Flying plants: Past, Present and Future of the Angel’s Trumpet (Brugmansia spp.), a Sacred Plant Intimately Linked to Human History
Federico Roda, National University of Colombia (UNAL) Biology Department (Bogotá)
I first heard the expression “flying plants” (“plantas voladoras”) from the mouth of Ayênan Quinchoa, a young man from the Kamentsá community of the upper Putumayo, while we were talking about the borrachero or angel’s trumpet, a plant with which I have worked in recent years and which is sacred to his people. The expression captures many of the things that fascinate me about this hallucinogenic flower that has traveled the world and has had a profound effect on minds, medicines, and cultures. I am a geneticist researching how human interaction with plants has shaped the compounds they produce and how these compounds have transformed and continue to transform human cultures. The use of plants with medicinal and psychedelic properties is as old as agriculture. These plants have played a major role in ensuring the health of humanity and have had a contagious influence on the worldview around us. Likewise, the study of the borracheros has expanded my scientific horizons through collaborations with people like Ayênan and the traditional physician Bernardo Chindoy, who seek to give flight to these plants in the face of the challenges of the modern world. My work seeks to address ancestral knowledge with the tools of modern science, such as genomics and metabolomics, in order to help understand the past and build the future of these plants. To do so, it has been essential to build bridges between visions and communities.
Borracheros belong to the South American genus Brugmansia and one of the most important plant families in human history, the Solanaceae. During their migration around the world, humans domesticated dozens of Solanaceae species for use as food (potato, tomato, eggplant, chili bell pepper, and many minor crops), medicines (borracheros, tobacco, toloache, mandrake and belladonna, etc.), and as ornamental plants (petunias and, of course, borracheros themselves). The close link between this family and humans is due to the type of substances they produce, which give them characteristic flavors, colors and aromas, as well as potent medicinal and recreational properties. Solanaceae and their associated compounds were modified by domestication and by the exchange of plants between cultures around the world. Thus, the potato, chili bell pepper and tomato acquired new flavors and colors when they were cultivated outside their place of origin in America. At the same time, these foods changed the cultures of the places to which they were transported.
Medicinal Solanaceae were also transported and modified by humans and changed the peoples they reached. The recent use of omics methods has revolutionized our ability to understand this history. For example, we know that the consumption of mandrake and henbane in Europe dates back to at least the Bronze Age and these plants were used by pagan cultures for hundreds of years(1) . Similarly, toloache (datura) was consumed by early Indigenous groups in North America(2), and it is believed that the Native settlement of South America was accompanied by the early adoption of its sister plant, borrachero(3). Both plants remain a fundamental part of ancestral cultures from the United States to Chile and Argentina.
Brugmansias have been used for millennia by Indigenous communities in South America because of their beauty and medicinal properties(4). Brugmansia species are trees with large, colorful, aromatic flowers that are traditionally used for ornamental purposes, to “protect” homes and attract pollinators. These plants have been exchanged throughout the world by an active community of breeders who have produced varieties with unique colors, floral morphologies and scents, beautifying the gardens of the planet. The beauty of these plants has been a source of artistic inspiration, appearing in archaeological representations of the Inca and Quimbaya cultures as well as in graffiti on walls in modern Colombia. However, borracheros also have great cultural importance due to their multiple medicinal uses to relieve pain and cure infections(1). In addition, shamans or taitas use borracheros for divination, or even “black” magic, due to their potent hallucinogenic effects. In summary, the intoxicating medicinal powers and beauty of these plants have made them a source of admiration, respect and awe, in all cultures that have come into contact with them. This makes them an icon of the complex and changing relationship between humans and plants.
The histories of borracheros and humans are so closely linked that all species of the genus Brugmansia are considered extinct in the wild and are dependent on humans for propagation(4): Brugmansia is almost always found growing around settlements and there are few reports of natural seed dispersers or plants growing in primary forests. This dependence on humans makes Brugmansia particularly vulnerable to changes in cultural practices. However, from the colonization of South America to modern times, these sacred plants have also been a symbol of resistance and transmutation in the face of the passage of time.
