Syrian Rue Toxicity

[User 18517]

I've seen several comments that rue contains toxins. This seems to be true in my experience: the first time I did rue, I blended it up with water and strained and discarded the solids. I incurred a poisoning sensation that felt like my bones were turning to metal. The second time I tried it, I did a Manske extraction (one pass only), and although it felt much less toxic, it still felt toxic to an extent.

I already checked The Encyclopedia of Psychoactive Plants. Christian Rätsch (2005) (page 427) and it does not provide documentation of the toxins found in rue.

 

[Cosmic Spore]

I once made the mistake of doing 30g rue tea; I felt poisoned. Both vomiting with diarrhea- big time. Terrible horrible nausea and body feeling. OEV of white lightning.

I would not ever do such a dose again. NEVER.

If I ever do any again: it'll be between 3g and 5g rue tea, or some rue extract.

I can't really tolerate the nasty taste anyway, even in orange juice.

* body weight 135lb.

 

[universecannon]

If you take a really high dose of harmalas, they will feel toxic. Its just part of the experience at those levels where their psychedelic nature starts to really manifest, but you can learn to work with it overtime and get used to it...But keep upping the dose more, and it'll still be there. I don't find much difference between rue and caapi in this regard.

I think this idea of it being somehow toxic has to do with rue being so potent and so easy to over-do...and it having a much higher harmaline/harmine ratio compared to caapi vine, which has more harmine and THH than harmaline...unlike rue

Harmaline is more potent than harmine, and imo not quite as "smooth" as harmine...although maybe i'm wrong, and thats just related to harmalines its higher potency. I haven't worked with separating them from each other much and comparing the two.

I think rue is incredibly underrated

 

[universecannon]

I once made the mistake of doing 30g rue tea; I felt poisoned. Both vomiting with diarrhea- big time. Terrible horrible nausea and body feeling. OEV of white lightning.

I would not ever do such a dose again. NEVER.

If I ever do any again: it'll be 5g rue tea, or some rue extract.

I can't really tolerate the nasty taste anyway, even in orange juice.

* body weight 135lb.

jesus christ

I have visions and OBEs on 3grams of rue, or even less, without any dmt. I think i'd be gone for a few weeks at that dose :shock:

 

[User 18517]

Very useful commentary, universecannon. Thank you!

 

[Ryusaki]

Only the first couple of times i felt poisoned.
Now i have some kind of strange Rue tolerance.
I regularly drink tea in the range of 6-12g without ANY nausea (maybe for 3 minutes after swallowing that bitter stuff).
Only when i get over 10g i actually feel the psychoactive effects of the harmalas.
No OEV/CEV, no body load only a slight drunkenness.

Its kind of unusual, but maybe has something to do with the fact that i really saturated my system with it last year.
Not microdosing, 1-3gr daily for at least 2 weeks.
I had to stop because i got sooo incredible sensitive to everything, it was exhausting.

 

[endlessness]

I think saying rue is toxic or contains toxic alkaloids is an exageration.

By weight, rue is definitely much stronger than caapi in terms of harmala quantity. Of course if people take more than their appropriate dose, things will get very uncomfortable (same with caapi or any other drug really), but that does not mean it is toxic. A large dose of most psychedelics can get very uncomfortable even if you`re still far off from the actual physically toxic dosages.

I think sometimes people mean vasicine/vasicinone/deoxyvasicine which are generally considered `unwanted` and are present in syrian rue. But I think those alkaloids are only a problem if you`re a pregnant woman because they are uterotonic and abortifacient. Otherwise they might even have medicinal properties (brochodilator, expectorant, etc). I think in terms of LD50 toxicity they are safer than harmalas even.

There is a published report about a guy consuming 150g of rue to ease his pain after eating 1kg sheep testicles (lol), and while there were negative acute effects (vomiting, convulsion), after some hours the person was fine.

I don`t recommend overdosing on these plants of course, I think the 3-5g rue is enough for 99.9% of the people for MAO inhibition, and even those that for some reason want to experience the power of harmalas on their own in larger amounts, it still won`t be too much more than that.


