He is Yu Chengming, the last "swallow picker" in the Yalong River:
After 40 years of bird's nest picking, he has witnessed the bird's nest, which was originally 2 yuan a catty, soaring to 26,000 yuan a catty.
Yu Chengming also relied on this craft to live a life without worrying about food and clothing, and even lived in a building.
However, even in the face of such a large income, Yu Chengming's son was reluctant to inherit it, and said that he would rather go out to work for a living.
What's going on?
The source of this article comes from the official media [Red Star News] [Chengdu Business Daily] [People's Daily Online] (the link is attached at the end of the article). In order to improve the readability of the article, there may be polishing of the details, please read sensibly, for reference only!
The last bird's nest picker - Yu Chengming
Yu Chengming is a Yi compatriot along the Yalong River in Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan.
Since he was a child, he has listened to the stories of the old people in the village telling the story of picking swallows on the cliff, and he is full of yearning for this traditional skill.
Finally, at the age of 16, his father and uncle decided to start teaching him the art of cliff swallow picking.
But when the young Yu Chengming saw the cliff dozens of meters high, he couldn't help but be a little scared, but more excited.
Under the guidance of his father and uncle, Yu Chengming learned how to use ropes and climbing tools, and how to find and collect bird's nests.
Although the process was difficult and dangerous, the young Yu Chengming showed amazing talent and soon mastered the art of climbing cliffs and collecting swallows.
However, due to over-excavation and changes in the natural environment, bird's nest resources along the Yalong River were gradually depleted.
Many swallow pickers have changed careers, and Yu Chengming's father and uncle have also quit the profession one after another.
But Yu Chengming couldn't give up this ancestral craft, so he decided to continue collecting bird's nest and began to look around for new bird's nest origins.
The hard work paid off, and Yu Chengming finally found a gathering place for swallows in a hidden canyon.
With years of experience, he judged that there was a high probability that there would be an abundance of high-quality bird's nests here.
However, at first, Yu Chengming's progress in this new bird's nest harvesting area did not go well.
The cliffs were steeper than any he'd ever collected before, and the bird's nests were hidden deeper.
But Yu Chengming was not discouraged, and with his tenacious perseverance and superb skills, he finally found the treasure of bird's nest hidden in the depths of the cliff.
Soon, Yu Chengming's collection of wild bird's nests from the Yalong River became famous in the market for its superior quality, and the supply exceeded demand, and the price soared.
Until 2023, the price of top-quality white bird's nest has been as high as 2,600 yuan per tael.
But even with such a high profit margin, no one wants to learn the art of picking swallows, what is going on?
A legacy that cannot be continued
Yu Chengming's greatest wish is to pass on the cliff swallow picking skills.
More than ten years ago, there were still 5 or 6 swallow pickers in the Yalong River Gorge who fought side by side with Yu Chengming.
Every spring and autumn, they travel in tandem to climb cliffs tens of meters high to collect precious bird's nests from the burrows where swallows nest.
However, as time went on, more and more swift pickers became aware of the risks of the job.
Some of them accidentally fell while climbing a cliff, and although they survived, they were also left with lifelong disabilities; Others, fed up with the fear of working on the cliff for a long time, chose to quit.
Gradually, there were fewer and fewer companions who picked swallows with Yu Chengming, and to this day, he was the only one left who was still persistent.
As a veteran swallow picker with decades of experience in collecting swallows, Yu Chengming is well aware that this craft is in danger of being lost.
He has tried many times to find a successor and pass on his skills to the younger generation.
However, when he took his two sons to the cliff with hope, hoping that they would inherit his business, he was rejected by his sons.
The eldest son witnessed a thrilling scene of his father on a cliff when he was following his father to pick swallows.
At that moment, he was convinced that he could not afford to fall off a cliff at any time, so he politely declined his father's teachings and chose to go out to work to earn a living.
Although the youngest son shared his father's love for swallow picking, after witnessing his brother's reaction, he also realized the danger of the job and finally decided to give up learning the art of swallow picking.
In the face of his sons' decision, although Yu Chengming regretted it, he also expressed understanding.
As a father, he didn't want his son to risk his life to work as a bird's nest picker.
He understands that cliff swallow harvesting is a profession that requires extraordinary courage, and not everyone can afford it.
Although he longed for someone to inherit his mantle, he also wanted his sons to have a stable life.
Today, the sons are working in other places to earn money and live a stable life.
Yu Chengming, on the other hand, still goes to the cliff to pick swallows every spring and autumn, continuing this ancient tradition.
He knew that when he was too old to climb the cliffs, the skill would probably die with it.
But he is still doing his best, using every experience of picking swallows to interpret his love and perseverance for this skill.
However, the process of collecting bird's nest is full of dangers.
Blocking the cliff of life
The season for picking swallows is generally from March to June every year, during which the cliffs in the Yalong River Gorge become Yu Chengming's workplace.
First of all, he needs to carefully check the distribution of bird's nests on the cliff wall to find the exact location of each bird's nest.
Bird's nests are mostly hidden in the hollows or crevices of the cliff face, hundreds of meters above the ground, and it is difficult to detect at a glance.
After determining the location of the bird's nest, Yu Chengming had to start preparing the operation tools-
A long bundle of tough rattan, a metal ring slightly larger than a bird's nest, a pocket knife, a pair of sturdy ropes, etc.
He first tied one end of the rattan firmly to the rock protrusion, and then slowly hung down the cliff, waiting for an opportunity to obtain the bird's nest.