The epicenter of flying plants
The Putumayo region of southern Colombia is the center of diversity of Brugmansia and the site of domestication of a large number of medicinal cultivars by the Inga, Kamentsá, Quillasinga and Siona peoples. The hallucinatory and unique morphology of these cultivars, as well as their medicinal and cultural importance, attracted the attention of the “founding fathers” of chemical ethnobotany, Harvard Professor Richard Evans Schultes and his students. These cultivars have characteristics not found in varieties elsewhere, such as deformed leaves and flowers with separate petals (Brugmansia is characterized by fused petals forming a tube). In collaboration with Colombian scientists such as Professor Hernando Garcia-Barriga and local traditional practitioners such as Taita Salvador Chindoy, these researchers introduced the sacred cultivars of the Sibundoy Valley to Western science. My laboratory seeks to continue the legacy of these researchers through the study and conservation of these emblematic plants and the exchange of knowledge with the cultures that have created and used these plants.
The ethnobotanical importance of Putumayo is due to the fact that it is a site of confluence between the three regions most diverse of the world biogeographic and different cultures. This region connects the Andes (upper Putumayo) with the Amazon (lower Putumayo) and the Pacific. Therefore, it contains an extraordinary richness and endemism of plant species. Culturally, this was a dynamic area where a transition occurred between the Inca world and the multiple indigenous cultures that populated Colombia, and it was a meeting place for the different Spanish colonizing expeditions. The exchange of plants between cultures and regions has been a fundamental part of the history of this region.
For example, two sacred plants with psychedelic properties move in opposite directions between cultures of the lower Putumayo and upper Putumayo: while the plants used in the creation of yagé grow in the Amazon, borracheros grow primarily in the Andes. I have traveled several times to the jungles of Putumayo to talk about these plants with my collaborator Taita Bernardo Chindoy, grandson of Salvador Chindoy and practitioner of Kamentsá medicine. According to him, the mythology of his community says that the borracheros were “little trees that were born when a lagoon of many mysteries that existed in the Sibundoy Valley dried up”. From the beginning, the curaca (traditional healer) ancestors associated these plants with animal visions such as worms, birds and snakes and used them to have visions and communicate with other worlds. According to Taita Bernardo, over time the people “began to exchange borrachero seeds with people from the lower Putumayo” where there were no borracheros, but there was yagé, and both plants became a fundamental part of the medicine and culture of the region. Likewise, the enormous diversity of borracheros used in the upper Putumayo is possibly the result of the historical exchange of plants with other peoples of the upper Andean region.
Since the 1980s in Colombia there has been a resurgence of ancestral traditions and a reclaiming of cultural, political and territorial rights by Indigenous peoples. This process has been catalyzed by the resurgence of rituals associated with the use of psychedelic plants and the changes in worldview that this entails. In fact, many Putumayo taitas frequently travel to do “tomas” (drinking) of yagé or borrachero with members of other communities in Colombia, who have returned to using these sacred plants, or who have recently begun to use them. The interest in medicinal plants has even permeated Colombian mestizo society, particularly among the young, who see them as a vehicle for rewriting the identity of a people.
However, the integration of sacred plants into the modern world faces multiple challenges. Borracheros have been stigmatized by the Catholic Church, which has often opposed Indigenous traditions and worldviews, especially those related to psychedelic experiences and sacred plants. Recently, borracheros have also been stigmatized because their extracts are used in crimes due to their hypnotic effects, to which is added that recreational or mistaken consumption of these plants produces intoxication. Finally, the policy of combating illicit drug trafficking has been accompanied by the stigmatization of psychoactive plants. All this has led to public eradication campaigns. Although the use of Brugmansia for ornamental purposes is still quite common, its medicinal, recreational and ceremonial uses are in danger of disappearing in the modern world. Taita Bernardo has had to carefully cultivate his children’s interest in brugmansia because young people are not interested in these plants, which they consider dangerous. Unlike yagé, whose popularity has grown rapidly in recent years, borracheros are more dangerous plants and therefore very few people know how to use them.
The medicinal varieties of borracheros, whose propagation and use depend on a small number of Indigenous healers, are particularly vulnerable to extinction(5,6). The loss of languages and traditions associated with these plants seriously jeopardizes our ability to take advantage of the benefits they provide(7). The Inga and Kamentsá languages spoken by the taitas who know the most about borracheros are restricted to a small region that has been overwhelmed by modernity, violence and drug trafficking. Moreover, as Taita Bernardo tells me, it is as important to rescue this knowledge as to promote its exchange between cultures, because “the new generations have not been guided and believe that certain plants belong to them, ignoring their origin”, which is a source of conflict between peoples. For example, Taita Bernardo tells me that periodically there are “shamanic wars” between Putumayo healers over the use of sacred plants. At present, the interest of new generations of mestizo Colombians in sacred plants has generated friction over the right to use or study them. These frictions have been exacerbated by an extractivist vision and disregard for traditional knowledge. Therefore, one of the main objectives of my work has been to contribute to the mutual nurturing of different types of knowledge.
