite solubility in the nonpolar extraction solvent), this is sufficient since Le Châtelier's principle is on one's side. But unless there are instability-related complications or other factors to account for, it's better to have the vast majority of the alkaloid in the desired form (in this case, unprotonated)--especially with MHRB, where emulsions are a crucial issue.
6) The tek treats emulsions as though they are inevitable, that one should not be concerned if these take several days to resolve, and that it's near-miraculous for an emulsions to resolve in less than an hour. This is insanity. Emulsions can be prevented by ensuring sufficiently high pH and by mixing gently (rather than shaking, as the tek suggests). The addition of plain salt may be employed as a further preventative measure.
7) The tek suggests that the final product may contain "hydroxide". Hydroxide is not a molecule, it's an ion. It is possible that the product could contain sodium hydroxide or other hydroxide salts, but neither of the recommended methods for eliminating the "hydroxide" would help at all if the product actually were contaminated with sodium hydroxide or another hydroxide salt.
Practical Issues
1) The pH for step 2 is unnecessarily low. While pH 2 won't hurt anything, it's a waste of materials.
2) Ridiculously long times are presented for the aqueous acidic extraction. The tek recommends 24 hours for the first soak, and a whole week for subsequent soaks. In reality, simmering 15-30 minutes three times will get most of the DMT out of the MHRB and into solution. There is no need to spend two weeks; this step can be done in two hours or faster.
3) The tek recommends defatting, even though it is designed for use with MHRB, which is not a fatty material. This is a waste of solvent and time.
4) Step 7 says to add warm naphtha to the acidic MHRB extract and shake it for five minutes before adding lye. This won't accomplish anything.
5) The tek says to repeat steps 7-9 two more times. In step 8, one is told to add 5 grams of lye to the mix. Is the tek really suggesting that this step is also supposed to be repeated, with more lye added each time? Of course, that extra lye isn't going to hurt--on the contrary, it will likely bring the pH up into a more practical range than the tek (seems to) recommend. But why is the tek suggesting that one add more base prior to each extraction with nonpolar solvent, instead of adding all that one is going to use at one time? We suspect that this is just an artifact of poor phrasing on the part of the tek's author.
6) The tek calls for using way too much naphtha for extractions, suggesting 100 ml per pull for 30 grams of MHRB. A tenth of that would be sufficient.
7) In "Lab Notes" under step 6, the tek suggests that one should be saving the naphtha from the defatting process, but discarding the DMT-laden naphtha from the later steps. Why would one want to save the (practically non-existent) fats from MHRB but throw away the DMT?
8) "You will know when DMT is in the final product by the smell." This is an odd statement, since DMT is supposed to be the final product, not merely be contained in it.
9) Outdated info: The tek suggests using Red Devil lye; however, the manufacturer of this brand discontinued production in 2005.
10) The three sets of "Lab Notes" from QT's extraction record that the extractions took 24 days, 39 days, and 61 days. Yikes! A quick and effective acid/base extraction can be completely finished in 24 hours (and that includes time for freeze-precipitations); a big, leisurely (and frankly, unnecessarily long) acid/base extraction (BLAB) is still done in a week. From a legal standpoint, it seems prudent to complete an extraction as quickly as possible so that--if worse comes to worst--the extractor is only on the hook for possession of a controlled substance and not for manufacture as well.
11) The tek is written for MHRB with lye as the base and naphtha as the non-polar solvent; yet it implies that it would be just as effective for Phalaris grasses with chloroform as the solvent. Unfortunately, different factors need to be taken into account for different plants and solvents. Getting clean DMT out of Phalaris grasses, in particular, is a massive chore, requiring its own specialized tek.
Minor Gripes
1) Measuring pH with beets and cabbage? Seriously? That's pretty ghetto. Litmus papers and pH monitors are fairly cheap if one cared to measure the pH. And with MHRB, it's not necessary; a dash of acid is fine for the initial extraction, and MHRB provides its own handy color-changing reaction when enough base has been added.
2) Multiple times, the tek refers to "naptha" instead of naphtha.
In modern times there has been a reduction of ritual. The ceremonies, that previously served to cast out an individual from modern associations and throw him into a field of epiphanies, have become merely form, betraying the inner forces that must somehow manifest. Shamen know of these inner forces. They understand the inevitable overwhelming psychological experience that everyone will face if they are to complete their inward path to open the unconscious and fall in. The psychological crisis is the fulcrum of any metaphysical realization the individual may have about himself or his world. Without these intense experiences, without the rituals that convey the message of the journey, and without shamen to show the way, many are lost in the world searching constantly farther for what is contained only within. To chemically force such spiritual breakthrough may be interpreted by some as a way to circumvent the trials that are necessary to test each soul willing to see the truth of their life. But in contemporary society where is the individual to seek these tests of the self or to be struck silent in awe of their own natural beauty or that of the universe? The shamen offered these opportunities to the individuals of their society for generations, helping people maintain a healthy psychology between the known world and the mystical. I now offer this ability to you in one of many forms, DMT.
