Calea #
| Binomial / Botanical Name | Calea Ternifolia; Calea Zacatechichi |
| Street Names | Dream Herb; Leaf of God; Bitter Grass |
| Major Active Compound | Unknown |
| Indigenous Source | Mexico and Central America |
| Form | Leaves |
| RoA | Oral / Smoked |
| Personal Rating On Shulgin Scale | +** |
SUBJECTIVE EXPERIENCE #
Traditionally used by the Chontal Indians of Mexico to induce visions in dreams, calea is possibly the most well known natural oneirogen. However, scattered amongst the reviews on various Internet forums and message boards, comments like the following are not uncommon:
“Crept up slowly to a moderate ‘stoned but trippy’ feeling, audio was certainly enhanced. Short duration though - 20 minutes and Im back to baseline.” ~ Mezza, Drugs-Forum.com
“Yea so i just vaporized some calea, and damn im really stoned, like this high is better than cannabis, i think its really euphoric cuz when you smoke it or drink it, its bitter and that counteracts the euphoria, but i straight up just got the chemicals” ~ Zaltoa, dreamviews.com
These suggest that this is more than a dream herb, which of course, was an added attraction for my own experimentation.
Alarmingly, a respected poster introduced a different complexion:
“NO. Just fcking no. Never again. Ever. Don’t fcking bother. I’d rather be stabbed in the eye with a pitchfork that try this again. After a gram taken in a brew of tea, I found myself sleeping in a world of looped, tormenting nightmares of morphing monstrous creatures with tentacles coming out of horses mouths on crab legs which would spawn mange wings with claws attached to piranhas…This went on for a week, I was scared to sleep after some days and had to resort to Diphenhydramine to get through it.” ~ Lolcat, ukchemicalresearch.org
This was not quite what I had in mind.
I decided to take it easy, so I made just one cup of calea zacatechichi tea, and took a single toke of it from a bong.
I had seen the abhorrent taste of calea tea mentioned in a few places, but dismissed it as exaggeration. However, it was genuinely revolting. I shuddered with each gulp, as I battled my way through it. It tasted absolutely foul.
I experienced some mild but real effects. Were these stoned but trippy as described above? To some degree they were, although not in a strong way. I was definitely chilled, and audio was indeed enhanced.
After an hour or two I went off to bed, hoping that the main course was yet to be served.
There was a lot of tossing and turning, but nothing much by the way of dreams until later on, during the early hours of the morning. These were slightly more lucid than usual, and I also recalled them.
Encouraged by this toe in the water, I decided to have another go a couple of nights later. This time I couldn’t face the tea, so I bonged repeatedly.
Again, I definitely experienced a nice chill. It was not a knock-out stone, but quite pleasant in its own way. The night’s sleep was good, and I woke refreshed, but without any noticeable dream lucidity or recall.
From my experience, therefore, tea would appear to be the route to take for dreaming, if the taste can be faced.
Overall, I feel that I have only scratched the surface of this one, and may well return at a future date.