The result is over-harvesting of remaining stocks, making peyote even more scarce. “Things are kind of getting slower every year,’’ said Morales, who is one of just three Americans licensed to sell peyote, which grows wild in four Texas counties along the border with Mexico.
Peyote is illegal under federal law, except for use in some American Indian religious ceremonies. Since the mid-1970s, the state has licensed a small number of people to sell it to members of the Native American Church.
California voters recently rejected a proposal to legalize marijuana for recreational use, and a drug war threatens to tear Mexico apart. But Morales says his business is simple and honest.
“I try to stay out of problems,’’ he said. “I’ve been doing it too long.’’
Morales, 67, has seven employees who search for peyote plants to harvest their “buttons,’’ small, round growths that contain the mind-altering juice mescaline, which produces a dreamlike delirium for up to 12 hours.
Users generally chew on the buttons, smoke them, or boil them in water to make tea.
Morales’s crews now bring in about 3,000 buttons per day, but even four years ago, it was 10,000. He began harvesting peyote at 14, when American Indian elders taught him to cut the buttons without harming the roots. Back then, each button could be sold to distributors for a nickel, but had to be at least as large as a half dollar.
Now Morales pays his harvesters 15 cents per button, no matter the size. “There are no more half-dollar sizes around.’’
Known as peyoteros, the distributors use information provided by families in the area to hunt the cactus down, and they know all roads and trails by heart.
Prime spots are usually hillsides that are a bit rocky and have no sand in the soil. The intense heat means harvesters can often search only until early afternoon and must contend with the occasional rattlesnake.
