Extracting Amanita muscaria 

Amanita muscaria is increasingly popular, even though it is listed as a poison for the FDA and cannot be sold for consumption in any way, it is becoming more and more sought after in recent history.  Also, because so many venders appear in Google in relation to any keywords that have to do with extracting Amanita muscaria, that it's difficult to find information about techniques that can efficiently extract the active components from this elusive plant.  So, if you want to learn about how to extract Amanita muscaria mushrooms, you've come to the right place, except, we need to make it absolutely clear that this information is provided solely for educational purposes, and is not intended as a guide for putting this information into practice in any way.

First, the active ingredients in Amanitas are muscimol and ibotenic acid.  After ingestion, a small amount of ibotenic acid decarboxylates into muscimol, which produces the intoxication that this plant is infamous for.  The question is this:  Is there an effective way to measure the amount of ibotenic acid in fresh or dried amanitas, and is there any way to convert ibotenic acid into muscimol, the active ingredient?

So far, the most effective way for this conversion to take place, is through the human body itself.  In old texts where we find accounts of Amanita ingestion, people would wait at the feet of the person who ingested the Amanita (usually royalty), waiting for them to urinate out the Amanita!  Strangely enough, the best known conversion for iboteic acid to muscimol happens in the human body itself, and the perfectly converted psychoactive compound excretes through the urine.  So, drinking the urine of the person who just ingested the Amanita, provided a second person with the same experience, although i don't know anyone, including myself, who would resort to this practice if effects from Amanita were desired.

Since muscimol melts at 175 degrees Centigrade, and ibotenic acid melts at 150 degrees Centrigrade, it is safe to assume that boiling Amanitas will not destroy or vaporize the active components.  The question becomes one of what liquid would work best to extract the active ingredients of Amanita muscaria into.  This is a question we are still seeking the answer to.  If one wanted to be sure, as in the extraction of Kava Kava, which extracts both into water and fat, an extraction of both alcohol and water might be the best possible solution to this mystery.

We are always looking for more information related to extracting Amanitas and would love to post any personal experience you have had with this process here.

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