Hi!
I recently acquired three ~18" x ~2.5" Bridgesii cuttings and I plan to use two of them and cultivate the third. I have never worked with cacti before so I've been reading a lot here and other places. I'd like to get some input from the intelligentsia here before I get started though. Based on what I've read I think I want to make a tea (for two) following this guide I found at Erowid (https://www.erowid.org/plants/cacti/cacti_growers_guide.shtml - about 1/3 of the way down the page). I assume one prepares Bridgesii and Pachanoi the same way. I'm more concerned with potency than with nausea prevention so it seems to me, given that extractions can never be 100% efficient, ingesting as much of the actual plant matter as possible would be the best solution. To that end I'm thinking of using a very course filter and drinking as much of the pulp as I can. Thoughts?

Also, I've read that stressing the cacti will make them more potent and that not watering them for an entire growing season is a good way to do that. If that is so, do I need to root the cacti to do this? If I'm not going to be watering them at all, can I just keep the cuttings on a windowsill or set them outside?

If anyone has any tips or suggestions about working with this plant I'd love to hear them.

Thanks!

I despine with needlenose pliers (grip and roll, rather than pluck), slice it up into strips and then freeze/thaw it twice to break down the cell walls and loosen the harder outer skin. Remove the outer skin then liquify in a blender with about 8 ounces of lemon juice. Add the foamy green slime to the biggest cooking pot you have and low boil it til it cooks down to a manageable amount (about 20 minutes). Simmer for about an hour and a half, adding water if needed. Let cool and strain through a t-shirt.

Chug it in the morning, unless you don't mind staying up all night. Enjoy the purge.

Thanks for the suggestions! I'll make sure to do that.

Good advices given by Wolfnippletip.
I have done this only once, with Peruvianus and Pachanoi. It was really perfect by slicing them, freezing them then blending them, without removing the outer skin, since we decided to experiment the whole plant effect and we red that the outer skin was responsible, at least partially, of the purging effects. By the way, I appreciated the purge as a purifying step in the experience!

After blending our cacti, we blended them and gently boiled them during 6 hours, adding some fresh water each time it was necessary. Didn't add lemon juice but the water we used was from a lightly acidic stream (pH 5,5).

After that, we filtered, through a coton shirt, and then reduced the resulting juice to 700 ml. What will need to be improved next time, to me, is this step: this resulting juice had a bitter taste, but not disgusting. What was really awfull was the texture: each sip was like swallowing a dead slug! It took me one hour to drink 250ml... So, I think we shouldn't have reduced that much the cactus juice, it would have been easier to drink!

To finish: I don't know about letting your cutings behind a window, I heard it was better to keep them 2 to 4 weeks in the dark before to consume them, that's what I did, in the middle of the growing season, without watering them during one month before to take the cuttings.

This said, it was a really great experience, I think, to this day, my favorite one with any psychedelic! I wish you the best, let us know how it was for you.

Peace

Thank you very much for your input as well!