Psilocybe azurescens with Hamilton Pevec
Alisa Nappa
The rare and illustrious Psilocybe azurescens is the most potent magic mushroom in the world and also happens to be one of the most evasive species to find. We sit down with Hamilton Pevec who just released a multiple award winning short film documentary about this mushroom and talk about what all the hype is about.
TRANSCRIPT
0:11
Welcome, welcome to the mushroom revival podcast. This is your host, Alex Dora, we love to dive in to the wonderful, wacky, strange, mysterious, incredible world of mushrooms and fungi, we bring on guests from all around the planet, to geek out with us and go on this mystical fungal voert voyage with us. So
0:34
if you don't know, this is the mushroom revival podcast. If you want to support the show, we don't have a Patreon or anything like that. But we do have a website mushroom revival.com If you want to check out a whole line of functional mushroom extracts, etc. We also have a giveaway going on, where you can win some goodies link is in the bio. But
0:56
what you're here for is our amazing guests. This week, we are bringing on Hamilton Piwik with a new feature short film about some magical wonderful mushrooms. So Hamilton, how you doing?
1:11
Very well. Thanks for having me, Alex.
1:15
Yeah, so I just watched this film last night. And it was incredible. And I loved it. And I didn't know much about philosophy as a residence before this film, and they went down like a rabbit hole last night. And they're really cool. I'm glad you covered it. So who are you? What? What inspired you to start this film? What got you into mushrooms? Tell the listeners who is Hamilton Pavic.
1:44
Hamilton Piwik me I am. I'm a career filmmaker and mushroom geek.
1:51
I been making films for 22 years. And I've been hunting mushrooms since 2009. And I had a
2:07
pretty, you know, integrative experience with mushroom hunting from my very first mushroom hunt, as I'm sure you can relate to and many of your listeners can relate to that. When you get exposed to mycology, whether it's through wild mushroom ID or cultivation are another avenue.
2:30
It can be overwhelming and it can be really, really inspiring. And that's what happened to me on my first mushroom Hunt is I went with someone who had a lot of experience and he was able to, you know, he knew all the Latin names, which of course is impressive when you first get into it. And
2:48
he he could explain what the Latin meant. And he could talk about the relationships with the mushrooms have and you know whether or not they're food and whether or not they're functional and all that kind of thing.
3:02
And so that really kicked me off onto my mycology journey. And
3:10
it's been a long winding road since then, I spent
3:16
a better part well, I'm still doing taxonomy. I learned new mushrooms every year doing wild identification. I try and add new edible mushrooms to my repertoire every season. I love experimenting with rare mushrooms and eating them. And
3:36
my
3:38
The thing about hunting mushrooms in Colorado is that we have a super short mushroom season, you know, six weeks if we're lucky, which really isn't very long. It's not long enough by any standard.
3:50
And so I got into cultivating you know, to extend my mushroom season more or less and spent many years cultivating standard gourmet mushrooms inside and outside. And I spent a stint in the Himalaya
4:10
about seven years in the Hillman Himalaya in Nepal as a mushroom farmer organic mushroom farmer.
4:18
And
4:20
during that time is when the door opened for me regarding functional mushrooms. And when I started hearing about that, like they were on my radar, but I wasn't really paying attention to them in the you know, mid 20 teens.
4:38
And
4:40
once I started learning about the functionality and active compounds, I really got deep into that and went down that that road. And that's kind of where I'm at now, in terms of you know what my interest in mycology is even though that's expanded into applied mycology and particularly ethno myco
5:00
allergy. But I had a an experience
5:04
at the beginning of the pandemic, when I had to escape Nepal, I got on one of the last planes before they close the borders.
5:13
And I went immediately into quarantine in a trailer in my town where I had two weeks alone. And I unearthed an old film project that I had shot seven years before about hunting ovo kortesis, an interest in Nepal, with my brother in law. And then I made a film about that called to glow hunt. And as I was making this film, in quarantine, and like, it was basically a passion project.
5:44
everything clicked really, really well. And it kind of came together perfectly. And I had a kind of revelation kind of download, you'd say, or maybe it was a message, you know, some direct transmission from the fungi, I don't know. But
6:00
I realized that all I really wanted to do was make movies about mushrooms because it was combining my passion
6:07
as a filmmaker and as a mushroom geek.
6:11
And so I released the film at the very first fungi Film Festival. And it was well received and it was fun, and it sort of opened this door. And I realized that like, how am I going to
6:26
pay for films about mushrooms, you know, nobody's going to pay for movies about mushrooms like this was, you know who's gonna do that? So, it occurred to me that I could finance these films by selling functional mushroom extracts.
6:42
And so I started Hamilton's mushrooms. And
6:48
and now that's what I do. I sell functional mushroom extracts in order to finance mycology, centred film, and finance, mycology events and education, and hopefully, ultimately, to finance actual science and research. And so my latest film, as your essence through a blue lens, is just one of these many projects that is now being paid for by
7:18
functional mushroom extract fail.
