Text & Picture: I Am Shaman
The famous red and white fly agaric mushroom
(Amanita muscaria) is very common in Western North America, Europe, Siberia and Asia, where it can be found on the ground: under pine, spruce, fir, birch, live oak and madrone
(Arbutus menziesii).
It grows solitary, scattered, densely, or in large rings ('fairy rings') in forests and at their edges. It is often found in coastal pine forests and along freeways where pines have been planted.
The fly agaric is historically the most widely used hallucinogenic in the world. For over thousands of years it has been used by shamans, witchdoctors and priests throughout Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas. They used it mainly for religious purposes such as healing, receiving prophecies, summoning spirits, communication with ancestors and perceiving divine immortality.
It has been suggested that this mushroom was at the source of (if not all, then at least most of) the major religions, and in symbolized form it occurs often in many folk tales and alchemical texts. It was also used recreationally and by warriors for acquiring courage for battle.
The most important active substance in the Amanita Muscaria is muscimol, unlike most other hallucinogenic mushrooms, where the active substance often is psilocybin and/or psilocin. The active substances are activated by drying the mushroom.
AMANITA 
