Today, let's talk about raising birds among the four major hobbies of Beijingers.
Painting: Zhang Rugang
From the end of the Qing Dynasty to the beginning of the People's Republic of China, there were many people walking birds in the Four-Nine Cities of Beijing, and the "Yanjing Miscellaneous Records" said: "The Jingshi people raise more birds, and those who idle on the streets have eagles..." The habit of raising birds in old Beijing can be traced back to the tradition of the Manchu people raising birds and listening to music. In 1644, the Shunzhi Emperor moved the capital to Beijing, and also brought the habit of flag bearers to carry caged birds into Beijing, and followed suit for the common people in the capital. Before the founding of New China, there were many hot bird market trades in Beijing, and in addition to pigeons, the flower market temple fair sold all kinds of birds and goldfish, and in the autumn, they sold grasshoppers and grasshoppers. In the bird market of Yuanbao Hutong, the back gate of the White Pagoda Temple, some bird dealers and the descendants of caged birds gather here to trade, and the ground is narrow and dense, like an ant nest. The bird market in the middle of Longfu Temple sells pigeons, quail and all kinds of other birds... Great variety and everything you need.
Beijing's earliest temple fair Dongyue Temple Festival, there is also the so-called "release meeting", in front of the temple to help the good, if you find a caged bird to visit the temple fair, that is, Chang Yang Yingzhi said: "How pious you are!" "It is not to be said that the cage is opened and the birds and finches can escape."
The author was born in the 1950s, when Beijing's flower market, bird market, fish market is still very prosperous, the old Beijingers live under the imperial city, many people have a small hobby of playing with flowers, birds, fish and insects. Let's say that this bird is raised, and as soon as the TV series is performed in old Beijing, there must be a person carrying a bird cage. Old people like to raise birds, in the morning to walk the city roots, small woods to "whistle", the most common bird is a lark, call up nicely, you can also learn the chirping of other birds.
In addition to larks, thrushes, yellow orioles, parrots are also very common, thrush calls are also good, looking better than lark water spirits, there are two handfuls of white hairs on the cheeks, as if two eyebrows are drawn. When I was a child, I had a parrot for a while, and it chirped all day long.
My cousin's family has a small white jade bird, which is free-range without resting in a cage, and it flies around the house, identifying itself as a member of the family's family, and when it arrives at the meal, it flies to the dinner table to wait and see what to eat today. When the dish was on the table, it picked up a leaf and began to throw it, in fact, it did not eat, its meal was in the bird food jar.
Interestingly, my neighbor Lao Huang, who had a wren and came from chick to adult. This wren brother is particularly fond of talking, almost "talkative". In the early morning, it first comes to a "wash", calling out the sound of running water and "grunting, grunting, purring!" If you don't see it with your own eyes, you really think it is a sound made by people. After a while, Brother Wren sang two songs and then called the master early: "Xiao Yu, it's time to get up, wash your face quickly, don't be late for work." This voice is the same as Lao Huang's.
The types of birds raised by people are roughly divided into "songbirds" and "technical birds". Songbirds such as thrushes, red indigo chins, larks, these birds are not only good at singing, but also mostly beautiful. Even the cages and bird food canisters they make the "Zhuozhou Horse" unique. Let's say that the lark's "calling mouth" pays attention to the "thirteen sets", that is, the lark must learn 13 different rhythmic chirps. The larks cultivated by our northern bird keepers, the "thirteen sets" are: sparrow noise forest, magpie spring, domestic swallow whispering, hen nesting, learning cat barking, learning dog barking, learning yellow finches barking, car axle ringing, eagle singing, grasshopper barking, oil gourd barking, small whistle bell, squeaking red call. The lark comes from the desert grassland, is a master of singing, it imitates the sounds of other animals, it is intoxicating, really as the song sings, "In this vast grassland, the lark flies freely and happily..."
Teahouses are a place where bird keepers concentrate, and bird keepers often hold "meetings" here to discuss the experience of "meeting birds" and "pressing birds" - pressing birds is the jargon of bird keeping, that is, domesticating it to call out the beautiful calls of other birds. People in the teahouse were chatting about the Bird Sutra, and the birds were singing in a chorus, which was very lively. The chirping of these birds is divided into clean mouth and dirty mouth, and the sound of clean mouth is loud, the number of sets is still large, and there is no sound of suspicion; the sound of dirty mouth has been infected with suspicion, and it is not worth much at once.
Common songbirds with pleasant calls include blue indigo chins, red seeds and yellow finches. The blue indigo chin learns a lot, the call is gentle, and the sound of insects is beautiful. The yellow finch is the best of the songbirds, this bird has a clean mouth, no dirty mouth, and it is still a full mouth.
The second category is the "skill bird", which often performs skills in temple fairs and tea houses. In the early days of the founding of New China, I saw the "Old Xizi" playing bullets in the hutongs - the owner tied the legs of the bird with a rope, made it stand on the wooden bar in his hand, untied the rope while turning in a circle, led it with peanuts and Su seeds, and added a whistle to make the bird fly into the air to get something. Most of them are small flags and steel hammers, and when the birds behave well, the owner often shows a proud color. There is also a technical bird called "Jiaozi", the scientific name of the red cross-billed finch, docile temperament, but also has the ability to pick up the sign.
There are fewer bird owners in modern society, and with the development of cities and wildlife protection, bird markets are difficult to find, but these beautiful creatures are still embellishing people's lives.
Transferred from: Beijing Daily Supplement Editor: Liu Yang Zhang Peng