7:23
So when did you start the film? What is it about for anyone who hasn't seen it? Can you give kind of a trailer, audio trailer of the film
7:35
trailer opener
7:39
in a world in order to rule the planet.
7:45
So as your essence through a blue lens is part of the documentary series that I'm doing. The first episode was super long talk about Ocasio Cortez, Epstein insists. And now this episode is about philosophy as your essence. And what the series explores, and each episode, it focuses on a single mushroom and then looks at the relationships that surround that mushroom, from the people who are hunting it or cultivating it to the people who are or rather the relationship that the mushroom has, with the environment, its role that it plays in the environment, its role that it plays in economics and society. And we look at sort of the impacts and the relationships that surround that particular genus or species.
8:30
And so the film follows my brother Lucien and his friend Fred, on the hunt for as he's traveling up the Pacific Northwest coast
8:43
on a kind of pilgrimage, because in the mycology scene, particularly in the Pacific Northwest, it's kind of this legendary mushroom to go hunt. And, you know, I started hearing about it and it was kind of, you know, it had that sort of mythological quality, where it's like, Oh, my God, you're going to find, you're going to have this very rare and precious potent mushroom that exists only in this tiny geographic area. And oh, if you eat it, you might get paralyzed.
9:14
You know, that it had all this
9:17
lore surrounding it, and I got the opportunity to go on the hunt happened in November 2021. And I hopped on it right away. I normally travel out to Northern California to hunt mushrooms every year, and so have corresponded perfectly with that timing. And I would not have missed it for the world. And so yeah, we traveled up the coast. We spent
9:44
five days filming and then that was that made up the principal photography, which was the initial mushroom hunt. And then and then I started researching the mushroom after that principal photography and
10:00
looking at, you know, its role as a psychedelic and society and economics.
10:07
You know, and the thing that really spiked my interest was learning about the ecology of the mushroom as a primary decomposer. And, and, and how and why that matters so much, particularly where it goes. So the film really dives into its ecological role and its ecological backstory.
10:28
As a as a kind of equalizer in the ecosystem.
10:35
And as I, as I started digging into it and researching this, these a combination of rumors and mythology, I started uncovering what was really going on with the mushroom and the culture that surrounds it. And the film explores that in particular.
10:56
So yeah, know how much it was a very interesting beginning, because, you know, I've heard all the rumors of like, it's such a rare mushroom that only natively grows in one specific Valley region, and only the people that are in the No, no, where's where it grows. And now, of course, there are patches that people have artificially cultivated in other regions of the country, and even the world. But you know,
11:27
where you were shooting that, that was like, where it first popped up. And you gave a really cool kind of history in the film of why it first popped up. And I'm just curious if you can give a little one on one on, you know, you said they're kind of like, they're in response for ecological reasons, you know, right. Right. So why did why did they pop up in the first place? And this is still a theory. Yeah. But there's a lot of physical evidence to support this.
12:02
So
12:05
the European settlers arrived,
12:10
you know, quite quite a long time ago in the 1800s, not earlier on the West Coast.
12:16
And when they, when they
12:20
arrived into this specific region of northern Oregon and southern Washington,
12:27
they built a jetty at the mouth of the Columbia River. And this jetty you know, it's to control the tide, so that boats can come in and out of the river, the mouth of the river, and to calm the waters.
12:46
And one of the side effects of this jetty was that it caused a massive buildup of sand in inland. And they call this rampaging dudes where the sand started pushing inward, and burying farms and pasture land and disrupting the forest and like, really causing problems for the settlers that were living on the coast at that time. And so in classic human fashion, they were looking for solutions to manage these rampaging dunes.
13:20
And so they imported a strain of European beach grass called mo Philia, aranea.
13:27
Or an area I think,
13:29
and it, it did a very good job of it did a very good job of catching the windblown sand and creating for dunes on the beach, basically helping to save all this pasture land. And, and, and prevent these rampaging dunes and unbury these farms. And so it worked. And the thing that they didn't understand, they also introduced a
13:59
scotch broom.
14:01
And
14:03
these, these are both now considered some of the most invasive species
14:10
on the Pacific Northwest coast, and they are traveling all up and down the coast, hundreds of miles that they've traveled now 100 years later, and it causes so funny to the ecosystem. How many times this happens, you know, throughout history of humans cause some, like an entire eradication of a species and then they try to solve it. And they always introduce something worse. Yeah, it's all the time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We're not very good at understanding, you know,
14:44
the greater, you know,
14:48
view the long view on messing with ecology, you know, yeah. And like ecology 101 says, Don't move species around, like leave them in place like Everybody I talked to all the time.
15:00
ologists all the dune specialists,
15:03
all the
15:06
Yeah, all the experts that I spoke to said, you know, this is like classic. No, no. Yeah. And we've learned over over the last 150 years, some of us more than, yeah, well, we can point to it and say, oh, yeah, look what happened in Australia, you know, the cane toads are right, whatever, you know. And
15:28
yeah, now it's happening on the Pacific Northwest coast with these two species of plant, the European beach grass and the scotch broom.