The evolution of a flying plant
My fascination with borracheros was born when as a teenager I decided to eat some seeds of these plants so common in my native Bogotá and surrounded by an aura of mystery. This experience made me understand the great power of plants, not only to intoxicate us (I ended up in the hospital), but to affect our way of seeing the world. As a biology student, I found inspiration in the book One River by Wade Davis, which tells the story of Schultes and his students in the Colombian jungles(8). In this book, I saw a new way of doing research in my country, combining western science with the knowledge of native peoples. This is the strategy that I decided to implement when I was given the opportunity to return to my country, by chance following the same route as Schultes between Harvard University and the National University of Colombia. Unlike Schultes, I had been born in Colombia and received training as an evolutionary geneticist, which led me to become interested in understanding how we South Americans have changed the metabolism of sacred plants such as the borracheros. These plants gave me the fascinating possibility of approaching an ethereal subject such as the sacred through the investigation of the evolution of tangible organisms.
From a biological point of view, the sacred status of the borracheros is due to the unique combination of two traits, beauty and medicinal-hallucinogenic properties. From an aesthetic point of view, Putumayo medicinal cultivars were selected for their deformed leaves that sometimes look worm-eaten or can be long like filaments. These morphologies fascinated Schultes and his students who went so far as to propose that some cultivars were actually new Solanaceae lineages unknown to science. Although the reason why these morphologies were selected is unknown, there is a possibility that it was because they relate to unique pharmacological properties. Additionally, the Taitas select varieties with unique appearances, as it is a status symbol and appearance is fundamental in rituals. (5,6,9)
In order to understand the evolution of medicinal cultivars, we have analyzed their genomes and metabolic profiles(10). According to these analyses, cultivars are the result of a fascinating breeding process in which ancestral peoples conserved and crossed species from different regions, generating hybrids with unique genomes. An important finding of our research has been that these strange morphologies are caused by infection with a virus originating in Sibundoy and apparently selected by the inhabitants of this region(11). This is a unique report of the ancestral use of viruses to manipulate the appearance and applications of medicinal plants. Paradoxically, this virus was taken by accident to Europe, North America and Australia by Schultes’ students who transported plants from the Putumayo region to exchange them with a vibrant network of collectors. This is how the borracheros and their associated microorganisms continued to spread around the world.
Brugmansia species are traditionally used as hallucinogens and in magic rituals, but also to treat a wide range of illnesses such as pain, inflammatory conditions, and infections(1). For example, Taita Bernardo and his daughter use the borracheros especially for baths in the treatment of pain associated with childbirth. From a phytochemical point of view these properties are determined by compounds known as tropane alkaloids (TAs). TAs are defensive metabolites produced by plants that have a long history of use in witchcraft and traditional medicines throughout the world, including coca, toloache or stramonium, mandrake and belladonna. TAs have been listed as essential medicines by the World Health Organization because of their broad spectrum of applications in modern medicine. Understanding the evolution of TAs is essential to trace the history of medicinal cultivars of Brugmansia, as these varieties were probably selected based on their TA content. Our research has shown that medicinal cultivars produce unique metabolic profiles, characterized by a high diversity of TAs and a wide variation in TAs production across varieties. This variation may be related to the multiple medicinal uses of borracheros and suggests that Indigenous peoples shaped the metabolism of these plants through cross-breeding and virus infection. These results demonstrate the painstaking work of generations of Indigenous peoples in the conservation and improvement of a sacred plant. Our findings led me to understand the enormous importance of preserving these medicinal cultivars and their associated ancestral knowledge.
The future of flying plants
The conservation of plants and their associated knowledge are fundamental vehicles of research in Colombia, the most ethno-biodiverse country in the world. Today, about 80% of people worldwide use traditional herbal medicines, and a similar proportion of pharmacological compounds used in modern medicine are isolated directly from plants or are inspired by plant compounds. Indigenous peoples are particularly dependent on plant species for medicinal uses and are the main custodians of this botanical diversity. However, most of the plants used by Indigenous communities continue to be collected in a rapidly degrading natural environment.
