Sacred Indigenous Plants in the Anthropocene

Native to the Chihuahuan desert, Lophophora williamsii grows underneath the glare of the Southwestern sun. Baby pink flowers bloom from the tips of these small, spineless cacti. More commonly referred to as peyote, this cactus plant is rich with Indigenous American history. For centuries peyote has been a sacred medicine and an aid in spiritual healing. Its psychedelic alkaloid, mescaline, induces visual and auditory hallucinations. It is a way for Indigenous Americans to connect with their ancestors and the spirit world, and to further understand their own mental battles. Traditionally, peyote is consumed either raw or dried. The plant is eaten in the form of “buttons”, which are disc-shaped and cut from the top of the cactus. Peyote buttons can also be cooked in boiling water to make a tea or even ground up into a powder or paste. The process of taking peyote in a religious context often requires complete vulnerability and can be grueling and harsh. It is not the same as taking other recreational drugs and should not be treated as such.

Peyote cactus (Lophophora williamsii) in bloom

Formally founded in the early twentieth century, the Native American Church is a pan-religious movement centered around the use of peyote. Peyote is now boxed into the category of a schedule I drug under the 1970 Drug Act due to its hallucinogenic abilities and potential dangers to health. Indigenous Americans have fought hard for their right to keep peyote for religious and cultural practices. Through their efforts, the Native American Church was granted legal exemption from the ban and were allowed use for religious purposes for cultural preservation through the 1994 amendment to the American Indian Religious Freedom Act (AIRFA). Despite this legal win, the relationship between peyote, the sacred healer, and Indigenous Americans still faces danger on both a human and environmental scale. According to the 1990 Employment Division v. Smith ruling, should members of the Native American church use peyote, they are vulnerable to being fired from their jobs and denied unemployment benefits regardless of their religious and cultural exemptions.

In recent times, a Native American group - Apache Stronghold - has risen up to protect peyote and the sacred land it rests upon. Earlier in the year (2025), the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the decision to transfer the Arizona Oak Flat, also known as Chi’chil Biłdagoteel among Native Americans, to a private mining company. For what reason? The world’s third largest copper mine deposit resides under protected Native land and is the current target of the corporation Resolution Copper, a subsidiary of mining companies Rio Tinto and BHP. One recent article on Grist describes the effects of the mining operation, saying it “will leave a crater nearly 1,000 feet deep and 2 miles wide.” Apache Stronghold, along with religious freedom groups, are fighting back. They are speaking up for the land in the form of protests and legal action to prevent the irrevocable disastrous ecological and spiritual effects of the mines.

Members of Apache Stronghold at the US Surpeme Court in September 2024

The illegal drug designation of the peyote cactus means that there are strict regulations of where they are permitted to be grown for religious and cultural use. Restricted designated areas, called peyote gardens, are where Native Americans would go to prayerfully collect these cacti. Through the government peyotero system, government licensed peyoteros harvest the peyote cactus by the thousands and sell them back to members of the Native American church. Despite the threats surrounding their use and the very existence of peyote, members of the Native American church wish for the cactus to remain illegal in order to protect it from exploitation and endangerment. For perspective, it takes 30 - 40 years for the cactus to mature for use. Poaching and over-harvesting have already caused massive damage to the existing cactus gardens as well. Unfortunately, the Native American Church’s wish for the plant to remain illegal is being threatened by the increasing interest in peyote among non-Indigenous people.

Over the years, psychedelic retreats have opened their doors to anyone seeking Indigenous-culture-mediated enlightenment. Whether it is a rustic cabin retreat in Colorado, or a luxurious wellness center in Costa Rica, these establishments have become popular. Retreats that revolve around consuming peyote are often several days long and cost thousands of dollars for participants. To critics, they strip away the spiritual sacredness of the plant and commodity it for profit.

For many non-Indigenous people, the process of consuming sacred plants like peyote cacti and Yage (Banisteriopsis caapi) is intriguing. Yage, sometimes called ayahuasca, is a plant that is yet another sacred medicine that has increased in desirability outside of Native culture. Like peyote, yage is of significant importance to many Indigenous South Americans. This plant is one of the major components in a brew (also called ayahuasca) that also consists of leaves of a second plant, chacruna (Psychotria viridis). Chacruna (or chaqruy in the Indigenous Quechua language) contains DMT, a powerful hallucinogenic alkaloid. Yage contains harmala alkaloids, which inhibit monoamine oxidase enzymes, allowing DMT to be orally active. Yage is native to the Amazon rainforest and has been used by several Indigenous South American tribes for centuries. Both plants that make up the ayahuasca brew are seen as spiritual healers that help connect the user to the spirit world.

Yage (Banisteriopsis caapi) grows as a liana - a giant woody vine - in the Amazon Basin

However, many Indigenous people have made their concerns about recreational use clear. The "psychedelic renaissance" refers to the increased interest in hallucinogenic drugs in the general population. It poses one of the greatest threats to the peyote cactus, as use of psychedelics has significantly grown as a trend in both destination-experience vacations for tourists and in scientific investigations into potential medical treatments. Non-native tourists often seek out these psychedelic experiences as they are advertised as an “Indigenous” healing ceremony, a means to cleanse oneself from secular ailments of the mind and heart, and as an opportunity to experience spiritual awakenings. Turning peyote cactus or ayahuasca into a recreational drug for non-Indigenous people can result in overharvesting, ecological damage, and the erasure of cultural importance. In an interview with AP News, Darrell Red Cloud, who is Oglala Lakota, speaks on the dangers of widespread access to peyote when it is grown outside of its native habitat or in production labs. He says, “it just becomes a drug that people depend on rather than a spiritual medicine.”

Many plants like peyote and those in the ayahuasca brew have been used and intertwined within Indigenous cultures and identity for generations and still prevail today. Steven Benally, a Navajo elder from Sweetwater, Arizona describes what these plants mean to the Native American experience. He says in the AP News interview, “Our belief is that these plants, these animals, these birds are just like us. They can hear, they can understand. They have their powers, they have their place, a purpose and a reason — just like us.”

These special, reciprocal relationships between Indigenous peoples and their plant counterparts must be protected from the exploitation and decimation that comes with capitalistic gain and approaches; whether it comes from medical research, psychedelic retreats, or copper mines that destroy sacred land to extract minerals for profit.

Who gets to decide the fate of the peyote cactus and who is best suited to act as its voice?

As these industries continuously seek new capital amongst earth’s limited gifts to extract wealth from, at what point do we ask about the well-being of our non-human companions?

One step towards beneficial action lies in looking towards the wisdom from those who have known this land the longest. We do this by centering and supporting Indigenous and Native voices in the fight to protect our intertwined freedoms and the land we live on.

-- Mikaela Montesclaros & Lily Shield