15:39
And so to take that one step further, you know, so now they're invasive. They, you know, which is, which is a loaded word anyway, you know, for the listeners out there that understand sort of the nuances of what an introduced species is, versus an invasive species. There's a lot of debate around that as well. So
16:00
I'm just using that to describe what's happening, but I don't necessarily land on one or the other side of that debate of how to talk about the introduced species. So, but mushroom is described and started starting to be found in the
16:17
mid 70s. And it's found particularly on rotting wood, and growing alongside the beech grass and the scotch broom. And as a primary decomposer, we understand that it's actually decomposing these grasses and scotch broom plants. And now we understand that after about 40 years or so,
16:47
due to the decomposition rate, this European beach grass can form a very rich layer of topsoil.
16:55
And so you can imagine that this
16:59
mushroom is growing in response to this sort of monoculture of grass that has disrupted ecosystems and disrupted these a few different animal habitats. And it's, it's presenting itself as a possible solution to equalize these coastal dune ecosystems, and to sort of
17:24
regain balance ecologically. Where, where this is one of these delicate ecosystems where, you know, it's any kind of disruption is massively impacted. And then we can introduce the human element, again into this story, which is, you know, if this
17:50
mushroom is acting as a decomposer, and helping to manage these invasive species, then it raises the question and brings up the conversation around, can we use this mushroom to mitigate the beach grass, all along the Pacific Northwest coast? And that's what I really wanted to bring up in this film was the start the conversation about spreading the species around? And that's a whole other conversation. And, and a loaded one too, because it brings us back to this right ecology 101, which is like don't spread species around. However,
18:31
if it's managing these other species that are causing all these other problems, then shouldn't we consider it as a possible short term flash long term solution?
18:46
And it wouldn't be the worst thing to have all over the place.
18:52
Who's gonna complain about extra magic mushrooms growing in appropriate era? What a drag? Yeah, just such a bummer. I mean, ah, the worst. And there's actually a group doing that, right called wood lovers United that you interviewed, I think the founder of wood lovers united, which is a group of people actually doing this, of taking, you know, cultures of philosophy as their essence. And, you know, bulking it up on wood. And then convening in secret places, and on, you know, on secret dates and spreading the spores, so to speak, and making kind of Gorilla garden patches all over the country to kind of fight against this over harvesting of these mushrooms. Because,
19:42
you know, you've talked about a little bit in the film. It's this Michael Pollan effect of people. You know, getting into Michael Pollan for the first time realizing that philosophy was, you know, incredible. Figuring out where as our essence grows, think
20:00
By creating a stampede of people and overharvesting this mushroom, and so what lovers United was kind of fighting against that over harvesting and allowing the biosecurity of this species.
20:15
Correct? Yeah, there's kind of a two prong human impact that's happening,
20:22
particularly in this very small geographic region where the mushroom exists. And so it was, you know, a heavily guarded secret by locals.
20:35
As you know, you know, mushroom hunters can be very protective of their spots, particularly of honey holes, and very territorial. And so, when,
20:49
when wood lovers United
20:53
is a Facebook group with about 11,000 members that focuses on wood loving strains of philosophy, mushrooms and other
21:03
psychoactive mushrooms.
21:06
They kind of helped blow up the spot.
21:12
And in response to that, well, they felt the attitude was that they felt partially responsible for blowing up the spot. But the second prong of that exposure was Michael Pollan's book where he goes with Paul Stamets to go hunt this mushroom, and then tries to be clever about hiding the location. But inadvertently advertently, I don't know gives it away. Yeah, and the difference between these two audiences are enormous, you know, like the few 1000 people that are in the group versus and the number of locals that know where it is versus Michael Pollan's audience of millions, you can imagine that it created a massive rush to this area now, for a couple months, every year, that whole zone is booked out. There's lots of people out there hunting. And this causes significant human impact. You know, especially if the people aren't
22:14
the foragers there aren't doing like sort of sustainable best practices for foraging. And there's a number of things you can do to protect the species, you don't have to
22:27
you know, ravage the area. And in order to take home, your supply.
22:34
So there's certain things you can do like having mesh baskets, while you carry your your fruits around and spread spores, you can ask also take the stem butts off the bottom of the your mushroom, and replant them so that you're establishing mycelium in new places.
22:51
And, you know, pack it in, pack it out, leave no trace. And that's just not the situation. There's a lot of disrespectful foragers that mess up the area. So there was this impetus to protect the zone and to
23:09
let's say,
23:11
Make amends with having exposed it. Yeah, and the wood lovers united group meets secretly to
23:21
a couple of times a year to spread the spores, they culture, they cultivate the liquid culture, they run it out on woodchips
23:31
and, and
23:34
I tried to get in on this. I asked if I could join the group for the hunt. And the myco, Zach, the creator of the group
23:46
went to the group members who are participating in this activity and said, you know, is it okay for Hamilton to join and record our, our our spawn spreading party? And they I don't know exactly, you know, how the vote went down or not. But
24:05
the response that I got back was you can come but you're not allowed to feel. Right. And I thought, Well, I'm not going to drive the 2000 miles to California, and if I can't film the event,
24:20
so I asked him to take pictures for me and use some of those in the film. But yeah, I mean, there's a still a lot of people that want to protect their identity that don't don't want to
24:34
expose this kind of sub sub culture of this very niche community. Makes sense. And I respect that.
