NETTLES -- ADVENTURES IN ORGANIC SM
Northwest Indians used them to keep awake on long canoe voyages.
English herbwives used them to stimulate prize bulls to do their
duty. English Mistresses found them equally useful, and nettles are
almost as common in Victorian erotica as canes and birches.
Nettles can be the main element of a scene, or just serve to spice
one up. They can be a threat, a warmup, a tease, a punishment or a
sensory enhancement. And, like SM itself, they don't feel like what
people expect.
Recall that lovely glow that comes just after the sharp pain of a
whipstroke fades? Nettles are much the same, but the glow can last
for hours. The first touch is very sharp and hot, fading slowly to
a hot glow. This glow takes a long time to cool, and can't really
be ignored because it has microscopic electric tingles in it, just
often enough to keep you constantly aware. Nettles are perfect for
anyone who likes overnight bondage, prolonged teasing, or going out
in public with the scene hidden under street clothes.
Besides the initial hot sting and later tingling glow, nettles leave
the skin very sensitive. A feather can feel like a brush, a light
spanking feels like a strap, a light strap or flogger can blow their
minds. One lovely nettles fan once asked me if the treatment she
had just received would affect a spanking much. I gave her a few
light swats with just my fingertips and after she got her breath
back she claimed that a "four-year-old could have me in agony."
Incidentally, blows heavier than a slap are not boosted so
dramatically; heavy impact still feels like heavy impact. Only
surface sensitivity goes up.
Aside from re-sensitizing tough, jaded bottoms, nettles may be used
on areas that should not receive heavy blows because of underlying
bones, tendons, or fragile organs. Nettles ability to deliver
intense stimulation withour corresponding damage opens all kind of
possibilities.
Speaking as a man who always thought that condoms and celibacy felt
a lot alike, I was delighted to find that a good nettle treatment on
my cock added more sensitivity than a condom could take away! Safe
sex suddenly became much more appealing.
USING NETTLES
If you want to use them on a bull, like the English herbwives, I
suggest heavy bondage and taping the nettles to a long stick. Given
consensuality, and a human partner, there are fewer problems.
Nettles sting with thin, delicate hollow hairs on the stems and
leaves. Up close, the are just visible, like tiny pale bristles.
They break open when touched, but nothing is felt unless that touch
has actually driven them into the skin. Sideways pressure bends
them over and breaks them, and usually wastes the sting. Each hair
stings only once. You cannot get nettles by touching nettles skin;
it is nothing like poison oak or ivy.
The most efficient way to use nettles is to take one sprig or one
leaf at a time, get down close to your target, and touch the hairs
in, with a close enough view that you can watch the hairs go in
straight. When you can't work in that close, at least make sure
that the stem or leaf comes down flat--parallel to the skin of the
target area. Before I learned this, I needed several whole plants
to do a scene I now do with a dozen leaves.
This careful, stem-by-stem application is not the only way to use
nettles, but it's one of the best. It is appropriate for:
1) Slow, ritualized or "anticipation" scenes
2) For testing the bottom's response, either in an SM/sensual
sense, or in a small application to test for allergies (more
about this later)
3) to economize on nettles
4) for precise targeting. A large sprig or stem covers a
large area, and the top has no idea of where in that area the
actual stimulation is happening. This is especially true
when working around erogenous zones.
Nettles can also be used as a birch. While somewhat wasteful, this
can be useful too:
1) as a variation on whipping. Here it functions almost like a
strap or paddle, sensitizing the skin without bruising. It
is also silent, though the bottom may not be! As with other
nettle play, the tingling, glow and sensitivity will last
hours rather than minutes.
2) As a good way to use up the tall summer plants, with their
milder and sparcer stings. To try this, cut stems 18-30"
long and whip lightly with one or more of them. Do not use
any "draw" or drag in your strokes. The stem ends can be
wrapped with tape or cloth to make a handle.
