New Zealand’s Entomological Society is hosting its annual bug of the year contest. Here are some of the insects in the running. 

For some reason – perhaps humans’ inherent competitiveness, the idealisation of democracy, the need to demarcate winners and losers  – one of the best ways to get people excited about the natural world is to mount a competition. Accordingly, the Entomological Society of New Zealand is currently hosting the third edition of its Bug of the Year election. Here’s a brief introduction to some of the invertebrates on the ballot. 

Bat fly 

Technically, bat flies are New Zealand’s only protected insect – and that’s just by proxy because they’re completely dependent on the threatened lesser short-tailed bat. Pale yellow – they mostly live in dark bat colonies inside trees – these insects have found a shortcut to year-round tropical holidays, because the bats keep things warm with their body heat. Like us, they’ve developed an air travel system; instead of queuing at departure lounges, females full of eggs will find a first-class seat in a bat’s fur, so that when bats leave to form a new colony, they get to come too.

“It doesn’t suck blood of its hosts but gently grooms the fur and cleans up the roost [where the bat takes shelter]. In return the bat fly can hitch a ride and strive in the very warm roost with endless guano to devour,” says Julia Kasper, lead curator of invertebrates at Te Papa. Bat flies are very unusual invertebrates, completely different to bloodsucking bat flies in other countries: they exhibit social behaviour, with adult insects looking after the young ones, and have evolved hairs on their legs, like grippy velcro, to hold on to the bats. Their presence in disposing of guano, partially decomposed bat poo, likely makes them a valuable housekeeper to their mammal landlords. 

Ngāokeoke | NZ velvet worm

A perennial favourite, the gorgeous velvet worm is also a vicious predator. Like an assassin wearing a midnight-dark couture gown spangled with sequins, these invertebrates navigate New Zealand’s bush, shooting sticky lines of fluid at their prey. The fossil record shows that this species became an A-list celebrity of New Zealand’s invertebrate world almost unimaginably long ago: they’ve remained essentially unchanged for 500 million years. Want to show your support wherever you go? Why not purchase this gleaming ngāokeoke sticker? 

Putoko ropiropi | Gherkin slug

The putoko ropiropi disguises itself as a delicious snack; people who meet it often leave dreaming of sandwiches and afternoon tea. While it could be well disguised at the back of your fridge, it’s actually adapted to life on the floor of New Zealand’s forests. This cunning leaf-vein slug looks like a forgotten bit of foliage, which means it can slither away while its predators don’t even notice that they’ve spotted a tasty treat. If you spent the last six months referring to yourself as “brat” you’re going to want to vote for this green trendsetter. 

Ātaka | Exquisite olearia owlet

Want to be trendy? Why not be timeless: the ātaka is incredibly fetching in its spotted cloak, lined by a vibrant pop of teal-green. Sadly, this fashionista has seen many of its favourite catwalks close. Once present from the balmy northern reaches of Tāmaki Makaurau to Invercargill in the south, many of the tree daisies (olearia) it depends on have disappeared. The exquisite olearia owlet dressed for a party among these flowering shrubs, but with its habitat damaged, all too often it’s all dressed up with nowhere to go. 

Giant springtail

Have you ever been “so ahead of the curve that the curve became a sphere”? The giant springtails surely relate to Taylor Swift in this regard. Unlike most other springtails in the world, this species can grow to 17 millimetres, about the width of your fingernail. As a result, it can no longer spring to hop away from predators, but it can start bleeding as a defence mechanism. Very dramatic. This sweet black and yellow bug is fussy about its home, preferring areas with character: it only lives in undisturbed native forest, where it spends its days nibbling on gourmet treats like slime moulds, fungi and decaying plants. “We have no idea what their conservation status is, because nobody has assessed it. But since they’re only found in undisturbed native forest, there’s a good chance that they’re at risk wherever the bush is being cut down,” says Frank Ashwood, a post doctoral fellow at the University of Canterbury’s forestry department. 

Southern ant 

Though small, the southern ant loves to party: like other ant species, it spends its life in a social colony. It’s an exclusive clique – or rather, a collection of cliques. “They attack and eat other insects, using a powerful venom as a weapon. They are also likely to be a species complex – a group of morphologically similar species currently lumped into one,” says Phil Lester, a professor at the school of biology at Victoria University of Wellington. This species is one of New Zealand’s most common native ants: there are records from the 1800s of their annual mating flights in April filling the air with dense humming. Sadly, they’re less common now. 

Pūngāwerewere | Trapdoor spider

Pūngāwerewere are caring parents: this species will look after their babies for up to 18 months. Leilani Walker, the entomology curator at Auckland Museum, compares them to one of New Zealand’s favourite exports: hobbits. “These spiders dig burrows into a range of soil types (even bird droppings) and construct a trapdoor or “lid” over their hobbit holes. And, with the greatest affection, they are little nightmare hobbits; they’re long-lived, stout and prefer to stick to themselves (although males are known to go on the odd adventure),” she says. Scientists learn about these spiders when they open the door in search of elevenses: they will flip their trapdoor holes open to snaffle unfortunate insects and munch them down, so the best way to meet one is to attach a string to the end of a hapless beetle. Walker suggests that if you like to get delivery instead of venturing outside to eat, you might find something in common with these introverted arachnids. 

