spinofflive
Image: Bianca Cross
Image: Bianca Cross

SocietyNovember 16, 2022

Can we learn to love ugly? Introducing the inaugural Bug of the Year candidates

Image: Bianca Cross
Image: Bianca Cross

Long deemed hideous and unlovable, it’s time our native insects had an electoral uprising. But who deserves your vote? Marcia Welch investigates the candidates for the newly announced Bug of the Year.

When wētāpunga (our giant wētā) translates to “the god of ugly things” you know you’ve got a serious PR problem on your hands. And if you’ve ever seen a close-up photo of an ant, you know that’s a face only a mother could love. But against all odds, the Entomological Society has hit us with yet another election. Move over Bird of the Year, the bug memes are coming.

With 24 candidates to choose from, Bug of the Year aims to get you curious about Aotearoa’s native critters or at least have you feeling less repulsed by the thought of anything with more than four legs. 

With the help of iNaturalist, a network of bug-frothers and citizen scientists, you can now find out exactly what you’re looking at instead of swatting it to death on the nearest hard surface. This is exactly what we need in a world where people don’t know their arachnids from their coleopterans. It’s time to get acquainted. 

‘Become a member to help us deliver news and features that matter most to Aotearoa.’
Lyric Waiwiri-Smith
— Politics reporter

Chorus cicada

Cicadas are like New Zealand’s version of Michael Bublé, missing for most of the year but emerging from the ground in December to let us know it’s almost Christmas. Or, in our case, the start of summer. It’s a chorus more iconic than any Dave Dobbyn song, and our Kiwi summer wouldn’t be a slice of heaven without it.

Da da da boom boom… The chorus cicada (Photo: Jon Sullivan)

Ngaro huruhuru – native bee 

This bee is the epitome of sustainability. You’ll see her at your local farmers market, choosing mānuka and kānuka flowers over anything imported. She has a 10-acre block, grows her own vegetables and sells sourdough. Most importantly, she advocates for organic produce – without the pesticides killing her kind.

Ngaro huruhuru, Aotearoa’s native bee – votes Green. (Photo: Noah Fenwick)

Kapowai – Carové’s giant dragonfly 

Almost 10cm long and equipped for any adventure, the giant dragonfly is an adrenaline junkie. From winged wrestling matches to taking prey on the wing, don’t be surprised if they pick up an endorsement from Red Bull. 

Kapowai – doesn’t need wings, already has them. (Photo: Joel Knight)

New Zealand praying mantis 

With its tiny waist, ample booty and powerful front legs – the praying mantis is the envy of the bug world. Hobbies include looking at their own reflection, creating content for OnlyFans and occasionally dabbling in sexual cannibalism.

New Zealand praying mantis, link in bio. (Photo: Amaya M)

Homer grasshopper 

The Homer grasshopper is a sucker for punishment, choosing to live in a place that sees Aotearoa’s highest rainfall, lowest sunshine hours and occasional avalanches: Fiordland. Only a few will appreciate the risks we introverts take to seek solitude. 

Homer grasshopper, the invertebrate Thoreau. (Photo: samtheanimalman)

Canterbury knobbled weevil 

Declared extinct in 1922, this weevil rose from the dead to make a miraculous comeback at the turn of the century. Like any proud Cantabrian he’ll weigh your social standing based on what high school you went to, but we can forgive him because he’s critically endangered.

Canterbury hobbled weevil, aka Gramps. (Photo: Warren Chinn)

Helms’s stag beetle 

While the stag horn-looking pincers are said to give these huge beetles their name, the real reason is their infamous bachelor parties. Nocturnal antics include getting drunk on tree sap, dangling off tree trunks and naked wrestling matches. The next day you’ll find them nursing a hangover under a log or leaf litter, evading the pigs and rats that see them as an easy snack.

Yeah the boys! Helm’s stag beetle. (Photo: Thor Elley)

Namu – sand fly 

Likely the most hated bug in Aotearoa, a sand fly’s fetish for blood drives every summer camper up the wall. Actually it’s only the females that bite and use your blood for protein for their eggs. While annoying, is it any different from that steak you had for dinner last night? At least you’re still alive.

The deeply disliked namu – she’s just trying to feed the kids. (Photo: strewick)

North Island lichen moth (aka zebra moth)

Elegant and evasive, this moth’s coat makes every fashion designer envious. They use it to fade seamlessly into the surrounding lichen and to hide from Cruella Deville. Everything the lichen moth wears is organic, vegan and ethically sourced – no puppy skinning necessary.

