

               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!