This thread might also be of interest:

is harmaline toxic? - Harmalas - Welcome to the DMT-Nexus

By the way ryusaki, do you do 3x boils when making rue tea? do you powder them before or pressure cook?

 

[universecannon]

Good post endless, i forgot to mention vasicine etc

ryusaki i would also like to know how you prepare it before consuming. I took rue daily for months on end and experienced a reverse tolerance in some ways. 2g never used to take me to the moon like it does now. But at the same time the higher doses do seem to become more functional and less incapacitating...so maybe that explains it somewhat. Has your diet changed in that time to? I started eating mostly raw fruits and vegetables and I think that has also had an effect on my sensitivity to psychedelics/harmalas.

 

[Auxin]

...I think sometimes people mean vasicine/vasicinone/deoxyvasicine which are generally considered `unwanted` and are present in syrian rue. But I think those alkaloids are only a problem if you`re a pregnant woman because they are uterotonic and abortifacient.

I suspect you may have touched on the real foundation for the claims of it being 'poisonous'.
In traditional peganum using cultures 3 to 6 grams are routinely used as a deworming, antibiotic, etc medication and not considered toxic but 9 grams is the traditional dose for inducing abortion and in those cultures abortion is usually considered a crime, and suddenly 9 grams is a 'poisonous' dose :?:
Though, as endlessness indicated, if you ever get food poisoning from eating a kilo of non-fresh goat testicles in an attempt to gain mystical super-manly powers, avoid taking 50 doses of rue as a 'cure' :lol:

 

[User 18517]

Made tea with a ground up teaspoon and I found the effects to be sickly and unpleasant. Didn't even fully recover until about 35 hours had passed. I was sick for all of Christmas, which I wasn't celebrating anyway.

 

[endlessness]

What dosage, User 18517? Do you consume any medication? What is your diet normally like and what was it like the day you consumed the rue?

 

[User 18517]

Already said that, one teaspoon of unground seeds, ground and infused in very hot water for 15 min.

Started St. John's Wort* recently, but when I took the rue, I hadn't taken it in over 10 hours, and it's important to note that I'd previously sustained toxic effects from rue when not taking any type of medication recently.

Stripped down version of a health food diet. Apples, local or organic, skin removed. White rice cooked in water and coconut oil. No tap water; water in glass bottles only. Grass-fed beef, although I haven't eaten it in days and don't intend to continue as I'll be switching to Bulletproof whey and supplemental oils like walnut oil and ghee (specialty brands). Day of the rue, all I had consumed was apples.


*Taking this opportunity to clear up some misinformation about St. John's Wort:

At first, hypericin was wrongly attributed as being responsible for the antidepressant activity of St. John’s Wort extracts. It was claimed that this compound exhibited MAO-A inhibiting properties [19], but finally it was demonstrated that this was due to an impurity of the hypericin that was used for the assay [20]. It has since been established that hypericin seems not to play a major role in the antidepressant effect of St. John’s Wort – this pigment is, however, responsible for various other interesting biological effects that include photo-dynamic properties, antiviral and potential antineoplastic activities [18]. (p. 7)

[...]

St. John’s Wort extract is a broad spectrum inhibitor of neurotransmitter uptake (p. 32)

Source attached.

 

[endlessness]

Your diet sounds fine in general (though only apple in the day sounds like I`d also get stomach problems), but it seems the st john`s wort is probably an important factor there. I`d have to look back at publications but I had the impression that it was not safe to mix with harmalas, and if you are consuming it regularly, quite possibly 10 hours are not enough to get your body clean of all the substances in it and to have the neurotransmitters back to regular levels.

Thanks for the info on hypericin. What other compounds are purpoted to be active in it? (edit, just noticed you attached the paper, downloading it now)

 

[User 18517]

No problem. Glad to help out.

Pretty sure hyperforin is the main/only one that's psychoactive. It's a long, technical document though, so I'm not gonna check that. Thanks to ebookee.net, by the way.

 

[Ryusaki]

I regularly simmer/nearly boil the crushed seeds (in a teabag) for 3x30 or 3x45 min.
I put them in a teabag because this gives me a tea i can drink without further filtering.
I tried uncrushed seeds which i boiled longer, with the same result, i even swallowed 3g or more (in gel capsules) with the same effects, experienced only some minor stomach aches.
I NEVER purged with rue.