24:41
And, you know, that's, that's totally schedule one. So, you know, make sense.
24:48
Right.
24:50
Yeah, that you know, that raises the question, go ahead. No, it just, you know, some of you might be wondering if you have no idea what this mushroom is
25:00
Like, what is all the hype about it? Right? You know, it is fairly easy most places to get, you know, quote unquote regular magic mushrooms. So Osby cubensis, they're grown so easily, it's probably
25:15
one of, if not the easiest mushrooms to grow, you know, at home. And so what is all this hype about this rare mushroom?
25:25
You know, growing in this specific region, you know, why are people going after it? Well, it's it's toted that the most potent magic mushroom in the world, and it has a very interesting
25:38
array of compounds. So, you know, it has doubled the amount of psilocybin
25:47
but it has about two thirds, the psilocybin which psilocybin in your body,
25:54
it I don't know the exact chemical term, but it it breaks breaks down maybe into Cillessen. I don't know, if breaks down is the river converts into psilocybin. And psilocybin is actually the active compound that, you know, makes you quote unquote, trip. But it also has blood brain barrier, right? But Salafi as arrestance, has up to 14 times of this one specific compound compound called biosystem, which we don't have much research on, but, you know, is one of one of the main tryptamines in magic mushrooms that is getting a lot of hype recently. Because we're finding out you know, all these different mushrooms have all these different compounds beyond psilocybin and psilocin. And what did they do? So I know you brought on
26:48
someone on on the film, DOMA is his name, right?
26:54
Yeah. dominante Oh, from Magic myco fam. He's he seemed to know quite a bit about biosystem.
27:05
Did he have anything to say about it? You know, I'm just curious of, of, if, if, you know, if you if you talk to anyone of like, why we think it has so much of this one particular compound.
27:19
Right, well, the conventional wisdom around these active alkaloids now is that they exist within the fruit bodies, as a kind of antibacterial, anti parasitic antibiotic, a survival compound to protect itself from, you know, other organisms in the ecosystem. But I think that's,
27:43
that's just like sort of a functional role that isn't, that doesn't tell the whole story, because we have
27:53
the locks that these active alkaloid keys can plug right into in our brain. So there's this larger
28:02
sort of larger picture larger understanding of the role of these alkaloids in the world. Because we have we have the receptors in order to take them in and they can have profound impacts on our lives and our psychology our mental health or physiology. So they're not I don't know, I don't believe that they're just acting as an antibiotic within the ecosystem it perform a much larger role in our lives.
28:33
The bottom line is that
28:35
they do they do? It's wild. What did they do to you?
28:42
Well, first they make me it's just an antibiotic for me. I don't know what you're talking about.
28:49
Yeah, I mean, just anti inflammatory and helped me relax and focus, you know, and then you know, I ski better and I hike better and I find more mushrooms and I
29:01
get better ideas and I play better and I feel more free and yeah, all kinds of good benefits. Someone described so microdosing while hiking as enhanced hiking, and I will never forget that. I think it's great.
29:20
The old cycle hike cycle. I love it. Yeah, no, I mean, yeah, it's a it's amazing. It's amazing how effectively and consistently it helps you feel connected. You know, in this very mycelial kind of way. Where you go hiking on a micro and you feel the air better and you smell the forest terpenes more and you have your six senses, you know heightened and everything connects and you feel everything more, you feel much more part of nature and
30:00
That's one of the measurable, functional aspects of this medicine, or or lack thereof. Excuse me?
30:14
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yes. Thank you. And DOMA, you slip this into the film, which blew my mind. And I tried to google it after and I couldn't find anything on it. So I'm hoping that you could kind of elaborate a little bit more, but you,
30:32
you know, brought DOMA on he had some words to share about philosophy as their essence. But then you, you said, Hey, Domas, pretty famous. In in the, in the scene, he won the first psilocybin cup for having the most potent strain. And later on, you know, was was pretty fundamental for people developing like, very potent strains of philosophy. And he came up with this technique called the antibiotic fusion technique. And you kind of slipped that into the film. And so I'm curious what, what is the antibiotic fusion technique?
31:09
Yeah, what is it all about? This is fascinating.
31:13
You know, let me let me preface this by saying that like, a 30 minute film about a single magic mushroom is really just a snapshot, like you need an entire documentary series to talk in depth and comprehensively about psychedelic mushrooms.
31:31
So yes, I could only touch on a few of these things. And one of them is this antibiotic fusion technique, which he was telling me is, and I don't understand the chemistry of it, because I'm not that heavy of a grower. But the it allows the mycelium to become soft and malleable enough that two different strains of mycelium or rather, two different species of the same strain can fuse together. And once they fuse together, they can be isolated and basically create a new strain. And this, this methodology, was
32:20
initially started with snake venom, which is a whole other story that I would love to make a film about, because it's absolutely fascinating. But DOMA didn't have access to the snake venom. So he tried it with this antibiotics. Where is this? Now he's evolved?
