The image of the tiger occupies an extremely important position in the historical development of the Chinese nation for thousands of years, and it is both the object of our fear and the object of our worship, and is often mentioned together with the dragon. Tigers and humans have coexisted on the land of China for thousands of centuries, and at the beginning of the formation of culture in the Chinese nation, tiger culture was also born, and it is an extremely important part.
In the 1950s and 1960s, when the "tiger plague" was severe, many folk tales about tigers were produced, among which the most impressive one was the "Hundred Tigers Walled Village", which made people feel incredible just by listening to it.
tiger
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="19" > the "Baihuwei Village" incident in Hunan</h1>
We all know the importance of ecosystem stability, and once something goes wrong in the food chain, there can be a series of chain reactions.
Around the 1950s, when the country's population growth was accelerating, coupled with the development of productivity, a large number of lands were opened up, resulting in the compression of the living space of wild animals and the destruction of habitats. The most direct consequence of this practice is that the conflict between wild animals and humans who have lost their homes has intensified, such as wild boars, which continue to storm farmland and waste crops, and eventually suffer large-scale retaliation from people.
Wild boars, deer and other large numbers of ungulates are hunted and killed in retaliation, for tigers, it is neither territory nor food, but they can not "eat", so they set their eyes on livestock and humans working in the wild.
The story of "Baihuwei Village" takes place in such a background, telling that in 1957, in a small village of less than 100 people at the foot of the southern foothills of Xuefeng Mountain in Hunan Province, hundreds of tigers were besieged, during which people were frightened to hide in houses, and the tigers ransacked the livestock in the village, the whole process lasted for three days and three nights, and finally took away a little girl when they left.
The story is depicted as one afternoon in September, people were working normally, but suddenly the cattle in the field were desperately rushing home, and then the dogs stopped barking, and there was a scream and a banging of gongs around the village, and then tigers appeared from all directions, and no matter how people made noise, they just didn't leave, and the more they gathered, the more they were said to eventually reach hundreds.
They surrounded the village and continued to storm the village, the poultry and livestock were looted, but fortunately the people hid in the room, and only a little girl who accidentally walked out of the door was attacked by tigers.
According to the old man who "personally experienced" this incident, Xuefeng Mountain is located at the junction of Sichuan and Guizhou, the forest is dense and the beasts grow, and the small village at the foot of the southern foothills is surrounded by mountains, traffic is closed and the outside world is inconvenient, and the tigers dare to attack rashly.
At that time, people saw the fires that were lit, beat gongs and drums, and tried to scare away the tigers with their sounds, after all, this trick still worked. But the tigers here don't seem to eat this set, and no matter what people do, they just don't leave, and they have been surrounding the village for three days and nights, and all the livestock are not safe, causing people to suffer heavy losses.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="19" > some perverse points in "Baihuwei Village"</h1>
The beginning and end of the whole incident of "Baihuwei Village" are depicted in a variety of ways, and there are details, which sounds like a real story in the past, but is this really the case?
It has been so many years that it is impossible to verify the facts, but there are many abnormal points in the story, the biggest flaw of which is the tiger in the "Hundred Tigers Village", which conflicts with the habits of the tigers we know. Just as the so-called "one mountain is difficult to tolerate two tigers, unless male and female", this sentence can withstand the test of science.
Tigers are animals with a strong sense of territory and a high degree of solitude, basically except for the estrus and nursery periods, they do not live in groups, so tigers in daily life basically appear alone, even if there is a "short cluster" phenomenon, but rarely appear in tigers, which is a small probability event.
The territory of male tigers is relatively large, often containing the territory of 2-5 female tigers, but there is no overlap between male tigers and male tigers, female tigers and female tigers, so it is simply strange to want to gather hundreds of tigers in the same small area.
In the feline family, only lions are really social animals, but the structure of the lion group is not like a wolf pack, the wolf king can mobilize and lead the entire wolf pack to act together, but the connection between the male lion and the lion group is not so close, the daily actions of the female lions are almost not controlled by the male lions, and only when they migrate, they are more like a collective.
In this species of tiger, although there is also the role of the tiger king, the tiger king does not have the ability to rule, it will do and can do only one thing, that is, killing, the tiger king will conquer the territory, will kill or drive away the losers, and will never gather other tigers to form a group, but the tiger group that appeared in the "Hundred Tigers Walled Village" incident is obviously a model of the wolf pack, even more advanced than the model of the wolf pack, which is not common sense for animals.
Flocks of tigers in captivity
Let's talk about the tiger territory, tigers are large predators standing at the top of the food chain, they have high requirements for the living environment, taking the South China tiger as an example, the living space of an adult South China tiger must be at least 70 square kilometers of forest, which also contains a large number of ungulates to survive for a long time.
Hunan was the most serious tiger infestation at that time, one of the most concentrated areas of tigers, we count the density of tigers is larger, the living space is smaller, but if you want to accommodate hundreds of tigers, it is at least 5,000 square kilometers of forest, more importantly, these tigers are rushing in one direction, to know that a Bengal tiger in India walked more than 2,000 kilometers, but it took more than 5 months, obviously in the mathematical logic, the story of "Hundred Tigers Walled Village" is difficult to be consistent.
Hungry tigers in the African Tiger Valley prey on it
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="19" > "human-tiger conflict"</h1>
Just as the so-called art comes from life, higher than life, in the long history of the Chinese nation, it is not difficult for us to find that some legends and stories occur in the context of the characteristic era, or there is a certain prototype, which is exaggerated and adapted.
After the 1950s, the conflict between man and tiger is indeed very fierce, due to the increase in population, the increase in the absorption of natural resources, the contact between humans and animals has become frequent, the phenomenon of beasts hurting people is also frequent, and tigers, as the most ferocious predators, are also the greatest threat to humans, and naturally stand at the peak of contradictions.
Since 1952, the whole territory of Hunan has suffered tiger plague, is the country's most severe tiger plague area, according to the local forestry records, dozens of counties have sent tiger plague emergency reports, tigers frequently prey on livestock, attacking people working in the mountains and fields, bringing a great threat to agricultural production at that time.
Perhaps the village at that time was really attacked by several tigers, such as Leiyang County in 1952, 120 people died because of the attack by tigers, and finally passed on the story, forming the story of "Baihuwei Village".
Historically, there are 5 subspecies of tigers in China, namely South China Tiger, Northeast Tiger, Xinjiang Tiger, Bengal Tiger and Indochina Tiger, which can only appear in Hunan, which can only be South China Tiger, which is also the largest number and most widely distributed tiger in China, and its habitat is almost all over most of China. Compared with other tiger subspecies, the South China tiger is smaller, has a rounder head and a more orange coat color.
In the early 1950s, China had a large number of South China tigers to survive, to 1956, from the number of tiger skins collected in the country, the number of South China tigers is still relatively considerable, unfortunately in the "human-tiger conflict", South China tigers were treated as pests were hunted on a large scale, and eventually extinct in the wild.
South China Tiger
All in all, the story of "Baihuwei Village" is too mysterious, the credibility is basically very low, but I believe that this story must have a prototype, after all, for Hunan at that time, it was one of the most important habitats of the South China tiger, and it was also the area with the highest density of tigers in South China, during the tiger plague, the tiger preyed on countless livestock, injuries were frequent, and it was reported that the tiger bit 32 people a day, from this point of view, the "Baihuwei Village" incident at that time was false, and people were deeply harmed by tigers. Do you think "Baihuwei Village" is credible?
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