Ayahuasca, explained with sources

Ayahuasca is a brew from the western Amazon basin, usually made from the woody stem of the vine Banisteriopsis caapi and the leaves of the shrub Psychotria viridis. The leaves contain DMT, a strong psychedelic that the body normally breaks down before it can act when swallowed. The vine contains harmala alkaloids that block that breakdown for a few hours. The combination is the reason the brew works at all, and it is also the reason it carries risks that most other psychedelics do not.

This site explains the subject in six chapters, listed below: the brew, the experience, safety, retreats, the law and ethics. It gives no recipes, no brewing or extraction methods and no doses, and it makes no claims about health of any kind. Ayahuasca is often sold to travellers with exactly such promises. We leave them out and stick to what has been measured, documented or decided by courts.

Three facts to keep in mind

The harmala alkaloids in the vine inhibit the enzyme MAO-A. Combined with SSRI antidepressants and several other drugs, that can cause serotonin syndrome, a condition that can be fatal (Callaway and Grob, 1998).

The strength of a brew is unknown to the person drinking it. Laboratory analyses have found that the total alkaloid content of different brews varies by more than twentyfold (Brito-da-Costa et al., 2020).

In the Netherlands, Germany, the United Kingdom and France, possessing or importing a DMT-containing brew is a criminal offence. In the Netherlands that applies to churches as well, as the Dutch Supreme Court confirmed in October 2019.

The site is published by the team behind Avalon Magic Plants; read who we are and how we work.