by Nursery Specialist Guadalupe Cota    

"The Fabulous Angel's Trumpets"   

Brugmansias belong in the Wicked Plant family, but are probably familiar to many of you who live in the Bay Area. They grow in our backyards, and are currently blooming in the Arizona Garden gracing the Conservatory's parking circle! You may be more familiar with their common name 'Angel Trumpets,' recognizing their horn-like shape. They belong to the poisonous Solanaceae family of Atropa belladonna fame. Autumn is the best time to see the Angel Trumpets, and thanks to Berkeley Horticultural Nursery, we have several cultivars of Brugmansias in the Wicked Plants Exhibit.

Brugmansias are tropical trees or large shrubs native to South America and are rich in powerful tropane alkaloids: atropine, scopolamine and hyoscyamine.  Brugmansias are related to Datura and are potent solanaceous plants that have been used as a medicine and a poison. Datura innoxia grows in the American Southwest and has a long history of use by the Zuni and Navajo tribes.  

The cool growing species, Brugmansia aurea and Brugmansia sanguinea, inhabit wet highlands above 6,000 feet and have nodding, pendent flowers.  Golden Angel's Trumpet is employed for medicinal purposes; healers use the crushed leaves and flowers in a tea in Columbia and northern Peru. The seeds are used as an additive to chicha, a brew. Brugmansia sanguinea, Blood-Red Angel's Trumpet, has been cultivated and used for divination and healing purposes since pre-Colombian times.

The lowlanders, Brugmansia suaveolens, Brugmansia versicolor and Brugmansia x insignis, grow in Western Amazonia and are employed as hallucinogens or as an admixture with Ayahuasca; also known as Yage or Caapi.  The brew is made from the Vine of the Soul, the celebrated hallucinogenic plant of the Amazon. The Brugmansias are always found in fields, cemeteries and by houses- never in the wild. They bring on a crazed disorientation and terrifying visions followed by complete amnesia.  Many shamans cultivate Brugmansia cultigens in their gardens for their psychoactive properties; leaves and flowers are crushed in cold water or aguardiente (a sugar alcoholic distillate).

If you're interested in further stories about the role of these plants in a historical context, you might read One River by Wade Davis.  One River mentions the ritual use of Ayahuasca and Brugmansia by many tribes in the Amazon Basin.  Wade Davis recounts his travels in South America with Timothy Plowman, both students of the famous Harvard botanist Richard Evans Schultes. Dr. Schultes worked in South America to bring many plants new to science, made many friends of the tribes in Colombia and explored many rivers.

Enjoy the beauty of these dangerous plants this fall, but do not experiment: outside of the ritual use, which has been closely manipulated by tribe leaders over time, these plants are fatal to consume.