Nettles can be used under things. They can be put inot bras, pants,
tights, or other close-fitting gear. They can be added to body
suits or mummification wraps. A nettle skirt can be made by tying
short stems every few inches along a cord, and then tying the cord
around your subjects waist. An ordinary skirt over that, and your
partner is all ready for a night on the town. Any of these uses are
psychologically severe, because no one can possibly believe that
GETTING THEM OFF ME! wouldn't really help. The stings will mostly
have done their worst at first contact, but the sensations go on and
on.
Nettles can be used for control. This is a refinement of bondage,
where the nettles are placed so that they are difficult, but not
impossible to avoid. This has something in common with scenes where
the bottom is bound by tender parts like hair, balls, or piercings
to punish excess motion.
1) Nettles can provide motivation for holding military braces
or other strenuous positions.
2) A bunch can be placed almost touching the subject to limit
motion during whipping or any other play. Try taping
nettles to a whipping post, and then secuting your partner's
wrists above them with just a little slack...
3) For male bottoms, there is always erection control. A vase
of nettles just in front of a tightly bound male, who is
then teased by whatever sort of person turns him on...can be
really inspiring to watch. If the guy already has a hardon,
the vase can be set a little lower to stimulate him every
time his interest -- sags.
In any of these games, the bottom will not always react at once. It
takes a moment for the contents of a stinging hair to diffuse
throught the upper layer of the skin and find a nerve. The bottom
will let you know. The intensity builds for a little while after
that, so when you get a reaction, wait a bit before adding to it.
Everything happens slower than with a whipstroke or a piercing
needle, so take your time.
Within a few minutes, the stings will usually be visible.
Reactions vary, but most people show at least a reddining of the
skin, and a series of little lumps, like small mosquito bites is
common. On callused or wrinkled skin, such as around a nipple, they
may not be visible at all.
There is also a seasonal difference. The first young shoots that
come up in spring are very hot, sometimes shockingly so. The tall
summer plants have fewer and milder stinging hairs. Springtime
nettle scenes are also lively because regular use of nettles for
many people seems to lead to a partial immunity, which goes away if
your winters are frosty enough to leave you nettle-less for a few
months. After a cold winter even a dedicated nettle fan may need a
gradual re-introduction to the game!
SAFETY ISSUES
Since the stinging hairs on a nettle are so fragile, each will
normally sting just once. The hairs do not draw blood, or even
lymph, as far as I have seen. I would consider nettle play (the
ten-dollar word is "urtication" from the Latin for nettle) to be a
low-risk activity, but would still recommend:
Use a given leaf, sprig or stem on only person. The end you
hold can be kept away from the subject, or taped.
Don't allow your own or any other person's body fluids to
contaminate your main bouquet of nettles. Tiny as the hairs
are, viruses are smaller yet; the idea here is to prevent
viruses from hitching a ride on the hairs.
Incedentally, thin latex surgical gloves will not protect
you from the nettle stings! Even four or five thick! The
stings also go through condoms, so never trust a condom
that's been netteled. Your aim will be better on bare skin
anyway--put the condom on later.
Besides these safe-sex issues, any top should be aware of the
possibility of allergy problems. I've never seen a bad reaction
myself, but this means little; there is nothing in the world that
someon, somewhere isn't allergic to. Four precautions are in order:
1) Ask your bottom if they have ever been stung by nettles,
whether in play or by accident outdorrs, and did they have
any reaction beyond the area of skin that was stung?
Redness, itching, tingling or small swellings like mosquito
bites are normal; your concern here is for systemic reactions
affecting other parts of the body. Anyone with a history of
systemic reaction to nettles should avoid them in play.
2) Test your subject with a small dose first! Don't do a
severe, large scale application until you know that a person
can tolerate samll doses safely. The lower arm or leg is a
good place for such a test, and allow at least two hours
before using more nettles. While waiting, you can explore
the new sensitivities, or do other kinds of play.
3) Because nettles can cause local swelling even in ordinary,
non-allergic people, don't use them on the head or neck.
Swelling here might interfere with breathing. Back, breasts
and shoulders are fine.
