Why Animals Eat Psychoactive Plants






Why Animals Eat Psychoactive Plants


February 10th, 2015

Via: BoingBoing:

What Ronald K. Siegel discovered seems strange at first. He explains in his book Intoxication:

After sampling the numbing nectar of certain orchids, bees drop to the ground in a temporary stupor, then weave back for more. Birds gorge themselves on inebriating berries, then fly with reckless abandon. Cats eagerly sniff aromatic “pleasure� plants, then play with imaginary objects. Cows that browse special range weeds will twitch, shake, and stumble back to the plants for more. Elephants purposely get drunk off fermented fruits. Snacks of “magic mushrooms� cause monkeys to sit with their heads in their hands in a posture reminiscent of Rodin’s Thinker. The pursuit of intoxication by animals seems as purposeless as it is passionate. Many animals engage these plants, or their manufactured allies, despite the danger of toxic or poisonous effects.

Noah’s Ark, he found, would have looked a lot like London on a Saturday night. “In every country, in almost every class of animal,� Siegel explains, “I found examples of not only the accidental but the intentional use of drugs.� In West Bengal, a group of 150 elephants smashed their way into a warehouse and drank a massive amount of moonshine. They got so drunk they went on a rampage and killed five people, as well as demolishing seven concrete buildings. If you give hash to male mice, they become horny and seek out females — but then they find “they can barely crawl over the females, let alone mount them,� so after a little while they yawn and start licking their own penises.

In Vietnam, the water buffalo have always shunned the local opium plants. They don’t like them. But when the American bombs started to fall all around them during the war, the buffalo left their normal grazing grounds, broke into the opium fields, and began to chew. They would then look a little dizzy and dulled. When they were traumatized, it seems, they wanted — like the mongoose, like us — to escape from their thoughts.















<!–

–>











<!– AD CAN GO HERE

Buy gold online - quickly, safely and at low prices

END: AD CAN GO HERE –>

Leave a Reply


You must be logged in to post a comment.







Source Article from http://www.cryptogon.com/?p=46009

Views: 0

You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Leave a Reply

Powered by WordPress | Designed by: Premium WordPress Themes | Thanks to Themes Gallery, Bromoney and Wordpress Themes