Confusing changa guides (how much MAOI ?)

[blue.magic]

I want to make changa using freebase harmala alkaloids and some herbs.

However, the changa recipes are confusing to me. Some say I should use 4 times more harmalas than DMT, others say as little as 1/4 of harmalas. That's 16x difference!

For example, PsychonautWiki advices to use 1.5-2 grams of harmalas per 1 gram of DMT.
Here the common ratio of harmalas to DMT is 1:3 up to 1:1. That's basically the inverse of that of PsychonautWiki.

What confuses me most is that the the changa is described by just 2 numbers (e.g. 1:2) while there are actually 3 parameters at play:

1. amount of DMT
2. amount of MAOI
3. amount of herbs

I can't decipher how much MAOI should I use from just those two numbers.

My best bet is to use something like 100 mg harmalas + 200 mg DMT + 400 mg herbs (is this 1:2 changa?). That would make 700 mg of changa (if it's 1:2, then it should contain 350 mg DMT but there are MAOIs included...) which I will divide in 70 mg doses (each containing 20 mg DMT) for GVG (or for joint/bong if vaporization won't work).

I don't know however what ratio that is and how it's counted:

1. (DMT+harmala) : herbs ?
2. DMT : (harmala+herbs) ?
3. DMT : herbs (amount of MAOIs omitted) ?

I am quite sensitive to DMT and I really want to get the numbers right and not accidentally underdose/overdose myself. I am even pondering a use of more herbs for more accurate measurement.

 

[○]

I've mentioned this recipe over the years here, several others here do the same thing - 1:1 dmt-herb with 300mg harmala freebase per each gram of dmt used.

Some like to go much heavier on the harmala-dmt ratio, though the harmalas at that level really start to impart their own ways onto the experience, plus the tryptamine space lasting a decent while longer.

Using only 250-300mg harmalas per 1g of dmt used - this adds just enough inhibition to get as many tokes as are needed to get as deep as needed without the tryptamine degrading at the rate that it would if you hadn't added the harmalas. Also for me at that amount of harmalas used it doesn't seem to change much of the dmt experience itself ime, just the speed at which you're traveling through the space and how deep you decide to go.

Just offering my opinion.

 

[_Arcane_]

As ever tatt has nailed it perfectly, follow his advice and you wont go far wrong

 

[pitubo]

The quick answer is that there is no single clear cut recipe for changa. It depends on personal taste and purpose. If you aim to reach a dmt breakthrough type of experience, too much harmalas can get in the way of the dazzling brilliance of the dmt rollercoaster. But if you aim to have a more meditative type of experience, more harmalas will help you ride the flying tapestry with better focus. If you aim to optimize the chance of hitting it big time, use less herbs. If you aim to to not overshoot or want to build up the experience over the course of multiple tokes, use more herbs.

Apart from the commonly understood basic definition of changa as "herb + dmt + harmalas", the type of herbs (or a blend thereof), the source of the harmalas and the proportions of the individual ingredients is not predefined. No central authority exists to canonize Changa(R) and ordain any batch as genuine(TM), despite what some people would like you to believe.

My own home made changa consists of herbs : dmt : harmala in the proportion 3 : 2 : 1. The herbs are damiana, the dmt is extracted from mimosa hostilis root bark and the harmalas are the harmine and harmaline freebases extracted from syrian rue seeds.

Your question about proportions is a valid question, because it appears to be a common area of confusion. I have seen all kinds of definitions of proportions used. For example, my own changa recipe could be labeled with the following proportions or percentages:
- in terms of herbs vs. alkaloids it is a 50% or 1 : 1 changa;
- in terms of herbs vs. dmt it is a 40% or 3 : 2 changa;
- in terms of total weight vs. dmt it is a 33% or 3 : 1 changa.
I always use the 3 : 2 : 1 proportion when describing my changa. This cannot be simply translated to percentages, because percentages cannot be used to express a ternary proportion, percentages express only binary proportions. Perhaps the best approximation in terms of percentages would be to name it a "33%, 17% changa".

Sometimes it is very hard or even impossible to quantify a changa. For example when preparing a changa from "dmt oil" extracted from some acacia that contains a mixture of alkaloids, and harmalas in the form of caapi leaf containing an unknown amount of harmala alkaloids, and a blend of herbs that may add additional active principles of unknown potency. Although hard to quantify, it still qualifies as a "changa".

