Posted on 01/26/2026 3:16:59 PM PST by BenLurkin
Only recently described by science, the mysterious mushrooms are found in different parts of the world, but they give people the same exact visions.
Every year, doctors at a hospital in the Yunnan Province of China brace themselves for an influx of people with an unusual complaint. The patients come with a strikingly odd symptom: visions of pint-sized, elf-like figures – marching under doors, crawling up walls and clinging to furniture.
The hospital treats hundreds of these cases every year. All share a common culprit: Lanmaoa asiatica, a type of mushroom that forms symbiotic relationships with pine trees in nearby forests and is a locally popular food, known for its savory, umami-packed flavor. In Yunnan, L. asiatica is sold in markets, it appears on restaurant menus and is served at home during peak mushroom season between June and August.
One must be careful to cook it thoroughly, though, otherwise the hallucinations will set in.
"At a mushroom hot pot restaurant there, the server set a timer for 15 minutes and warned us, 'Don't eat it until the timer goes off or you might see little people,'" says Colin Domnauer, a doctoral candidate in biology at the University of Utah and the Natural History Museum of Utah, who is studying L. asiatica. "It seems like very common knowledge in the culture there."
But outside of Yunnan and a couple of other places, the strange mushroom is largely an enigma.
"There were many accounts about the existence of this psychedelic [mushroom], and many people who looked for it, but they never found the species," says Giuliana Furci, a mycologist and the founder and executive director of the Fungi Foundation, a non-profit group dedicated to discovering, documenting and conserving fungi.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
There’s a TV commercial for mushroom tea (RYZE), with a cute mushroom person who dances. Here it is: https://youtu.be/zFKuoQst174?si=b6-YQev9I_lRcz-O
So that’s where the dancing mushrooms in Fantasia went.

"I saw I saw it I tell you no lie."
One wonders if this helps explain the widespread mythology of pixies, sprites, elves, brownies, leprechauns, and all other sorts of wee folk?
Most likely.
I wonder if it has the same molecules as DMT. People taking DMT have supposedly been seeing “machine elves” for years and years.
Freegards
“machine elves” are those elves in work overalls, a hardhats and organizing a machinist union?
Interestingly,Charles Bonnet Syndrome is a set of visual hallucinations that commonly feature miniature people in detailed attire...like chimney sweeps, with tall hats. Multiple patients reported this! When macular degeneration reduces visual stimuli, the brain compensates with its own visual contribution. My mom had this but because she had vascular dementia she thought the images were frightening (some, not all).
How people with this syndrome can conjure specific images of tiny, ornate people going about complicated business is fascinating, especially if it ties in with a hallucinogen like the mushrooms. Macular sufferers without dementia usually identify them as fake, but think of all the sane people who refuse to tell anyone what they’re seeing.
When I first told my mom’s retina specialist about her visions, I was dumbfounded and given the name of a woman specialist studying it, Dr. Lylas Mogk. I spoke to her once, she said ondansetron, which I never heard of in 2002, at the time, but now it’s a common anti-nausea med, coincidentally reduced the visions.
As a young man I had friends who took acid... I never did myself because I saw them go insane in all directions.
Must have been bad s—t.
I guess they look like little robot looking things. The other name for them is fractal elves.
Freegards
For the mushrooms to be the cause of the elf like hallucinations it would have to be shown that all, or most of all, the people who eat the mushrooms get the exact hallucination. Sounds like suggestive phenomena to me. Would have to happen in any province where the mushroom is eaten
Mass formation psychosis - like Covid fear porn?
Maybe. Lewy body dementia has similar symptoms: "Visual hallucinations, often featuring vivid, non-threatening images of small people, children, or animals, are a core early symptom of Lewy body dementia (LBD), affecting roughly 80% of patients. These "little people" hallucinations, along with seeing animals, are often detailed, recurrent, and may occur in the evening. " I knew a lady who had this and she knew she was hallucinating but they were so real.
Sounds like DMT and clockwork elves.

I wonder, do Asian people see tiny Asians, Caucasian people see tiny Caucasians and so on and so on?
thats easy to explain, they are all real,
crawling, climbing, and clinging Asia Roaches.
Fo you GI, no estra chaj, yum yum.
I don't know...I wish I had asked her. She's dead now so can't find out.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.