Gravel maggot 

Also named for a Lord of the Rings character: this gravel maggot, which has the scientific name smeagol climoi. It might live in the dark but this detritivore – as in, it eats detritus – gets rid of everyone’s unwanted nutrients. It gets around: this species has been found 500 kilometres from the nearest known members of the genus. “All of us translucent, slippery, antisocial airbreathers can celebrate a new mascot, a new leader, and a new frontrunner to win Bird of the Year in 2022,” wrote Alex Casey in 2022. Replace “bird” with “bug” and “2022” with “2025” and you might just know who to vote for. 

Learn more about the other nominees and cast your vote for Bug of the Year here. Voting closes on February 17. 

Are we too modest when it comes to celebrating our putrid plant life?

She’s beauty. She’s grace. She smells like a decaying corpse and lurks in the backrooms of Auckland Zoo, wallowing tragically in a bucket. 

In recent weeks an Australian corpse plant named Putricia has captured the noses and imaginations of thousands around the world. She’s had a livestream, at least 15,000 guests lining up before even unfurling, and a piece in Vogue, where she’s been named “The Internet’s Stinkiest It Girl”. And in New York, another corpse plant had people queueing in the cold for hours to catch a whiff.

Meanwhile, one of New Zealand’s own Putricias languishes in obscurity. She has no name. She has no fanfare, no velvet curtain, no cultish devotees. She was kept in the ectotherms team room, says a source, “ominously growing” in a bucket (“we hoped it moved before it was stinky”). She was briefly on display, then relegated to an industrial aquarist pump room. 

Last December, she bloomed her little heart out, exuding her effervescent pong to the world. Harold*, an employee at Auckland Zoo, recalls three people lining up. He was one of them. 

She smelled like shart, Harold says, especially in the evenings, when her tip engorges and becomes more pungent. People wanted to sniff her. Many just didn’t know she was there. 

“There were people calling asking just to see the plant – and people getting angry after us taking it off display. People don’t realise they only bloom for three to five days – five is lucky – until the tip starts to sag.” Harold continues talking about her smelly, swollen tip for a while longer. 

New Zealand has had some corpse plants proudly on display. The Auckland Wintergardens amorphophallus attracted “hundreds” of visitors when it bloomed in 2020, described as smelling of “dead rat, but with added sulphurous odours with faeces”. In 2021, I was one of thousands in Dunedin lining up in the Botanic Gardens for a precious whiff. To my knowledge, none of these plants have had names. 

Using a PI and some hired goons, I tracked down the Auckland Zoo corpse plant’s dad. Ben Goodwin, now a lecturer, was an ectotherms keeper at the zoo, and grows amorphophallus (meaning “deformed penis”) species as a hobby. He obtained her from a seed donor on Facebook, though isn’t sure where they got it from – perhaps imported. When she got too big, he left to buy milk and never came back. 

“I don’t really miss the amorphophallus,” he says, ruthlessly. “I owned it, but I kept it at work nearly the entire time it was mine. It was just too big and too demanding of a specialised habitat – real hot, real humid – to grow at home.”

“They did put it on display when it flowered last year, but they didn’t really seem to make much of a big deal about it,” he explains. There were a couple of social media posts, and they had the flower on display for a while, but then it all blew over. “It should have been much bigger news,” Goodwin says. “I’m sure they realise this now and hopefully won’t be caught out next time it flowers.” (This possibly will happen within the next few decades, so hold onto your britches.) 

The issue, Goodwin reckons, is that “zoos are too fixed on animals.”

“I don’t think plants are perceived as having the same level of interest to the public, but plants are just as interesting as animals and just as worthy of attention. Auckland Zoo has an incredible collection of plants, but the gardens are treated as a backdrop to the animals rather than something significant in their own right.”

In the 1900s, zoos became more naturalistic, using habitat design to create an immersive space for both animal and visitor. I recall some positive feedback from a guest at Wellington Zoo, who’d not seen many animals but greatly enjoyed her inner-city bushwalk nonetheless. When walking through Auckland Zoo, it’s likewise easy to forget you aren’t really in the South American rainforest, but instead at Western Springs. 

Flowering amorphophallus are probably the biggest single draw cards for public plant collections, says Goodwin (see: season 14, episode 22 of The Simpsons, ‘Moe Baby Blues‘). “There are well documented examples of extremely high visitation for botanic gardens all over the world … I’ve spent my whole career trying to get people interested in less charismatic animals and plants. I think everyone should enjoy all parts of the natural world, not just the showy stuff. It’s all interconnected.”

I think back to Joel MacManus’s brave condemnation of the bucket fountain, decrying it as a symbol of New Zealand, understated and self deprecating. Why do our Putricias not deserve adoring flocks of fans? Where are her velvet ropes and curtains? 

In reality, zookeeping is mental, and there’s little time to prioritise a plant when over 2800 animals need husbandry. I do not, at all, blame Auckland Zoo, which is a world-leading facility in conservation and animal care (hire me please). I do think that we should give ourselves freedom to be vainglorious, extravagant, and camp. Let’s embrace our weird little freaks. Wherever she is, and whoever she is, I hope our next Putricia gets the stinky fame she deserves.