PS: here is a thread describing how to prepare changa from its ingredients. There is also an alternate preparation proposed by Nereus and a bit of discussion on the relative pros and cons of both methods.

 

[concombres]

I reccommend starting with a ratio like tatt mentioned, especially if you have little to no experience using harmalas. That is, 1g herb infused with 1g DMT & 300mg harmalas. If you are using a rue extract, you may want yo drop the harmalas down to 250mg as harmaline is a little more potent.

I have toyed with it a little bit & my personal preference is 1g herb infused with 1g DMT & 500mg caapi alkaloids.

 

[blue.magic]

Thanks for all the thorough and helping answers, especially for a good starting blend advice for the changa virgin like me

Of course, I am not looking for a single changa recipe, I just wanted to understand how the proportions work and map the confusions due to large amount of unclear information on the web.

There seems to be a large concensus (also in the Nexus Wiki and across the forum) that 1:1 changa should contain exactly 50% DMT.

Therefore the advised 1 g DMT + 1 g herbs + 300 mg harmalas would be 1:1.3 changa if I understand it correctly (43% DMT instead of 50% DMT as in 1:1).

I always use the 3 : 2 : 1 proportion when describing my changa. This cannot be simply translated to percentages, because percentages cannot be used to express a ternary proportion, percentages express only binary proportions.

This makes sense. You can always use 100% as reference and still describe full composition in percentages (e.g. the tatt's recipe would be 43% DMT, 43% herbs, 13% harmalas - it will make sense as long as the numbers add up to 100).

This leads to another good way of description I was thinking of - a "Nutrition Facts" style - (in 100 mg product) 43 mg DMT, 43 mg herbal mix, 13 mg harmalas. This seems to be most easy-to-understand format and you can also expand on the amounts of individual herbs used.

Sometimes it is very hard or even impossible to quantify a changa. For example when preparing a changa from "dmt oil" extracted from some acacia that contains a mixture of alkaloids, and harmalas in the form of caapi leaf containing an unknown amount of harmala alkaloids, and a blend of herbs that may add additional active principles of unknown potency. Although hard to quantify, it still qualifies as a "changa".

I agree. It seems to be more an art than science, people seem to fine tune their changas for they specific instruments and intrument sizes.

1:1 is never 1:1, depending whether there is NMT present, oxides, oils etc. etc. Maybe say "Brazilian MHRB alkalkoid extract" would be more precise than "DMT".

My own home made changa consists of herbs : dmt : harmala in the proportion 3 : 2 : 1. The herbs are damiana, the dmt is extracted from mimosa hostilis root bark and the harmalas are the harmine and harmaline freebases extracted from syrian rue seeds.

This is very compant and sensible format as herbs usually take most amount, then DMT, then MAOI. The exception is when Caapi is used, which serves as MAOI by itself (or maybe passionflower or other herbs would count as MAOI). Maybe that's why "original" changas were just X:Y - as it was just DMT and Caapi...

That's however exactly how I plan to do it. I extracted DMT from MHRB and harmalas from rue, now ready to combine. I will possibly adjust the proportions based on tatt's recipe and after doing more research on effect vaporized/smoked freebase harmalas.

Thanks for the link for preparations but this part is already clear for me. Except someone said IPA does not dissolve harmalas and one should use EtOH or MeOH instead. I tried today and IPA does dissolve freebase harmalas (there are few tiny undissolved particles, but warming the alcohol would do it). I can't get ethanol easily in my country so I will use IPA (I can use pure methanol but IPA is less toxic and does not discolor my herbs).

 

[blue.magic]

Okay I've mixed 200 mg freebase DMT + 100 mg freebase harmalas in 10 mL hot IPA (it all won't dissolve in less), then added 300 mg of herbs (Wild Dagga, Blue Lotus), evaporated a bit, then moved everything to a glass dish and letting the IPA evaporate completely.

Some bits are left on the glass, not sure whether it worths to wash them and sprinkle back on the herbs... but considerable losses seem inevitable when working with such small amounts.

 

[DeltaSpice]

I make or have made quite a bit of changa.