My diet changed only minimal (less sugar and white weat), i don't think it has anything to do with it.
I have a strong metabolism (a really fast one) i am usually the last man standing when taking drugs (any kind!). I am 6"4' tall and i don't get any fat on my body no matter how much i eat.
It runs in the family.
I took my father to an Ayahuasca session, he drunk half a cup of strong Chibipo Ayahuasca without flinching. Afterwards he shrugged his shoulders and said he didn't felt anything.

It is also not the plant material. I gave a friend 1 gram of tea, while i was taking 5, i felt nothing while he was flying around the room and felt the rue spirit clearly talking to him.

With Aya its different, i have a 50% chance to purge.

 

[User 18517]

--
However, it must be emphasized that peganine and
deoxypeganine, reportedly present in P. harmala seeds, were
for the first time detected in an infusion-like preparation and in
the patient’s urine. These two quinazoline alkaloids are
reported to cause a pronounced depression of cholinesterase
activity in animals, with desoxypeganine showing an antic-
holinesterase activity being 10 times superior than peganine. In
the experiments on anesthetized cats, desoxypeganine elimi-
nated blockade of neuromuscular conductivity induced by
diplacine and conversely enhanced blockade induced by ditilin
[40]. Their role in producing some of P. harmala intoxication
symptoms should be kept in account.

[40] N. Tuliaganov, F.S. Sadritdinov, G.A. Sulemanova, Pharmacological
characteristics of desoxypeganine hydrochloride, Farmakol. Toksikol.
49 (1986) 37–40.
--


Page e41. Frison, G.; Favretto, D.; Zancanaro, F.; Fazzin, G. & Ferrara, S.D. 2008.
A case of beta-carboline alkaloid intoxication following ingestion of
peganum harmala seed extract. Forensic Science International 179
(2–3): e37–43.

 

[jamie]

I dont believe anyone here has ever experienced toxicity from rue at the doses they are taking..aside from mixing with things like St.Johns wort..but you should know that 10 hours is not long enough.. Your experiencing nausea and ataxia from harmaline...just imo. I have taken both rue and caapi extensivly. I have had 6-7 gram doses of rue before and very large doses of vine. The larger doses of vine can produce all the same symptoms I had with large enough doses of rue. Vine was actually the most "toxic" I ever felt, and I still dont beleive I was poisoned.

I think all this worry about rue toxicity is overstated. All the alkaloids mentioned so far are medicinal, in the doses we are discussing here.

 

[PrimalWisdom]

I've tried rue in various ways, from a 10x extract, to tea to the extracted FB harmalas.
I've only felt any nausea or feelings of discomfort from tea(around 4grams)And I think this is due to the seeds themselves causing the nausea.

Once extracted the freebase harmalas feel much less "toxic" imo.
I've accidentally taken waay too much (around 700-800mgs) in some lemon juice and had an unexpected but never the less pleasant experience, with no nausea whatsoever. I did manske about 6 or 7 times though, so I think this made em nice and clean. All in all it lasted around 9hrs and was euphoric, psychedelic and enlightening.

Either I'm extremely lucky or extracting is the way to go to avoid the side-effects people report.

I've never extracted haramalas from caapi, but I love the effects I achieve with the rue ones.

Do some experimenting if possible, ass UC said, Rue is very underrated and I think the wrong ROA is often to blame for this.

Peace

 

[downwardsfromzero]

IME Syrian rue is very nice.

I lightly toast rue seeds in a stainless steel pan before grinding and extracting. Then the the tea tastes almost nice, not entirely unlike coffee. A little dash of cow's milk doesn't seem inappropriate on occasion - but not if you've used acids (vinegar/acetic, lemon juice/citric) to extract!

1 tsp of seeds doesn't feel toxic to me - quite the opposite, I'd say. Also I have combined with low doses of St John's Wort (amongst other herbs) with no ill effect.

Rue is very underrated

I'd very much agree! It's worth taking a little while to get to know it, starting gently at first.