When working on the cliff, Yu Chengming only relied on a rope and some protrusions of the rock wall to maintain his life.
He deftly climbed through the narrow rock faces, carefully approaching the bird's nest with the help of rattan.
Once the bird's nest is found, it is cut off whole with a knife and placed in a metal ring for careful storage.
Sometimes the bird's nest is hidden in deep crevices that are extremely difficult to approach, and Yu Chengming has to show extraordinary courage and skill, and sometimes even has to hang his body out of the air for several meters.
If you stumble, you will fall to the bottom and your life will hang by a thread.
Even after many years in the industry, he still feels a sense of danger during the peak work season, because he has experienced many dangers.
When Yu Chengming was young, he was once picking swallows on a cliff when he suddenly encountered a strong flash flood.
He watched as the flood swept away the bamboo ladder he had worked so hard to build, and he himself was trapped in the narrow crevices of the rock.
With years of experience in rock climbing, Yu Chengming gritted his teeth and trekked the rock wall for more than ten hours, and finally successfully escaped.
Another year, Yu Chengming found that there was a nest of little swallows on the cliff where he often went to pick swallows, and they were dying of hunger because of the death of their parents.
Yu Chengming felt pity and fed some of the insects to this nest of swallows every day after picking swallows.
In this way, under his careful care, the little swallows gradually grew up, and finally one day they fluttered their wings and flew high.
Later, the villagers often saw that whenever Yu Chengming was whistling and calling for swallows, there was always a group of swallows happily hovering around him.
In 2020, a sudden epidemic hit the bird's nest market hard.
Many swallow pickers have given up this business, but Yu Chengming still sticks to the cliff.
He said: "Swallows will not stop nesting because of the epidemic in the world. What we have to do is to guard them and wait for the day when the market recovers. "
Sure enough, when the epidemic was brought under control and the bird's nest market began to recover, the wild bird's nest collected by Yu Chengming once again became a hot commodity in the market.
And the reason why bird's nest is so popular is because of its nutritional value.
The best of the best
Bird's nests are nests built by swiftlets on cliff walls with saliva and feathers.
Swiftlets prefer to nest in caves at high altitudes and moderate humidity, which are often located on inaccessible cliffs and are surrounded by steep surroundings.
The material used by swiftlets to build their nests mainly comes from the saliva they secrete.
They first use their saliva to form sticking points on the cave rock walls, and then continue to pull the saliva back and forth, pulling the saliva into filaments and interweaving into a web.
The whole process takes dozens of days and is very physically draining for swiftlets.
During this time, swiftlets barely eat and rely only on their own stored fat to sustain their lives.
It is precisely because of the extremely special growth environment of bird's nest and the extremely difficult collection process that makes bird's nest an expensive and rare commodity.
On the one hand, there are not many caves that can meet the nesting conditions of swiftlets, and good bird's nest production areas are even rarer.
On the other hand, collecting bird's nest requires the bird's nest pickers to have superb climbing skills and rich experience, and it is not easy to acquire and inherit this skill.
In addition, the nutritional value of bird's nest is also an important reason for its high price.
Bird's nest is rich in protein, amino acids and various trace elements, which have unique benefits for human health.
It can not only beautify the skin, but also help in the treatment of respiratory diseases.
These special effects have further increased the market value of bird's nest.
The price of bird's nest is rising
As a precious tonic, the price of bird's nest was once as low as 2 yuan per tael, which was only a consumer product for a few people.
However, with the gradual deepening of people's understanding of its nutritional value and the continuous improvement of the economic level, the market demand for bird's nest is increasing day by day.
By the 1990s, the price of bird's nest had climbed to about 20 yuan per tael, 10 times that of a decade earlier.
After entering the new century, the price of bird's nest rose further, reaching 50-80 yuan per tael in 2000.
In 2005, the bird's nest market continued to be hot, and the price exceeded 100 yuan, and the high-quality bird's nest reached 120 yuan per tael.
In 2010, the price of bird's nest soared, and the price of high-quality bird's nest was as high as 200 yuan per tael, more than double that of 2005.
Subsequently, the price of bird's nest continued to rise, and by 2015, the price of high-quality bird's nest had hit 800-1000 yuan/tael.
In the 2020s, due to the impact of climate change and the new crown epidemic in Southeast Asia, the production of bird's nest plummeted, and the supply exceeded demand, and the price once soared to a record high of more than 2,000 yuan/tael.
Until 2023, the price of top-quality white bird's nest has been as high as 2,600 yuan per tael, which can be said to have soared from a civilian tonic to "soft gold".
However, in fact, the nutritional value of bird's nest may not be as good as that of eggs, but this does not affect its popularity among consumers.
What supports the bird's nest industry is the unknown bird's nest pickers like Yu Chengming, who use their sweat, wisdom, courage and even their lives to create the legend of bird's nest picking on the cliff on the bank of the Yalong River.
Yu Chengming's story also inspires more people to pursue their dreams and protect the nature we depend on for survival.
Bibliography:
1. [Red Star News] The last bird's nest picker in Yalongjiang: 20,006 pounds expensive, and his son would rather work than study.2019-05-22
https://www.toutiao.com/article/6693825966784905742/?channel=&source=news
2. Chengdu Business Daily: The Last Bird's Nest Picker in Yalongjiang.2019-05-24
3. People's Daily Online-Life Times: The nutrition of bird's nest is not as good as eggs.2021-01-06
http://shipin.people.com.cn/n1/2021/0106/c85914-31990898.html
4. Family Doctor Online: What is the effect of bird's nest as a precious tonic?2023-11-10