32:41
Is this into
32:43
different species fusing, fusing? So like philosophy as their essence? different vendors?
32:50
Yeah, no, no, no, it's a different strain. Okay. Same species. So got it, yeah, took in this case, he, when he created tidal waves to the awardwinning strain.
33:01
He took a a penis envy, and a B plus. And fue cool together and had different different isolations of those two strains, and then brought them together to create more or less a new strain of cubensis.
33:18
And, you know, my language describing this might be off, because I don't know exactly the right words to say I don't know when a when of when a phenotype emerges or not.
33:31
And
33:33
and so one of the interesting things now is that, you know, he switched his method now like the the mycology you know, sort of underground philosophy, growing community at that time was like, This is impossible. And he was new to growing at that time, and it was like, Whatever, I'm gonna try it anyway. And he succeeded. And that really changed the game for cultivation, especially in magic mushroom cultivation. But now what's interesting is, like we talk about, as he's being the most potent magic mushroom found. But the caveat to that is that it's, it's one of the most potent mushrooms found in nature. Now, the strains that cultivars are producing blow as he's out of the water in terms of potency. And it's kind of shocking, and this is one of the most important things. The most important works that DOMA and the magic myco fam are doing right now is
34:30
testing protocols to help and protect dosing, and make sure people are safe that they're no that they're getting a strain that has no 1.5% versus 3.5%. And that's a significant difference in your psychedelic experience. If you're eating a one gram at a low percentage and another grand at a high percentage, I mean, it's it can be shocking.
34:58
Huge Yeah, and
35:00
Yeah, and even how you store it, right? I mean, you know, if people have your pears, enormous year old mushrooms that they didn't store correctly, and it's like, yeah, they're, they're not as potent as, as the day after you pick them, you know, they're going to be very potent.
35:18
And this is the same talk. In the functional mushroom space, it's like, one gram of one. Company stuff is not the same as the other, you know, if you're talking about, does it? Is it coming from mycelium? Or is it coming from the fruiting bodies? How is it extracted? etc, right? You know, there's a lot of people, I don't know where it started, but people are like, I need a gram a day. And it's like, well, you know, yeah, 1000 milligrams for one thing is wildly different from 1000 milligrams of another and same thing with loss. Yeah,
35:53
absolutely. I mean, if you change one variable in the process, if you're changing the extraction process, if you're changing the strain of the mushroom, if you're changing the testing protocol, then you're gonna get different results. Each of those variables changes the ultimate outcome, whether or not you're testing beta glucans, or polysaccharides, or triterpenes, or NAC or s&m, or any of the active alkaloids, like Cillessen, psilocybin in their system, the nervous system origination, those are all going to be affected initially by how you extract it, how it was grown, what substrate it was on every variable count. And one of the big, you know, that's part of Domas work as well. I mean, I really think you got to get Domo on the show to talk about this stuff, because Oh, totally, he's amazing. And he's definitely really important work
36:44
at he. So you know, he's trying to standardize all of these tests, and extraction methods and trying to inspire other laboratories
36:55
to, to share their results, because that's the only way we can get on the same page. And it's really fundamental to the health of the community, that we have some kind of standard in this space. And I understand that too, from the functional mushroom space as well.
37:13
Because we don't really have a standard for American testing. Like, I want to create a stamp that we can put on our products as brands as producers as extractors as small time growers, big time growers, that says yes, this is verified 1% errand acing This is verified, you know, 30%, beta glucan, or whatever the case may be, like, we need that as we move forward. And as functional mushrooms become mainstream, and they're on track to do that.
37:49
Another compound of interest in philosophy as their essence is, and it's a weird one. I had never heard of it before. And going down the rabbit hole it kind of threw me for for a little loop but a Rogan a scene, which you talked a little bit about, at the very beginning of this episode, you said oh, yeah, people were talking about, you're gonna find that weird mushroom that makes you paralyzed.
38:17
And originais seen, there's this whole thread, apparently on Reddit, where people call it the wood lovers paralysis, or W LP phenomena, where some people a small percentage of people when they're eating wood, loving, active magic mushrooms, magic mushrooms that like to grow on wood. There's a small percentage of people that have this physical phenomena where they can't move their body for up to 24 hours. And it's not a mental thing. Like sometimes you're like couch locked or whatever. It's like a physical thing. And people think it's caused by this specific compound origination. I'm just curious if you have any more insight on this.
39:07
I can't speak to that. I've never experienced it myself. I've only heard about it.
39:13
When I asked him about it, he was saying that there is no documented evidence that this but at least through his experience, yeah. Whether or not, you know, origination or bail system are connected to this. He did mention that these compounds have to be coupled with the other alkaloids in order to be
39:37
metabolized at all, like they don't cross the blood brain barrier. And it's the entourage effect that allows them to cross the blood brain barrier. He said they had to be paired with the other alkaloids or an MA ally, which I thought was really interesting. And the bottom line here is that we need more research. You know, these compounds are very little under
40:00
Do it. And there's virtually no research on this stuff. And what actually those alkaloids are doing physiologically for us. And then, of course, how they work together. Just fascinating to me. And, you know, as this stuff becomes,
40:17
you know, you know, as magic mushrooms get decriminalized and legalized.
