opuntia id techniques?

[Parshvik Chintan]

so i am down in CA visiting family, and there are opuntia EVERYWHERE (there are even two HUGE ones in my moms' back yard) i remember reading somewhere that they can contain mescaline and dmt, and some species were even used as an ayahuasca admixture.

as such i was wondering how i could identify the species of opuntia (i know i have seem at least 3 different species [possibly different cultivars, but they seemed quite different]) so that i know which ones are worth playing around with.

i dont have access to a camera yet, but plan on doing some family photography fairly soon, so i can update with pics probably this coming week. but it would be nice to know what parts of the cacti to take pics of.

 

[AlbertKLloyd]

It might not be worth your time, no dmt has ever been found in it to my knowledge and mescaline has only been found in very low amounts in a couple of species.