Sacred Datura – beautiful, powerful, and dangerous.

I was driving along the Potash Road near Moab, Utah, last month and was delighted to see not just a scattered few, but thousands of beautiful white Sacred Datura blooms all along the edge of the great Colorado River and the red sandstone cliff walls that contain that potent waterway. This species of Datura (datura wrightii) can be found from here down into Mexico and has been a ritual, shamanic plant in use for thousands of years by native peoples.

This species contains scopolomine and other alkaloids that are very dangerous when ingested. All parts of the plant are potent. The main issue is dosage, because the amounts of the tropanes are not consistent across individual plants or parts. The visionary experience can be useful and powerful, but it also can cause serious or fatal medical conditions.

Personally, I wouldn’t touch it on its own, although I might like to try what some have said is useful and safe – having a single bloom in my room while sleeping. Even the sweet fragrance is potent.

My only actual experience with this plant teacher was in the Amazon. The chemically identical plant in South America is the brugmansia or “Angel’s Trumpet,” which is the origin species. The bloom or leaf there is used as an admixture plant by many shamans or medicine people in their Ayahuasca brews. It is usually known there by the Quechua term, “toé.”  See my previous post on this plant here.

Toé or Brugmansia – Peru – ©2012 David P. Crews

“Datura may be the single most dangerous visionary plant in North America.
Well, maybe after tobacco.”

Dale Pendell – “Pharmako Gnosis – Plant Teachers and the Poison Path”, San Francisco, Mercury House, 2005; p. 250

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Sacred Datura; Jimson Weed; “Georgia O’Keeffe’s flower”

This is the first datura bloom in my yard in 2012.

The blooms open at dusk, and close by morning. Very short-lived blooms, but just gorgeous for the short time they are open.

The plant has hallucenogenic – and quite poisonous – properties.

This google image shows an even larger plant than mine. Caution: Do Not Ingest. Every part of the plant is hallucinogenic, in an extreme ‘bad-trip’ sort of way.

After a potluck with fellow park rangers up at Canyonlands NP, I had casually mentioned that watching the local Sacred Datura plant open its blooms after sunset was a treat they shouldn’t miss. Some eyed me skeptically and held back; others trustingly followed me to the front yard where dozens of 6″ trumpet-shaped white buds awaited their nighttime opening. I had promised a good show.

My credibility began slipping slowly away as the minutes passed. We had gathered around the six-foot-wide plant, sprayed ourselves down with insect repellant, and were waiting patiently… but nothing was happening. Some co-workers eyed me with suspicion. The sun had dropped below the horizon twenty minutes earlier.

Then I saw it. The first of the closed blooms began gently trembling in the still night air. These barely-perceptible vibrations had to come from within the plant, but I have not a clue how. Soon, the arrival of nighttime pollinators — large black bees and hummingbird-sized sphinx moths — indicated that The Grand Opening was near.

Sphinx moth with its amazing proboscis. Google image.

The insects flitted about with a certain frenzy, poised like Wal-Mart shoppers early on Black Friday. The sphinx moths’ wings made a breeze when they got close enough to us, dangling a 5″-long proboscis like a tiny straw; they maneuvered like ace helicopter pilots, positioning themselves directly above the tight blossoms, inserting their mouthparts and drinking with abandon.

Nature geeks all, we each selected our own bud to bet on as the First Opener. The insect activity increased to a fever pitch, and any observer could tell you that something big was imminent. And then — one unlatched. That’s the only word I can use, because the tight pinwheel bud just… let go. It opened in a matter of less than 30 seconds, releasing a rush of intoxicating fragrance akin to that of Easter lilies. Instantly an insect traffic jam ensued, with two bees and two huge sphinx moths jockeying for a position in the bell of the flower.

We high-fived the ranger whose flower won, and proceeded to watch a dozen more tremble for a few minutes and then unlatch. Each opening sent the pollinators into great agitation, and my heart into great delight.

Thirty miles from the nearest town, on a remote mesa in eastern Utah, we make our own fun. The best part? Nobody looks at me as if I’m weird when I stand around and watch flowers open.

*Sacred Datura

About-to-open Datura blossom, few minutes before popping

At dusk one July night, Karen and I stood alongside a spreading Datura plant (also called “jimsonweed” — Nightshade family) with sixteen tubular blossoms. Its lay name is Moonflower, as white blooms open at night for pollination by sphinx moths (a.k.a. hawk moths) and bees. Here’s a unique evolutionary strategy to assure pollination:

Spiked narcotic nectar keeps the pollinator inside a blossom longer, thereby enhancing the opportunity for collecting pollen from the anthers and depositing pollen on the stigma. The hawk moth becomes “addicted” to the nectar and thus almost exclusively visits only sacred Datura during its flowering season. These species of hawk moths have been observed arriving early and hovering about the sacred datura flowers at dusk waiting for the blossom to open so that they may get their “fix.”