40:24
You know, hopefully this will open the door to funding research, so that we can understand this. In fact, there was a paper that was released a month and a half ago, co authored by Giuliana Ferrucci, and a number of other mycologists. Well known mycologist, where they basically like, did a deep dive into the philosophy genius. And the result was, Oh, hey, like, everything we thought we knew was wrong. And we don't know anything about this.
40:53
Yeah.
40:55
I was like, Oh, wow, what a what a massive takeaway. Like, I wonder how long? How long they were researching it before they decided to make that their official conclusion. Yeah, that that was with? Did you see that paper? That was with Laura Guzman, and a few other people, but yeah, yeah, that was it. She presented the her findings, or at least some of them
41:20
at the last Telluride mushroom Festival, and her talk was fantastic. It was incredible. And um, yeah, I'm kind of bummed. I interviewed her before.
41:31
Telluride where she presented I saw her years ago,
41:35
interviewed her, and then she spoke, and she talked about all these things that we didn't cover in the interview, and I was like, oh, man, like, this would have been great to talk about. But yeah, I mean, it was, it was basically like, there's tons of species in these, in these fungus areas that are labeled a specific magic mushroom species, and they, you know, based on further DNA analysis, they're actually not, or, you know, some degrade faster than others. And some, you know, they tested the active compounds, and they didn't have any. And so it's just kind of like, our, our understanding is not
42:12
is not very good based on, you know,
42:16
dipping into the past and pulling out these, these old species. And that goes to the same with like, you know, Latin names change all the time. And it was a, it's a big debate with, with, like, ganoderma, lucidum versus ligature. Like, there's tons of papers that say, you know, they say the Latin name is ganoderma, lucidum. But we further split, you know, ganoderma. So, it's like, okay, well, were they actually talking about ganoderma lucidum? Or were they talking about ganoderma literature? Or were they talked about or another ganoderma? Yeah, and they're just calling it ganoderma lucidum. And so now, we're looking at these old papers, and we're like, Well, what actual, like, what species were they actually using? And so the same thing with a lot of these old philosophy is like, Well, okay, now we got to recreate that as well. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So, you know, science content evolves. And
43:17
it's so funny, because this is just trying to figure out what to call it, you know, it's such a fundamental first step
43:25
in working with these, with these mushrooms, and, you know, it's like we have disagreements about what to even name them,
43:34
let alone what's inside them and what's happening, you know, biochemically and our relationship physiologically to them. I mean, we are really at the beginning of a very long journey, and it's exciting you know, I look forward to learning as new information comes out and telling these stories as they emerge like I think it's really cool. And
43:57
I want to backpedal a little bit
44:01
I'm talking and go right back to this this topic of the best system nor bail system and origination.
44:09
DOMA told me this morning that he's got he's I did not not identified he's seen a peak on the HPLC chromatograph. Like it's an unknown compound that spiking at very high amounts.
44:28
And there's no we don't know what it is.
44:32
And when I asked him if there was any connection between the wood lovers paralysis and the minor alkaloid, he said, I don't know about that. But maybe it's this new mysterious compound. Yeah, this new mysterious alkaloid which is spiking so high that it's not necessarily considered a minor alkaloid. So I think that's really interesting. And, you know, he's on track to
44:57
discover this, this new compound or at least that's
45:00
That's awesome. Get closer to. Yeah. And I, I'm excited, man, I think it's such a cool.
45:08
I think we're sort of collectively the point of the spear and this research, not only just in taxonomy, which is like the whole name game thing that we were just talking about, which is so funny to me because the Latin names are changing faster than the common name. Yeah.
45:25
And that's like a can of worms inside the mycology community, you know, like, oh, how dare you use a common name, but, you know, if I'm out there hunting mushrooms in the Himalaya, you know, or, or, or in any sort of
45:39
developing nation where the use of common name, the use of
45:46
Latin names is not it's not even on the radar, you know, that it's more effective, and more helpful to have common name documented, so that you can do comparisons to the Latin binomial later on. If you're trying to do taxonomy, like they play a role in the in the whole scene. And it kind of makes me sad that there's a number of high level mycologist that Oh, I just outright poopoo common names.
46:18
I guess I get both sides, you know, whatever it gets the point across. And
46:24
yeah, you know, yeah, of course, there's a rule like we need standardization, right? We need a Latin binomial. So everyone can be on the same page. But because of the onset of
46:38
white knuckle.
46:40
Yeah.
46:42
Don't white knuckle it because we're the Latin name you're holding on to will probably change.
46:48
Right.
46:50
Let it go. Let it go. Okay. It's gonna be a different one. Okay. Yeah, it's all good. It's all good. Have you have you read any of the work by Diana Smith and her research on the ganoderma?
