Peyote vs. Ayahuasca: What's the Difference?

Peyote vs. Ayahuasca: Exploring the Differences and Similarities

One afternoon in May 1953, author Aldous Huxley drank a glass of dissolved mescaline, the main psychoactive ingredient in the peyote cactus, and found his home quite transformed. At one point he looked at a flower arrangement, which he had appreciated that morning in clear consciousness for its colors.

“But that was no longer the goal,” Huxley wrote. “Now I was not looking at an unusual color composition. I saw what Adam had seen on the morning of his creation—the miracle, moment by moment, of bare existence.”

What is peyote?

Huxley’s account of his experience, 1954 The doors of perceptionpopularized psychedelic experimentation in general and the peyote cactus in particular.

Its bitter buttons, which cluster around a central flower, can be eaten raw or dried (crispy like potato chips) or steeped to make tea. As a holdover from 1960s drug policy, peyote and mescaline remain Schedule I controlled substances, like heroin and LSD.

Effects of peyote

Mescaline is known for its slow onset and LSD-like effects, which can include visual, auditory, and tactile hallucinations, loss of personal identity, distorted perception of time, and enhancement of novelty. This is probably why Huxley rethought his color arrangement so drastically.

There are more severe side effects of peyote due to its chemical structure, including nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, sweating, and increased heart rate. As such, its usage has fallen so low that it counts only 116 of the 2.8 million cases reported to poison control in 2007.

Early uses of peyote

Early Americans began consuming peyote, which grows in the American Southwest and Mexico, as early as 3780 B.C., according to a study. Their descendants, members of today’s Native American Church, still consume it today under a special exception for ceremonial use.

Difficult to harvest and cumbersome to traffic, peyote buttons fell out of favor as alternatives such as psilocybin mushrooms and LSD could be grown in home basements or synthesized in small laboratories, respectively.

What is Ayahuasca?

Another traditional psychedelic, ayahuasca, has skyrocketed in recent years, thanks in part to the popularity of ayahuasca ceremonies modeled after traditional Amazonian ones.

It contains DMT, a chemical that, like mescaline, activates a certain group of serotonin receptors, which can improve cognition at lower doses (see: microdosing). At high doses, they produce the profound hallucinogenic effects characteristic of serotonergic psychedelics.

Ayahuasca Brew

Ayahuasca drink is made from boiled ayahuasca vines and chakruna leaves. It can be brewed in anything from a cauldron to a stove, although ingredients containing DMT can be hard to find because the mescaline-like substance is still Schedule 1.

The seekers are headed for a retreat in South America, where they practice dating back to at least 900 BC in Peru or to new churches in the US that use the drink as a sacrament and claim legal protection under 2006 Supreme Court decision.

Like other psychedelics, ayahuasca has emerged as a potential treatment for mental illness. A 2022 survey tracked 40 subjects who consumed the “medicine” and observed a sharp reduction in mental illness: While about 45 percent of the original sample met criteria for a mental disorder, ayahuasca appeared to cut that group in half by the one-month check-in period.