On February 3, 1956, Hunan Daily published five news articles about the incident of hungry tigers injuring people in five counties and cities in Hunan Province, which is a microcosm of the tiger plague in those years, as early as a few years ago, Changsha, Yuanling, Xinhua, Anren and other dozens of counties and cities have reported on the incident of tiger injuries, which have intensified in recent years.
In addition to Hunan, Jiangxi, Guangdong, Fujian and other places have had tiger infestations, for a time, the tigers throughout the country seem to be crazy like frequent injuries, people everywhere in order to protect themselves, have set up a tiger fighting team, the Fujian Provincial Government to allocate 30 million yuan to support the masses to fight tigers.
Conflicts between humans and tigers are inevitable.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" data-track="2" > South China Tiger in Hunan</h1>
Among all the counties and cities in Hunan, Leiyang is the most severe tiger infestation, in 1952 alone, more than 120 people were bitten alive by tigers, and what is even more terrifying is that 32 people were eaten by tigers in one day.
Chen Qifang, born in Xiatang Township, Leiyang, Hunan, is a well-known local hunter who has never hunted tigers.
In the autumn of 1952, Chen Qifang asked her 16-year-old grandson to dig sweet potatoes in the field, but until dark, the grandson did not come home, Chen Qifang realized that things were not good, led the family to the field, but only found a shoe, the person has disappeared.
Through the analysis of chen qifang's footprints and recent news, it is very likely that sun tzu was taken away by a tiger!
Chen Qifang
That night, sad and indignant, he prepared the poison, and after his grandson was buried, he took his two sons into the deep jungle, and within a year, he hunted 40 tigers, and when it was difficult to find tigers in Leiyang, he transferred to the rest of the counties and cities in Hunan to hunt tigers.
In addition to Chen Qifang, the rest of the localities have organized tiger fighting teams to fight tigers in various parts of Hunan, and within two years, there have been many fewer tigers in Hunan.
In order to avoid human hunting, the South China tigers moved to more remote places, and some tigers moved to Xuefeng Mountain.
One afternoon in September 1957, a strange thing happened in a small village of less than 80 people at the foot of Xuefeng Mountain, the villagers found that the cattle in the village had rushed back, the dogs were all barking, and then several tigers surrounded the village, initially only a dozen, and then there were tigers coming one after another, and finally reached hundreds.
The tiger did not retreat, nor did it hurt anyone, but just surrounded the village and confronted the villagers for 3 days and 3 nights, although the villagers lit a fire and banged the gong, but they could not scare away the tigers.
Until a villager released the tiger cubs caught in the wild, he thought they would retreat, but when the cubs returned to the tiger, the tigers began to attack the livestock in the village, and also took a little girl who accidentally walked out and flew away.
After that, the deputy county magistrate of Tongdao County sought out Chen Qifang, a famous tiger hero in Hunan, and after a period of time, Tongdao County could no longer see the south China tiger.
Many people will scoff at this story, thinking that this is made up by the villagers, tigers are notorious solitary animals, each tiger has its own sense of territory, it is impossible to dispatch hundreds of tigers at a time, as the saying goes: "One mountain does not allow two tigers."
In fact, the incidents of tiger groups injuring people have long been recorded in history, and there are dozens of times, the largest number of which was in Xingning County, Hunan Province, during the Jiaqing period, there was an incident in which more than 100 tigers injured people.
It can be seen that it is not impossible for tiger groups to hurt people, and when the living environment is seriously challenged, tigers will also live in groups in order to survive. Of course, a hundred is only a little exaggerated, and a dozen should be there.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="02" data-track="2" > Why are it always Hunan people who are injured? </h1>
The place where tiger infestation occurred in Hunan during the Qing Dynasty
As early as the Qing Dynasty, tiger infestations often occurred in Hunan, and there were 17 prefectures at that time, of which 15 had tiger infestations. According to the 220 records recorded, it is roughly estimated that at least 400 South China tigers lived in Hunan Province at that time, and at least 600 South China tigers were active at the peak.
Statistics on the number of tiger infestations in Hunan dynasty
According to records, in Hunan alone, the number of tiger plagues before the founding of the People's Republic of China was as high as 165 times, of which 112 were as high as 112 in the Qing Dynasty.
There was a very important reason why the Qing Dynasty dominated other dynasties: the population exploded, compressing the tiger's range of survival.
At the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, the total population of Hunan Province was about 910,000 people, and by the 22nd year of Daoguang, the population exceeded 20 million, and the population explosion led to a shortage of arable land and food.
As a result, Hunan people cut down trees on the mountain, planted corn and sweet potatoes, and migrated to the mountain hills, which directly led to the tiger's living range becoming smaller and smaller, and at the same time, due to the destruction of the forest, herbivorous movement will be more rare, and the tiger has lost a large number of food sources, so it has to hunt in the human activity area.
If you understand the Qing Dynasty, you will understand what the tiger plague of the 1950s was like.
From 1949 to 1957, the cultivated land area in Hunan Province increased in the years, and the cultivated land area in Hunan Province increased from 3.4 million square kilometers to 3.87 million square kilometers, and the 1950s were the era of rampant tiger infestation.
From 1949 to 1964, Hunan killed a total of 647 tigers, until finally there were no tigers to catch, and the tiger fighting team was disbanded.
After 1970, jiangxi south china tiger annual hunting volume of less than 10, after 1975 never saw south China tiger, in 1979 the country received only one tiger skin, some people estimate that at that time the country wild south china tiger only 30-80.
The conflict between man and tiger has been staged, in the past due to the restrictions of the social environment, this conflict has been within the controllable range, but after the 50s, the war stopped, population growth, land reform and other factors superimposed together, eventually led to the extinction of wild South China tigers, in this tiger fighting movement, no one is right or wrong, all for survival.
In 1989, the Law of the People's Republic of China on the Protection of Wild Animals listed the South China tiger as a national protected animal for the first time, and since then, the International Convention on Endangered Wild Fauna and Flora issued by the United Nations has listed the South China tiger as an endangered species, ranking first among the top ten endangered species in the world.
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