4) If a subject feels faint, shows difficulty breathing, or has
redness or itching away from the areas you have been
nettling--stop using nettles, and be ready to get the person
to help. These symptoms can mean a systemic allergic
reaction, the kind people sometimes have to bee stings or
medications. Any emergency room will know what to do, but
you should be ready to get the person there quickly.
FINDING NETTLES
Nettles like to grow in deep rich soil with moist, shady
conditions. You are more likely to find them on an old farm gone
back to trees than on the thin soil of a mountainside. In the
northwest, the like to grow under the hardwood trees on river
bottomland. In Northern California, the grow among the ferns under
the redwoods, on flats more than slopes. I don't knoow such details
about other areas, but the books suggest they go for deep soils and
moist woods all over the Northern Hemisphere.
Here in the Northwest, at least, there are some little bramble
vines, a kind of wild raspberry, whose leaves look a lot nettle
leaves and whose stems bear tiny thorns. Some Portland nettle
enthusiasts found them in their back yard and got alll excited, but
the didn't work right. Remember:
1) Nettle leaves are oppsoite--back to back on the stem.
Brambles have leaves in groups of three.
2) Nettle stems are almost square, and the stand upright.
Older plants may bend over, but they aren't vines.
3) Nettle hairs sting, as described. The hairs are pale and
much thinner than thorns--so thin that they bend or collapse
when they sting. True thorns, even small ones, either stay
on the stem or come off visibly in the skin, like a sliver.
Nettle hairs are so fragile that you may not even feel a sting if
you touch them with a calluses finger. If in doubt, test with the
side of a finger, or the inside of your forearm. To gather or
handle them without getting stung, use gloves. Utility rubber
gloves or leather gloves will protect you; surgical gloves are too
thin. If such gloves don't fit into your scene, a bit of tape will
make a safe handle. You can put on the tape with golves before the
scene, or have the botton do it.
Because the hairs are so delicate, be careful how you cut and
transport the nettles. If you cut a big bouquet of them, and drive
half an hour with the window down, the stems will thrash around in
the breeze and lose about nine-tenths of their zap potential before
you get to the play party. Also, as soon as they are cut, they
start to wilt, and the stinging hairs wilt too; though like flowerss
they last longer if cut rather than picked. The best way to carry
them is in a sealed container with a wet rag, leaves or moss in the
bottom. The small spring shoots travel well in a coffee can with a
plastic top; for the larger summer stems try something like a
five-gallon bucket with a snap-on lid or foil cover. Sealed up like
this, nettles can last several days if kept cool.
GROWING YOUR OWN
As I said before, nettles like deep, rich moist soil. Even in
Oregon they like partial shade, and Oregon is not notorious for
sunshine. In California, try the kind of places you would grow
ferns and deep-forest flowers like violets--deep shade on the north
side of a building, perhaps with frequent watering. Even in Oregon,
watering the patch in dry summer weather lets the roots send up new,
hot shoots all season long.
Like their cousings the mints, nettles have perennial roots just
below the surface, and the stems come up from these each spring.
(Don't panic, they don't spread as fast as mints!)
If you can find a patch in the woods, or in a friend's garden, you
can transplant them easily by digging up some roots and keeping them
damp and shaded on the way home. A piece of root a few inches long
will make a good plant, so if you get your roots in longer pieces,
cut them up. Plant the pieces a foot or so apart, a couple of
inches deep, and keep watered. Naturally, any stems that are cut
down in the course of digging should not go to waste--take them home
and play!
A FINAL WORD
For some reason, a lot of people seem to think that nettles area a
very heavy scene. I have seen thest people walk a ten foot circle
around a little stalk that had fallen on the dungeon floor, like it
was a rattlesnake or something. The ironic thing is that few of
these people have actually tried them in a scene. Many people enjoy
nettle play, some don't, but the real panic all seems to be amont
the virgins. Urtication is basically light to medium play. The
final reward of learning about nettles is watching the occasional
heavy top shy away from the tingly green sprig that you're carrying
barehanded!