Honestly wtf?

I was going to research this myself, but then I got high.

I was gonna write my final report, but then I got high..
- And now I'm shitposting on Lemmy and I know why, yeah-heah...

The seeds are carried by birds and can survive in a dormant state for years.
Lots of stuff like trees washed away by rivers end up floating in the ocean.
But it's also perfectly feasible that a limited trade happened far in the past.
Polynesians showed that you can reliably cross even the pacific on boats made using stone tools and fire.

Humans before the Ice Age were fishing for tuna in the deep sea and were coastal hopping everywhere there are coasts to hop.
- Most of human history:
Limited trade... There were full on global trade networks through most of human history. Ironically, not as much across the Atlantic, because civilization in the Americas was centered on the West coast
But you find all sorts of stuff turning up everywhere. Not much of it, and most of it is lost to history, but enough to establish that global trade networks were the norm and not the exception
- My favourite trade fact is that when the Norse settled Newfoundland, it was theoretically possible to send an item from Patagonia to Melbourne via American and European trade routes, the silk road onto the treppang fishers and then into Australian aboriginal trade routes. But I'm just realising it could probably have gone the other way via Easter Island as well
Same as Rhipsalis_baccifera.
- Oh wow, didn't know that! :O

Graduate students famously never make mistakes (like including their own hair in samples) and also never smoke weed. So that couldn’t be it.

- Its likely origin was in Central America,[2][4] and it has been introduced in many world regions.[5][6][7] [...] D. stramonium has frequently been employed in traditional medicine to treat a variety of ailments.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datura_stramonium

The swallow may fly south with the sun, or the house-martin or the plumber may seek warmer climes in winter; yet these are not strangers to our land.

ARE YOU SUGGESTING THAT COCONUTS MIGRATE?
- Depends on if it's being carried by an African or European swallow.
Plumber?
- Failed mechanics
- Yes that puzzled me too, I checked like 5 different transcripts and they all said the same thing.

I walk past this plant all the time and I'm super tempted. I did salvia so I feel like the effects shouldn't freak me out. Rn I just kill them with gloves. We get also get Ricinus, that's not as tempting.

To give an honest answer, it's so fucking invasive I wouldn't be surprised if actually managed to survive a trip across the Atlantic or the pacific.

The question is how? I don't think we'll know until we find the "vessel" that carried it.

Don't, every trip report is horrifying, there are better ways to get high, that are also safer.
On top of being a bad experience datura doses are very hard to get right, you are very likely to overdose and die. And like I said, If you don't die, you will get a traumatic experience that can possibly fuck your mental health for decades.
Alternative drugs exist if you want to get high. Please check trip reports and harm reduction sources before trying anything.
- Like salvia but worse. And every salvia story is awful.
isn't that like the nightmare drug, that you can rather easily die from?
- Yeh, I just want to make a weak tea and slowly try it out. The seed pods sound horrible, but I'm probably going to make tea from the flowers.
I also did salvia but I wouldn't touch datura with a 10 ft pole.
I tried stramonium a couple times by smoking some seeds, I would describe it as unpleasant enough to not bother again, in the just not worth it category.
- How was it unpleasant? You don't have to answer. Im curious.
i've not done datura myself but by all accounts it's much more like benadryl than salvia, to the point that benedryl is described as being "like datura junior". you should check out some of these trip reports and think long and hard about if that experience is worth the risks to you.
Hi, drug nerd here. Especially psychedelic plants and fungi.
Don't.
And not just because I tried it in my twenties and had a really horrible time. But also because I've learned a lot in the last two decades about the plant, and that potency can vary significantly.
A dose someone took in a trip report where they had mild effects could cause temporary or permanent blindness for you. Because the plant that you are consuming may be a lot more potent than theirs was.
But yes, the trip is horrible. If you want to know what it's like it's a form of delirium. So if you've ever been up for long periods of time and your mind has started playing tricks on you, it's like that. On top of this you also experience urinary retention, which means I spent the night getting up to use the bathroom while delirious and being unable to pee.
And remember I mentioned temporary blindness, I had what you could call the opposite of tunnel vision. I wasn't able to focus and could really only see using my peripheral vision. This effect lasted well into the next day.
And while I was actually high, I was mostly experiencing audio hallucinations and I just wanted it to be over so I tried to sleep through it. About the only interesting anecdote I have is that I got up in the middle of the night to turn off a CD that was on repeat, only to find that I had unplugged the stereo hours before.
No insight aside from don't drink datura.
For a similar and safer visionary effect, try staying up for 2 days. It's basically the same feeling but without all of the side effects. There's also the old formulation of Dramamine, I don't remember what it's called but very similar deliriant but in a measured dose.
And none of those I would really consider fun or especially insightful. Considering most of us are familiar with sleep deprivation anyway.

Wouldn’t there be other possible plants that would provide the same alkaloid compounds?

That was what I thought until I reached this part with a link to another paper.
Charred capsules of Datura stramonium were recovered in a Middle Bronze Age ritual pit at Prats, Andorra, ca. 1600 BCE
- Ohhh daaaaam!!
- But if it was growing in Europe at that time, wouldn't it be all over the place and be in books in the Middle Ages? Unless the Bronze Agers somehow smoked all of it.

Birds?

But birds aren't real, haven't you heard?
- Heard what?
Have to be migratory, of course.
It's not a question of where he grips it! It's a simple question of weight ratios!
Damn Central American Swallows!
- They have a higher velocity, you know.

Some things get around because they're so pretty, don't worry about it

don’t worry about it
reaches for flamethrower and glyphosate

Uh, that's... Shit! I was going to sleep soon too!

So, you're telling me that this plant...
\ puts sunglasses
\ Went on a high trip.

I live in the middle of nowhere in Eastern North America. Saw some growing all by itself in the middle of the lane. It never came back in that spot and I've never seen any other plants. The seed pods are really spiky and light, they must hitch a ride on stuff.

I decided not to try it after reading a few "trip reports".

not the first time OP is raising questions like this 🤔