DMT is perhaps the most powerful hallucinogen known to man. It is related to LSD and psilocybin. There are no [commonly used - Erowid] drug tests that would show DMT usage. None of the basic NIDA-5 drug tests [Erowid Note: Now called the "SAMHSA-5"] or any extended drug test will show a result for DMT. DMT is naturally formed in the body and has been found in abnormal levels in the body fluids of persons suffering from schizophrenia. DMT is almost never sold through dealers, rarely synthesized, and seldom used. It is, however, easily extracted from common plant materials and has been used in various forms for hundreds of years (timeline). DMT is not a "social drug" however. Respect the drug and its incredible potential. This drug is not for the inexperienced, nor is it recommended to those who are just looking for another "high." Few seek the visions enabled through DMT, and even fewer return to them. Even avid psychedelic users have had frightening experiences with DMT on their first encounter with the drug. Take care to research and find out if DMT is for you. I stress that educating yourself about this drug (and about all drugs you intend to use) will make you a more competent and prepared chemist, tripper, and guide.
This manual is presented as a quick bench guide for the complete novice on how to extract DMT. Although the text and illustrations for the process were all created by myself, there are a few pictures which are not my own. The origins of these pictures are credited in the bibliography. I would like to encourage others to add to this manual their own written observations. When attempting to produce any of these products the reader is encouraged to read through the steps several times to closely familiarize himself with the entire process. Please take note that DMT is an illegal substance in the United States of America and is controlled under federal regulations. The following is for educational purposes only.
How to Extract DMT from Natural Sources
(in Ten Easy Steps)
First a plant must be selected that contains the chemicals we wish to extract. None of these plants are illegal and they can be found growing wild and free all over the world (much less can be said for some of our other favorite plants.) Most of these plant materials can be ordered through the internet. A little research may reveal a large quantity of some useful plant material growing near you. Alkaloid contents of each plant mary vary according to the growing conditions. Specifics about these plants and how to grow them are beyond the scope of this manual but the information can easily be found. Below is a chart of several plants that contain NN-DMT, 5-OH-DMT, and 5-MeO-DMT (DMT's close cousin.)
Extraction Procedure
For our experiment we will be using Mimosa hostilis root-bark to provide a very pure product of NN-DMT without the over powering influence of 5-MeO-DMT or the negative side effects of 5-OH-DMT. For a solvent we will be using common naphtha. Notes on adaptations for chemicals and other variations of this process are described as well. The following is a list of materials:
STATEMENT OF HAZARDS: Methylene Chloride
Suspect cancer hazard. Risk of cancer depends on duration and level of contact. Harmful if swallowed. Causes skin and eye irritation. Causes respiratory tract irritation. May affect blood cells. May affect the central nervous system. May cause blindness. Avoid breathing vapor or mist. Handle with caution. Keep in mind these risks whenever substituting DCM for any other solvent.
STATEMENT OF HAZARDS: Muratic Acid
STEP 1
Preparing Plant Material
© 2000 Erowid
STEP 2
Acidify Water to pH 2
electronic pH meter in jar
Figure 1
STEP 3
Convert Alkaloids to Salts
Using a pipette (or turkey baster) transfer enough acidified water from Jar A into Jar B to cover the root-bark in the bottom of Jar B (~8 ounces, or 250 ml acidified water into Jar B.) When the acid reacts with the root-bark, it converts the alkaloids (elf-spice) into salts. To help facilitate this process we can:
Figure 2
STEP 4
Filtration
Plug the bottom of the funnel with cotton balls or cotton cloth to create a cotton-filter. Pour the contents of Jar B through the funnel and into Jar C. Squeeze the root-bark contents inside the filter to press out the remaining juices. Save the root-bark that has been caught by the filter and place it back into Jar B.
Figure 3
STEP 5
Collect 3 Extractions
Repeat the process outlined in STEPS 2, 3, and 4, two more times. The initial extraction is most important. For best results, allow the contents of the jar more time to react during the remaining two extractions. Shake Jar B, 4 times a day, for 1 week before filtering each time through a cotton-filter. Collect the acidic contents in Jar C each time. After these initial 3 cotton-filtration cycles, clean Jar A and Jar B, and dispose of remaining root-bark.