47:08
Taxonomy debate? Highly recommend checking out Diana Smith. research papers around ganoderma fascinating stuff.
47:18
Yeah.
47:20
Kind of backtracking a little bit. Have you? Have you tried? Have you tried philosophy as a residence ever?
47:28
I did feel free knackered, though, though.
47:34
Did I notice any differences? Little ones? Yeah. I did. Yeah, they were right off the bat. Really tough really chemical tasting. You know, that, that? You know that? That sort of strong chemical taste in the mouth compared to something like a cubensis that has a pretty mild flavor ultimately.
48:00
And you know, it was
48:03
was beautiful. euphoric, mildly ecstatic.
48:10
And,
48:12
you know, very low impact. Like I didn't have any discomfort, feeling no poison feeling.
48:20
But I didn't really eat enough to trip so to speak. It was was much more of a micro I probably ate a couple grams fresh.
48:31
Cool. And yeah, I mean, you know, it wasn't it wasn't, it wasn't like 100 milligrams dried, which is kind of a standard micro. You know, it was, it was a small amount of fresh mushrooms. Right. And I felt I felt like it was my responsibility as an Eskimo mycologist as a documentarian to eat the boat was for science, totally for science.
48:55
I took I've never taken as your essence, I really want to and sine essence and you know, pretty much any of the wood lover species, but
49:05
I did take this specific species called Philosophy biosystem, I think is is the name and it was growing this or something? Yeah, yes. Something like that. It was growing in,
49:21
in Wahaca, and someone was actually growing it. And they stayed at their house.
49:28
And I ate way too much.
49:31
Because it was fresh. And I had in my mind, oh, you know, and, like, I just I need to take 10 times the amount that I usually do because it's fresh. And that was just a terrible idea.
49:44
And I was like overly confident because it's like, you know, like I'm, I'm in this beautiful place and like, you know, so I took even a little bit more, and i i There was a point where I was like trying to make myself throw up because like this is a little too much
50:00
You know, but I got through it, it was an interesting night to say the least. And it ended up the ending of it was beautiful. But there's there's a period where it's pretty uncomfortable. But apparently that species had pretty high levels of biosystem in it. AKA given the name, I don't know how much it it has. But
50:22
yeah, it was an interesting, it was an interesting setting as well where I took it. So I do want to take it again, with kind of a neutral setting and see my experience. But yeah, yeah, I mean, I would love to do.
50:42
I would love to sample all the different strains.
50:47
Just just to understand the differences.
50:50
You know, I've never tried a similar as Jada, which is another common one that grows out in the Pacific Northwest. And,
51:01
you know, you hear stories about all these different kinds all over the place. And I'm very curious about them. But you know, it's so, so much ready and easy access to all the new cubensis strains that it's almost like you have to go out of your way to go find these rare, naturally occurring wood lovers or grass lovers.
51:23
But
51:26
yeah,
51:28
yeah, I feel like pretty soon we're going to have dispensaries with a whole wide variety display. Little sample box that you could take,
51:39
you know, like a little chocolate box. Each, each thing is in a different a different species that you have to correlate to the the back of the chocolate box and you got to match it. You're like, Oh, yeah. Caramel as a Ressence. Yeah, this one. This one's the heartshaped. Let me get this.
51:59
Well, we're definitely you know, the psychedelic mushroom industry is on track to parallel the cannabis industry. And that's one of the big sentiments in the psychedelic community is like, what can we learn from what happened with cannabis that we can avoid doing with with psychedelic mushrooms. And I think that's one of the nice sort of guideposts in this emerging culture is like, look, it took 25 or 30 years to get cannabis recreationally legalized.
52:34
And it and then man magic mushrooms have kind of been fast tracked at like, just a few years, you know, but it's, you know, dispensaries, you know, treatment centers, these things already are, exist and are going to evolve into this thing where and ultimately it will be recreationally legal.
52:55
It's just a matter of time. And, you know, we can all
53:00
know, as mushroom people,
53:04
the resources to the community, be advocates for safe use for standardized testing for potency testing, for extraction, testing, you know, try and create some common ground, so that the people who don't know anything about it and want to use it functionally, can or need it, ultimately, can
53:27
use these compounds safely. And uncomfortably more than anything.
53:35
I really appreciate what you're doing with making these films because, you know, with this rise of psilocybin and functional mushrooms, tons of people are just hopping on the green rush, this new green rush, and it's, it's worrisome for me, it's it's half exciting and worrisome. It's exciting to see so many people getting into mushrooms, but it's also worrisome because it's turning into such a commodity, which people are viewing mushrooms as a commodity and less of a connection vehicle to the greater symbiosis of nature and the universe. And really becoming a better person, rather than using it as a commodity and kind of a another costume in their ego of like, oh yeah, I microdose mushrooms, you know, and like, using that as like a another token.
