The Spanish named the demonic plant peyote, from the Nahuatl word peyotl. It’s is a small cactus with fuzzy tufts instead of spines that rarely rises more than 3-4 cm above the soil surface, the largest part of the cactus being its long underground taproot.

Peyote is native to southwestern Texas and Mexico, growing in scrubby desert and preferring limestone soil. Currently in Texas it has been over-harvested and its habitat increasingly used for ranching, to the point that peyote is listed as an endangered species. This is made worse by the fact that peyote is extremely slow growing, though cultivated ones grow faster, with mature, flowering and harvestable (approx 3 inches in diameter) adult cacti taking less than three years to grow from seed.

Only in the 1900s did peyote gain public attention again, with the establishment of the Native American Church and the legal protection it was given.

PEYOTE INGREDIENTS

Peyote is another of nature’s wonderful chemical factories, making more than 50 alkaloids. The most interesting of these is the powerful entheogen mescaline, which makes up about 0.3% of the fresh cactus and 1-2% dried.