Fashion is survival: the New Zealand lichen (or zebra) moth. (Photo: Sara Smerdon)

Robust grasshopper 

Built like the proverbial brick house, don’t be fooled by the robust grasshopper’s impressive exterior. He’s a lover, not a fighter – which isn’t particularly helpful when you’re the equivalent of crack cocaine for stoats, rats and hedgehogs. Perhaps all that bulk is to compensate for his stumpy wings, which make landing any impressive jump rather embarrassing. 

The robust grasshopper – your mum will love him. (Photo: James Tweed)

Prickly stick insect 

Prickly stick insects have adopted an extreme version of feminism. The entire population is female, and they reproduce asexually. They know that if you want a job done right – you have to do it yourself. Prickly in appearance and character, their spines not only offer protection from predators, they serve to ward off her therapists’ probing questions.

Prickly stick insect – emotional baggage included. (Photo: sporadicnature)

Tunga rere – huhu beetle 

The audacity of a huhu beetle smacking you in the face is enough to turn even a pacifist to violence. But a fiend for a flame, if you were sitting on your deck at night with the lights on, let’s be honest, you were asking for it. These harmless, delightfully clumsy beetles are the final life stage of the huhu grub, a well known traditional food source for iwi. 

Tunga rere – likes to high five your face (Photo: Dougal Townsend)

Wētāpunga 

The kākāpō of the bug world, this bad boy needs no introduction. Eaten to extinction on the mainland, these giant wētās now only survive on offshore predator-free islands. 

Lobster of the land and crowd favourite Wētāpunga. (Photo: Zhaoxuan Li)

Lemon Tree Borer Wasp 

If you learn anything from the borer wasp, it’s to work smarter, not harder. Rather than feed their own young, females deposit their eggs inside a beetle grub host. Once they emerge, the hungry larva eat the beetle inside out. While gruesome, you can’t deny their ingenuity.

The charming lemon tree borer parasitoid wasp – don’t mess with her. (Photo: Jacqui Geux)

Click here to vote. Voting closes 14 February 2023.

Keep going!
Image: Bianca Cross
Image: Bianca Cross

SocietyNovember 16, 2022

Beware the cheap piercing deal

Image: Bianca Cross
Image: Bianca Cross

Botched ‘backyard’ piercing jobs are plaguing customers around the country, leading some in the industry to call for tighter regulations. 

The woman was noticeably bow-legged when she walked into The Crystal Ball Clinic in Thames one grey afternoon. Gingerly ambling up to the counter, she explained to shop owner and veteran piercer Wendy Berkhan that she’d recently had the hood of her clitoris pierced, and was experiencing huge amounts of discomfort. They went out the back to the piercing room and registered nurse Wendy saw something she had never seen before in her 21 years in the industry. 

“The piercing was nowhere near the clitoris,” she recalls. “They had pierced the labia lips at the top with a horizontal bar and it was pinching like you wouldn’t believe. I was shocked.” 

This is just one of dozens of horror stories that Wendy can rattle off from her time in the piercing trenches, along with penises “strangled” by their Prince Alberts, infected nipple piercings “dug out” of swollen breasts, and ear lobes that have “swallowed” earrings. It was her own daughter’s dodgy piercing that originally got the registered nurse into the piercing industry. “It was done in Hamilton and was so badly placed and then got so infected,” she explains. “There was no piercer in [Thames], so we decided I’d do a course and set up a better service for people.”

As one of only three piercing shops in the country that has a registered nurse onsite administering piercings, Wendy and Pete at The Crystal Ball in Thames have welcomed pretty much every type of customer through their doors, from 78-year-old divorcees getting their belly buttons bejewelled to teenage girls getting their tongues transfixed. They are also very used to customers seeking advice on botched piercings that have been done elsewhere at bargain bin prices. “It’s profit before people,” Wendy says. “They rely on volume, and that’s when people get sloppy.”

Down in Ōtautahu at Absolution piercing, owner Eden has seen much of the same. The piercing studio has been in business since 1996 and has two members on staff who belong to the Association of Professional Piercers (APP), an international organisation dedicated to the dissemination of health and safety information about body piercing. “The most common troubleshooting we do is for clients who have been pierced in studios operating at below what are considered minimum standards,” he says. “We see this almost daily.”