54:35
And so, I just appreciate you making these films of of kind of balancing that of like, yeah, you know, I saw functional mushrooms, but I also am making these films as a gateway for people to really dive deeper, you know, and it's like yeah, take this Yeah, for people who are brand new, and you know, you know, take take the product, but also
55:00
Learn more, you know, get out in the woods, like, dive deeper, because there is something
55:08
immensely magical and beautiful about fungi and their role in ecology and, you know, human nature, right, and how we interact with it. So, I mean, I just appreciate that. So keep that pumping them out. Thank you. Thank you very much. I appreciate that very much. You know, it's fascinating stuff, because what you're touching on here is how, for lack of a better term functional fungi are across the board in our lives, you know, they affect they can affect our food systems, our health systems, our agricultural systems, our,
55:49
our applied mycology, like industrial systems textile system, you know, they can find a place in every major aspect of our lives and in our society, and have profound impacts on them.
56:06
As solution makers, and you know, we're just as a culture, we're just beginning to explore the potential there. And it's beautiful thing, you know, it's not just a mushroom that might make you feel good, or help you sleep better. But it's also myco arisal, or a primary decomposer, and has this essential fundamental relationship with nature, with ecology, or with a specific plant or a specific tree, that makes everything else work in harmony. And that's such an awesome thing to try and wrap your head around and be a part of, and the films that I want to make, explore all of these different ideas. You know, I mean, I've got a long list of films I want to make.
56:54
And I couldn't, I couldn't really do with them, you know, a team of 10 people that make it happen, unfortunately, there's no budget for that. Well, fingers crossed, I hope you you win the lottery some somehow and you make that happen. So you sent me kind of a secret link. And I know you just you just released this at the fungi Film Festival, which is over now, which you won an award. So congrats on that, and well deserved. Thank you. I just want another I just won another award for it as well. Sweet. Hell, yeah. Congrats. What's this other award? Thank you.
57:31
It's it won Best Documentary Short film at the eight and a half Film Festival in Rome, Italy. Wow, dude, congrats. That's awesome. And that's Thank you. Yeah, I just found out yesterday. And
57:46
and then it won most entertaining film at the fungi Film Festival. Sweet. That's huge. That must feel good. That's awesome. So you sent me a secret link? Is it going to be available for people eventually? Somewhere on the online?
58:04
Yes.
58:06
Right now it's available. Vimeo on demand. Okay, I'll send you a link to that you can rent it for $2 or buy it for five. And the your ticket purchase goes directly to financing the next film.
58:24
It's worth it. You know, you're Yeah, it's worth it. I mean, you got two bucks to watch a half hour film. I mean, competing for attention on the internet is insanely difficult.
58:35
But I think just
58:39
I think I think you know, people out there they choose to support the projects that they want to support. And, you know, I do the same thing with projects, you know, that I give money to. And there is an added value to paying $2 To watch a film like this. And that's that you are actively supporting the production of new mycology centered film, which will ultimately become free in time, you know, I'll let it run its course through the festivals probably for another six months to a year depending on how well it does in the festival.
59:14
And then
59:16
it will inevitably end up for free on Vimeo and YouTube and we can all enjoy it forever.
59:24
Oh yeah. Until the solar flare comes and wipes all our hard drives clean. And and the your first film
59:32
about ovo CornerStep sign essence. Is that also on Vimeo as well?
59:37
It is Yes. Cool. It's also you can find it on my Instagram and my YouTube. And
59:44
yeah, it's out there. Please take the time to watch it. They're cool little short documentaries. Amazing. Yeah. Cool. Sweet. And do you have a website? Where can people find you?
1:00:00
We'll we'll try to link everything in the bio for everyone that to easy click but for people just listening
1:00:07
Yeah, you can check out my work and my products at Hamilton's mushrooms.com My Instagram is Hamilton mushrooms. My YouTube is Hamilton's mushrooms extracts My Facebook is Hamilton's mushrooms extract.
1:00:22
Yeah, please like, follow, share, do all the Internet things. I appreciate everybody out there who takes the time to watch the people in the audience now who are listening. You know, my door is always open.
1:00:36
My company ethos, my personal ethos is that a rising tide lifts all the boats. And so if you're out there, you have a mushroom story you want to tell you have a mushroom healing story or personal anecdotal experiences, you know, I want to hear about them. I want to help tell your story. I'd love to collaborate with anybody out there who's interested. And you know, onward together.
1:01:02
Allah Yeah. And thank you everyone for for tuning in and tuning in for another episode. It's always a really fun time. So thank you for wherever you're tuning in from all over the world.
1:01:15
And yeah, if you want to support the show, again, we don't have a Patreon or anything. So please head over to mushroom revival.com We have a bunch of goodies there from gummies and capsules, tinctures, etc. And we have a bunch of educational blogs and more all of our show notes and podcasts are on there as well. And just spreading the word you know, whether about our show or just mushrooms in general about Hamilton's films about anything related to mushrooms. You know, tell your friends tell tell your family collectively rise that tide for fungi as a whole. And, you know, it's it's all connected. The mycelium is spreading and it's up to all of us to get people super geeked out about mushrooms and fungi and eventually just the universe and nature as a whole. So
1:02:09
with that much love and made the spores we would
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