When I make the changa I am left with a beaker covered in DMT/Herbs/Harmalas.
I would never waste that. Rinse with IPA and keep in a separate container.
Over time and many Changas later you will have some potent soup.

I mix mine with loads of herbs and eventually give joints to friends. It is always strong stuff.

Personally I use a ratio of 1/1/2 = DMT/Vine Harmalas/Herbs
That gives me a Harmala heavy smoke which takes me into a more medative state.

Rue Harmalas has excellent effects with different plants but the Vine Harmalas I only mix onto the vine itself.

Enjoy

 

[blue.magic]

The quick answer is that there is no single clear cut recipe for changa.

I presented my "personal" changa to a friend who is an experienced psychonaut; and she told me:

"This is NOT how changa is usually made - when you give changa to people like me, we expect it to be 1:2 or 1:1 and take only tiny bits of it to smoke."

I made 8:1:1 changa (8 parts herb, 1 part DMT, 1 part harmala) since it is easy to calculate DMT content that way (it is 10% of the weight so just divide the weight of changa by 10, no need for a calculator). And it's also more precise since there is little variation in DMT content due to bigger amount of herbs making a buffer for error. Plus you don't need a 0.001 scale to weigh changa, a 0.01 scale will do. So many benefits but "it's not the way it's usually done".

The tatt's recipe "1:1 dmt-herb with 300mg harmala" is basically 1:1:0.3 therefore 2.3 grams of such changa gives you 1 gram of DMT and this is far from 1:1 DMT:herb (it's less than 1:2 !! ). Thus when people expect 1:1, they will underdose and waste the changa and if they expect 1:2, they will still get somewhat less.

It seems in the end I will have to stick with what most people do (seems to be 2:1:1 or 3:2:1 or 1:1:0.3) and tell friends it's ROUGHLY 1:2 changa. No one wants to weight herbs on a milligram scale and then divide the amount by 2.3 on a calculator like a scientist. I saw most don't even weigh it , they just eyeball it... I don't understand them.

Do most people really treat changa like if it's a weed and not the freakin' most powerful hallucinogen in the world?

With weed people take in as much as they feel it, but with DMT, once it kicks in, it's already too late. So IMO the dose should be weighted carefully and people seem not to do that with changa.

 

[Northerner]

I saw most don't even weigh it :shock: , they just eyeball it... I don't understand them.

Do most people really treat changa like if it's a weed and not the freakin' most powerful hallucinogen in the world?

With weed people take in as much as they feel it, but with DMT, once it kicks in, it's already too late. So IMO the dose should be weighted carefully and people seem not to do that with changa.

Yeah, we just grab a chunk of changa and stick it in the bong and smoalk it in these parts mate. It's not like eyeballing crystal in a dab rig, you can't accidentally massively overdose.

Knowing how much will go in the particular cone piece makes a difference though. I have tailored my changa to suit my bong. I know a full cone is a full hit with my mix. I can always put a little less in if I don't want to look too deeply into the pool and wouldn't pack it too tightly because it wouldn't burn properly anyway.

 

[blue.magic]

I saw most don't even weigh it :shock: , they just eyeball it... I don't understand them.

Do most people really treat changa like if it's a weed and not the freakin' most powerful hallucinogen in the world?

With weed people take in as much as they feel it, but with DMT, once it kicks in, it's already too late. So IMO the dose should be weighted carefully and people seem not to do that with changa.

Yeah, we just grab a chunk of changa and stick it in the bong and smoalk it it these parts mate. It's not like eyeballing crystal in a dab rig, you can't accidentally massively overdose.

Knowing how much will go in the particular cone piece makes a difference though. I have tailored my changa to suit my bong. I know a full cone is a full hit with my mix. I can always put a little less in if I don't want to look too deeply into the pool and wouldn't pack it too tightly because it wouldn't burn properly anyway.

Okay thanks for clarifying (I never saw anyone doing changa - it's hard to get that information on "how it's usually done").

For me even 4 milligrams are day and night difference. So just slightly more changa and I am already flying hard.

Now I don't like changa anymore - it seems like a guessing game and I like knowing exactly how much I am taking (I tried to weight exact amount of 1:1 changa ona mg scale with tweezers but it's not very practical). I consider knowing the amount taken as a part of responsible use / harm reduction.

 

[chocobeastie]

You don't need to add harmalas to Changa, especially from Syrian Rue.