Botanical collections alleviate many of these issues and provide a venue for members of various ethnic groups to discuss their ethnobotanical knowledge. Ideally, these collections should also be a space to perpetuate the traditional use of plants, either directly or through community donation programs. It is also essential to generate conversations about the use of modern techniques to study and use sacred plants in an ethical way. The borrachero is ideal for motivating these conversations because it is a plant that has been exchanged and modified for millennia, generating progress and changing visions in the cultures it reached. In addition, the beauty and mystique of this plant also facilitates the generation of bridges of knowledge through art, since the borrachero is an enormous source of aesthetic inspiration.
We have created collections of medicinal plants in metropolitan and local botanical gardens. These projects have arisen largely from the initiative of traditional healers like Taita Bernardo Chindoy, who understand firsthand the importance of the study, use and conservation of sacred plants. Taita Bernardo believes that learning traditional medicine, like an academic career, takes a lifetime. Traditionally, the most important form of learning is through family whereby he has passed on his knowledge to children and grandchildren, who live with him. Although he says that learning traditional medicine takes a lifetime, he continually receives visits from people and has traveled throughout Colombia and the world to impart his medicine and share his knowledge to people of different genders and ethnic backgrounds. These experiences have allowed him to continue learning and discovering.
My scientific vision has been transformed by my collaboration with Taita Bernardo, who describes himself as a “scientist” of ancestral knowledge who believes that “experimentation is the most important thing”. Since he was a child, he experimented with borracheros and under the effects of these plants he had his first visions in which he understood that he had to be a healer, travel and learn continuously. Before he was 10 years old, he went out alone to travel the Amazon and, after working on many things and getting to know many cultures, he ended up settling in the lower Putumayo. For years he has been interested in recovering the different varieties of borracheros of his native Sibundoy with which he and his daughter, an experienced midwife, work. Taita Bernardo’s life experience has inspired me to seek a balance between tradition and experimentation in order to insert the flying plants into the changing modern world. Likewise, studying the history of the borracheros has given me hope about the capacity of these plants to continue changing themselves as well as transforming us.
References
1. Schultes RE, Hofmann A. Plants of the Gods: Their Sacred, Healing, and Hallucinogenic Powers. Rochester, Vermont: Healing Arts Press,1992
2. Robinson DW, Brown K, McMenemy M, Dennany L, Baker MJ, Allan P, et al. “Datura quids at Pinwheel Cave, California, provide unambiguous confirmation of the ingestion of hallucinogens at a rock art site.” Proc Natl Acad Sci. 2020;117(49):31026-37.
3. Guerra-Doce E, Rihuete-Herrada C, Micó R, Risch R, Lull V, Niemeyer H. “Direct evidence of the use of multiple drugs in Bronze Age Menorca (Western Mediterranean) from human hair analysis.” Sci Rep. 2023;13(1):4782.
4. Hay, A, Gottschalk, M, Holguín A. Huanduj. Richmond, Surrey: Florilegium/Kew: 2012.
5. Schultes RE, Plowman T. “The Ethnobotany of Brugmansia: Tommie Earl Lockwood.” J Ethnopharmacol. 1979;1(2):147-64.
6. Bristol ML. “Tree Datura Drugs of the Colombian Sibundoy.” Bot Mus Leafl Harv Univ. 1969;22(5):165-227.
7. Cámara-Leret R, Bascompte J. “Language Extinction Triggers the Loss of Unique Medicinal Knowledge.” Proc Natl Acad Sci. 2021;118(24):e2103683118.
8. Davis, Wade. One River: Explorations and Discoveries in the Amazon Rain Forest. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996.
9. Rojas S, Madriñan S, Stahl M, Harter K. “Cultural Use of Tropane Alkaloids of Brugmansia Species and Cultivars in Colombia Depends on Local Plant Growth Environment Rather than Genetic Diversity.” bioRxiv. 2023;2023-11.
10. Perez-Mesa P, Pardo RA, Alseekh S, Rojas-Contreras S, Sierra GP, et al. “Genetic Basis of Alkaloid Divergence in the Solanaceae.” 2024
11. Hernández-Duarte, Sergio .A.; Oliveros-Garay, Oscar .A.; González-Almario, Adriana¹ ; Delgado-Niño, Maria .C.; Roda-Fornaguera, Federico. “Detection of Colombian datura virus infecting Brugmansia × candida medicinal cultivars and evaluation of sap inoculation in Solanaceae plants,” 23 January 2025, PREPRINT (Version 1) available at Research Square [https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-5845050/v1]