As one expert warns: ‘Good piercings aren’t cheap and cheap piercings aren’t good.’ (Photo: Alex Casey)

Wendy from The Crystal Ball once called the authorities after discovering a piercing tent at the Keltic Fair in the Coromandel that was not only using an ear piercing gun to pierce noses, but wasn’t cleaning the equipment or wearing gloves. In 2011, Hawke’s Bay Today reported that customers of Trendez piercing and clothing store in Hamilton were being tested for hepatitis after a raft of infected piercings due to unhygienic practices. “There’s a real risk of cross-contamination and these infections can lead to septicemia,” says Wendy. 

Safety is another ongoing concern, especially when it comes to intimate body piercings such as genitalia and nipples. “I knew of a piercer who used to tell girls that he had to put ice in his mouth and then suck on their nipple to get the nipple hard,” she says. “There’s a total lack of professionalism right through the country.” She says that piercing studios should provide a private area for piercings of this nature, as well as a towel for modesty. “Some places will just get you to take your top off in front of everybody. No privacy, your dignity goes out the door.”

The rise in poor placement, cheap jewellery use and bad hygiene and safety practices has meant that those in the piercing industry are now calling for stricter regulations. Last updated in 1998, The Ministry of Health guidelines for Safe Piercing of the Skin is in “desperate need of an overhaul” says Eden at Absolution. Wendy and her husband Pete, who contributed industry feedback to the guidelines back in the 90s, also agree. “If you tried to plumb your own house, the government would step in and say ‘you can’t do that’ and you’d get fined,” he says.

“But if you pierce someone from your house, they can’t do anything about it. There’s no real rules, there’s nothing to stop you doing it.” 

When asked how they enforce their recommended safe piercing practices, the Ministry of Health pointed to local authorities and to Medical Officers of Health employed by Te Whatu Ora (Health NZ). “When there is an applicable council health protection bylaw in force, council employees investigate complaints,” a Ministry of Health spokesperson told The Spinoff. But not all local authorities have bylaws around piercing practices and those that do (such as Auckland and Dunedin) are “vague and dated”, says Eden at Absolution. 

Absolution in Ōtautahi. (Photo: Supplied)

The Ministry of Health told The Spinoff that it has “long been aware of and concerned about the heightened infection risks posed by “backyard” establishments which may have poorly trained staff, inadequate sterilisation of equipment practices and unhygienic surroundings.” In 2018, Public Health embarked on a project looking at the state of the wider appearance industry in Aotearoa, including piercings, with the intention to eventually review the guidelines. However, due to “competing priorities, including responding to Covid-19”, the project has not progressed. 

In the meantime, the responsibility largely lies with consumers to do their research ahead of getting a piercing. If the studio doesn’t use single-use disposable instruments, Pete says it is essential that they have a regularly-serviced autoclave machine to carry out adequate sterilisation. “It actually is the only way that you can kill the hepatitis virus,” he explains. “Running boiling water doesn’t do it. Alcohol doesn’t do it. You can’t kill a virus any other way except through an autoclave. And if your autoclave is not performing, it’s just pointless.”

Customers should also ensure that piercers are changing gloves (ideally three times) during the procedure, and are using good quality, nickel-free jewellery. “Unfortunately very few studios are using jewellery that is safe for wear in the body,” explains Eden, who uses 100% biocompatible metals at Absolution. “Some studios also can be quite misleading with what they offer and what is accepted among reputable professionals as safe.” Wendy at The Crystal Ball now sources all her jewellery from the UK thanks to their nickel-free market

Aftercare is another crucial part of the piercing process, says Wendy. “It doesn’t matter how good a piercer you are, unless you give the right aftercare instructions and aftercare information, your piercing is going to stuff up.” Eden at Absolution agrees, saying that dated aftercare practices are “unfortunately commonplace” and can “say a lot about a studio and their willingness to stay current.” The most up-to-date aftercare instructions for the piercing industry can be found on the APP website.

Despite the rise of cheap Friday the 13th $13 piercing deals and free piercing at chain jewellery stores like Lovisa, Wendy says customers should expect to pay a bit more if they want the job done right. “It should not be costing you $20. If you’re using good quality jewellery and sterilising properly, that costs around $20 alone.” She says that people often go for the bargains because they think they are saving money, but end up spending more in the long term on doctors, medications and getting the piercing redone. “As a client, always question everything and always trust your instincts,” says Eden. 

“And remember: good piercings aren’t cheap and cheap piercings aren’t good.” 

‘Hutt Valley, Kāpiti, down to the south coast. Our Wellington coverage is powered by members.’
Joel MacManus
— Wellington editor
But wait there's more!