Curiously, one can predict which flowers will open soon because each one will begin to tremble perceptibly for a few moments before it abruptly widens its trumpet-shaped bloom for the first and only time. With sixteen to watch, we often caught them opening only through our peripheral vision. What a rush of sight and scent. A blast of strong aroma attracts insects the very moment the flower opens. I intended not to smell the bee-occupied blooms, but the insects were drunk on the nectar of these remarkable flowers and cared nothing about me. Even I, a non-bug, couldn’t help putting my face in each new blossom and inhaling deeply.

Note to risk-takers: DO NOT INGEST ANY PART OF THIS PLANT. Its alkyloids are highly toxic and this species has accrued the highest number of “Train Wrecks” — horrible outcomes from people thinking it could be used as a recreational hallucinogen. There aren’t many worse ways to be poisoned than by this plant.

I had the good fortune to study fine art photography under the instruction of Harold Jones at the University of Arizona in the early 1980′s.  Harold was at the George Eastman House, founded the Light Gallery in New York & was the founding director of the Center for Creative Photography in Tucson before becoming professor of photography at the UofA. Harold retired five years ago, but as a teacher he was humorous, approachable & always encouraging, no matter how far from his own style was one’s personal vision.

Friday evening I went to a lecture by Harold at the Center for Creative Photography and was reminded of his love of images with visual layers; the looking through one layer in an image to see other information below. I’ve had this photograph I made at Tohono Chul Park sitting in my “use on blog”  folder for some time now, but wasn’t sure about what I’d write to go along with it, other than to describe the plant, which is a Sacred Datura that has been lunch to some bugs. Now that I have become re-acquainted with Harold’s passions I can see that this image might be one he would enjoy, since it incorporates a layered quality (without any Photoshop trickery). So,  I will display this image in homage to my mentor. 

To learn more about Harold visit his web site at www.HaroldHJones.com  and see his current show : “A Fortunate Life” at ArtsEye Gallery in Tucson through April 15, 2010.

Image copyrighted. Reproduction, copying & file sharing prohibited.

bud of sacred datura starting to open

Many people are familiar with the appearance of the fully open flower of Sacred Datura, also known as ‘Jimson Weed’ and ‘Georgia O’Keefe’s flower.’ You may not be as familiar with the flower as it just begins to open. The flowers open just at dusk, and a bud at this point will unfurl completely in 15 – 20 minutes. The flower will be fully open throughout the night, and by mid-morning of the following day will be totally wilted.

SACRED DATURA is a night-blooming perennial plant which grows wild throughout Mexico and the southwestern portion of United States. It produces large white flowers and blooms through the summer on plants which can reach three feet tall, then generates thorny seed pods which open when fully ripe. It is also referred to as Jimson Weed, Indian Apple and Indian Whiskey. It’s a poisonous hallucinogenic used by native cultures (the Chumash Tongva, in particular) for rites of passage, dreams, visions and astral travel. Many recreational users of the hallucinogen have died  from the depression of the respiratory system it causes and/or from secondary accidents incurred when their vision was temporarily lost, so don’t mess with it!  The photos I’ve included here show before and after the flower has bloomed.

www.MarthaLochertPhotography.com

Sacred Datura

Also known as Jimson Weed and ‘Georgia O’Keefe’s Flower,’ this poisonous and beautiful plant grows wild in New Mexico.

Parts contain the belladonna (“beautiful flower”) alkaloids responsible for its hallucenogenic – and very poisonous – properties.

Sacred datura, or Jimson Weed, has beautiful flowers.

It also has very interesting seed pods!

The plant is known for its hallucinogens, the belladonna alkaloids, which can be quite poisonous. A tea is used by some Native American groups in religious rituals. Belladonna alkaloids are also used in some pharmaceutical preparations, such as the old Bellergal (ergotamine has recently been removed from that preparation, but a combination of phenobarbital/belladonna alkaloids is still on the market for GI symptoms and to control the vasomotor symptoms of menopause).

The ordinary gardener should admire the beauty of the flowers and the interesting nature of the seedpods, and consider the plant quite poisonous if ingested!

Also known as Jimson Weed or “Georgia O’Keefe’s Flower,” it is a “weed” to many in the desert southwest. But if your garden has room, it makes a beautiful addition, blooming from early summer until frost. It needs plenty of room, and once you have it, you will always have it!