|
Some of these posts are very old and might contain outdated information. You may wish to search for newer posts instead.
|
Asante
Omnicyclion prophet
Registered: 02/06/02
Posts: 87,291
|
The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies
#4012231 - 04/04/05 10:22 AM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
Warning: Opium is highly addictive and poisonous in overdose. It can and in fact is likely to destroy your entire life upon misuse, not just by its properties but also because it's nearly universally persecuted by the governments of most of the world. Poppy-lancing is a criminal act in most countries of the world. -----------------------------------------------------------------------
It's your turn for show & tell You are ofcouse pristine but AFOAF has lanced a poppy every now and then. The lancing of poppy-heads is an ancient craft that unfortunately is hardly known outside of the Opium-producing countries. The DEA describes this craft thus:
Quote:
The scoring of the pods (also called 'lancing,' 'incising,' or 'tapping') begins about two weeks after the flower petals fall from the pods. The farmer examines the pod and the tiny crown portion on the top of the pod very carefully before scoring. . The grayish-green pod will become a dark green color as it matures and it will swell in size. If the points of the pod's crown are standing straight out or are curved upward, the pod is ready to be scored. If the crown's points turn downward, the pod is not yet fully matured. Not all the plants in a field will be ready for scoring at the same time and each pod can be tapped more than once. . A set of three or four small blades of iron, glass, or glass splinters bound tightly together on a wooden handle is used to score two or three sides of the pod in a vertical direction. If the blades cut too deep into the wall of the pod, the opium will flow too quickly and will drip to the ground. If the incisions are too shallow, the flow will be too slow and the opium will harden in the pods. A depth of about one millimeter is desired for the incision. . Using a blade-tool designed to cut to that depth, scoring ideally starts in late afternoon so the white raw opium latex can ooze out and slowly coagulate on the surface of the pod overnight. If the scoring begins too early in the afternoon, the sun will cause the opium to coagulate over the incision and block the flow. Raw opium oxidizes, darkens and thickens in the cool night air. Early the next morning, the opium gum is scraped from the surface of the pods with a short-handled, flat, iron blade three to four inches wide. . Opium harvesters work their way backwards across the field scoring the lower, mature pods before the taller pods, in order to avoid brushing up against the sticky pods. The pods continue to produce opium for several days. Farmers will return to these plants - sometimes up to five or six times - to gather additional opium until the pod is totally depleted. The opium is collected in a container which hangs from the farmer's neck or waist. . The opium yield from a single pod varies greatly, ranging from 10 to 100 milligrams of opium per pod. The average yield per pod is about 80 milligrams. The dried opium weight yield per hectare of poppies ranges from eight to fifteen kilograms.
We are thankful the DEA has helped record this Craft so that it may be passed on to those isolated from the father-to-son teachings of the poppyfields.
But let's hear some stories! You likely have heard of AFOAF who did this himself and as such can relate more direct experiences then that rather bland DEA tutori-woops!- information booklet.
So let's hear some stories from the Poppyfields! We see many threads on the sowing and growing of poppies, but hardly a word is said about the lancing of them. So for today's Show and Tell we'll talk about The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies.
.
-------------------- Omnicyclion.org higher knowledge starts here
|
Asante
Omnicyclion prophet
Registered: 02/06/02
Posts: 87,291
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: Asante]
#4012264 - 04/04/05 10:38 AM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
Well, let me start myself!
Some years ago AFOAF sowed some poppyseeds. No devious intent, he just wanted to see if it could be done with spicerack poppies. And it -could- be done. Over small lettuces stood a few walnut-sized bulbs on top of gracefully curved stalks.
So to see if it could be done he decided to lance the poppyheads one evening, using a throw-away boxcutter blade. His plan was to score three slits on either side of the pod but ended up doing three slits on one quarter of each pod. His first lancing cut right through the surprisingly thin wall making the juice drip inside the pod.
The second lancing was about right, but the white juice spilled across the blade so he did his subsequent lancings upward instead of downward. Some drops of the juice spilled on the soil.
The other morning the drops on the pods had dried to dark brown ickiness. To see if it could be done he decided to scrape upwards to see if he could catch Opium. There was very little yield, perhaps 5-10 mg off of one pod. Wondering about the taste of Opium he put it to his tongue. It was sharp and VERY bitter.
Then he knew what he wanted to know. He spat out the brown dab, uprooted the plants and put them on his compost heap.
If he had *harvested* then he had grown poppies in the Dutch half-shade (temperate climate) from culinary seeds, gotten two-foot Nigrums with beautiful purplehearted flowers, light-grayish green pods big as walnuts and each of those single pods per plant would have yielded him, I guess, 10-30mg of Opium.
This is the only lancing story I know of
-------------------- Omnicyclion.org higher knowledge starts here
|
Cloud9
I don't feel, and it feels great
Registered: 07/03/03
Posts: 1,554
Loc: between here and there
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: Asante]
#4012430 - 04/04/05 11:40 AM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
Good info, i've been reading about poppies a lot lately.
--------------------
|
Cherk
Fashionable
Registered: 10/25/02
Posts: 46,493
Loc: International
Last seen: 1 year, 4 months
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: Asante]
#4012960 - 04/04/05 02:33 PM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
A FOAF grew some persian whites a while back. He enjoyed the beautiful flower, but even more so, the opium His pods were relatively small however, and it took him about 3 pods worth of opium to get where he wanted to be.
--------------------
I have considered such matters. SIKE
|
mjshroomer
Sage
Registered: 07/21/99
Posts: 13,774
Loc: gone with my shrooms
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: Asante]
#4012961 - 04/04/05 02:33 PM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
HEre is a scored pod and the milking dripping latex being harvessted, northern Thailand near the Fang River in a field pof poppies belonning to a Hmong tribal group.
mj
|
mjshroomer
Sage
Registered: 07/21/99
Posts: 13,774
Loc: gone with my shrooms
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: mjshroomer]
#4016727 - 04/05/05 10:49 AM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
bump?
mj
|
MycoCakeEater
Old Hand
Registered: 06/16/03
Posts: 1,572
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: mjshroomer]
#4017037 - 04/05/05 12:07 PM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
Thats not a tattoo, just a lil sharpie remembernce of Rhodium/The Hive, which I miss very much.
I score in the morning and and come back when its the consistancy of maple syrup. Ill have some scoring pics for you fellas in a few months.
MCE
|
Asante
Omnicyclion prophet
Registered: 02/06/02
Posts: 87,291
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: MycoCakeEater]
#4017316 - 04/05/05 01:06 PM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
Myco! You're 999! Just one more post and you're a four digit Shroomerite!
-------------------- Omnicyclion.org higher knowledge starts here
|
MycoCakeEater
Old Hand
Registered: 06/16/03
Posts: 1,572
|
Re: The Ancient Craft of Lancing Poppies [Re: Asante]
#4018506 - 04/05/05 06:14 PM (18 years, 11 months ago) |
|
|
Whooo Hooooo!
|
|