If you use ayahuasca vine in your changa, that can be enough MAOI to extend duration significantly enough as it is.

Say if you make 10 grams of Changa. And you use 3 grams of ayahuasca vine or leaf in that. What you can do is infuse your ethanol or vodka into another 3 grams of vine, and then use THAT ethanol or vodka to infuse the DMT.

Anymore MAOI than this, I find gives me a headache and find it too heavy. There is such a thing as a sweetspot to my mind.

 

[tripwire]

May as well add my (wildy different) findings here. I used to make changa with 14% rue harmalas. Over time feedback indicated there was still a slight stoning effect persisting at the hour after mark, and trip duration was 20-40 mins. I reduced harmalas to just 7% and this led to comnpletely clear headedness at the 1 hour after mark, and trips shortened slightly to 15-30 mins.

These are *way lower* values than most suggest here.

The reason i went this lower route was the startling fact that dmt infused caapi with its natural harmala levels around 1% was enough to significantly potentiate the dmt. At 1%. I really think this baseline should be recognized as such, so that the extremely harmala heavy recipes are recognized for what they are.

There are a few advantages to going lower on harmalas. The amount of solvent required to produce changa is basically decided by the harmalas as they dont dissolve too well in anything. In addition, the less MAOI, the less risk to people, who may or may not observe contra-indications as carefully as they should.

Im not saying any blend is right or wrong, but for general safety without compromising effectiveness, I suggest the 1% or so of harmalas be taken as a baseline, or reasonable minimum.

 

[Prima Materia]

I prepare my harmala fb leaf and dmt leaf separately. That way you can easily adjust the dose of each to you liking at the particular time. The downside may be that there is a bit more plant matter to be smoked.

You can mix both of the leaves preparations or you can smoke them separately. For example first smoke some harmala leaf and enjoy the meditative state and only after that smoke the dmt leaf.

edit:

It's always a good idea to test your preparations via bioassay with lower doses for the actual potency - especially if you intend to share those with your good friends.

 

[monomind]

I would like to share my aunt's changa experience... verbatim as it was told to me:

Changa is an alchemy. MAOI inhibition aside, there is some magical synergy going on between the power and the light when they are infused onto the same leaf.

The experience is qualitatively different than smoking those ingredients separately (not only in duration), even if done seconds apart. Also, for a deep long changa session, you want minimum details to be busy with. Might not seem like much but really anything beyond load & set alight is going to lose points on the magic front.

Changa recipe takes experimentation and seems there is no "one size fit all" thing. For example, my aunt was surprised to find out that a 10X caapi as a leaf substratum was very potent, although it does not make much pharmacological sense when you compare it to fb harmalas.
Try and see how it works for...

My aunt baseline changa recipe is 2:1:1 (herb: dmt: harmala) which is nothing short of magical according to her, and she is also experimenting with changing the dmt:harmala proportions up and down in order to find the ultimate experience for her

 

[Voidmatrix]

I've been playing around with this quite a bit (shared a bit here Changa Musings) and this is the conclusion I've come to: One may find that different ratios blends will have different utilities for them. One can be more therapeutic, while one is more exploratory, while another may be more connecting, etc.

One love

 

[brokedownpalace10]

I've been playing around with this quite a bit (shared a bit here Changa Musings) and this is the conclusion I've come to: One may find that different ratios blends will have different utilities for them. One can be more therapeutic, while one is more exploratory, while another may be more connecting, etc.

One love

I wonder if there is a parallel in the many Ayahuasca recipes used by Amazonian shamans.

Personally, I always pre-dose (smoke) the Harmalas. I have found quite a difference in whether I use Caapi (4x leaf), Rue resin, or a combination of the two.

Also a difference in the ratios of DMT to Harmala. The only real experimentation with those ratios has been either,
1. Smoking enough Harmala to definitely feel and then smoking DMT to whatever level. Goal being to extend and change the DMT. And,
2. Smoking as much Harmala as is comfortable and then smoking a small amount of DMT. Goal being a Harmala heavy experience. This seems to be more therapeutic... (words fail me), easier to take something back... lucid... I dunno. 'Course, there's less "force" there, but it's useful. Depends on what you seek at the moment, as you say.

Been a while. I've been busy. I'm due, and looking for the space between.