Text/Photo Peninsula reporter Wang Yongduan
For a week, Liu Wenguang, who is engaged in scorpion sales in Yiyuan County, Zibo City, has been busy selling the 5 kilograms of wild Yimeng whole scorpions that were saved last year until this spring at a reduced price. On March 20, the local official wild whole scorpion trade "big limit".
On March 1, under the epidemic situation, the relevant departments of Yiyuan County jointly issued a document prohibiting the hunting, eating and sale of wild Yimeng whole scorpions, and hunting more than 20 animals will be investigated for criminal responsibility. In fact, behind this regulatory storm of "banning fishing, banning sales, and fasting", it is not only the ban on wild game under the official leadership of the whole people, but also the fear that the Yimeng scorpion is on the verge of extinction.
For decades, this single body weighs less than 2 grams of Yimeng whole scorpion through folk sporadic capture and professional tools to catch indiscriminately. To this day, when the whole scorpion of the "first of the five poisons" is on the verge of extinction in Yimeng Mountain, the sound of seed preservation is incessant.
In Yiyuan County, you can see all scorpion trading stores everywhere
<h4 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > the "change" of the scorpion merchant</h4>
When the Natural Resources Bureau of Yiyuan County of Zibo City and the Forestry Public Security Bureau of Yiyuan County jointly issued an announcement on this spring's crackdown on the hunting of wild Yimeng whole scorpions by means of lifting and photographing, Liu Wenguang, who had been engaged in the scorpion sales business in Yiyuan County for more than 10 years, realized that the storm of "banning fishing, banning, and fasting" of wild Yimeng whole scorpions led by the government was really about to begin.
Scorpions are hotly traded locally
"The announcement mentions that before March 20, the owners who sold wild Yimeng whole scorpions disposed of all the Yimeng wild whole scorpions." Liu Wenguang told The Peninsula reporter that last fall, some of the Yimeng whole scorpions he bought locally have been raised until now, and when the announcement was released, he still had more than 5 pounds left there. In order to sell the remaining whole scorpion as soon as possible, he even reduced the price of 700 yuan / catty to 650 yuan / catty for sale.
In addition to the sale of wild scorpions at a reduced price, the four words "wild whole scorpion" on the billboard in front of Liu Wenguang's door have never been changed in the past 10 years, and after the announcement, Liu Wenguang erased these four words.
"If it is not removed, it may be investigated and punished by the relevant departments." Liu Wenguang said, "In the future, only the farmed Yimeng whole scorpion can be sold. ”
Peninsula reporters found in Liu Wenguang's store that in addition to selling mountain scorpions, his shop also sells local specialty agricultural products. Liu Wenguang said that in the future, the wild Yimeng whole scorpion will be completely banned, and the price of cultivated whole scorpions may rise, because there are not many local whole scorpion farming.
"I don't dare buy or sell wild whole scorpions this year." Liu Wenguang said, "After the 'three prohibitions', only the whole scorpion that can be farmed can be sold. ”
Earlier, in Yiyuan County, almost all the characteristic agricultural products business areas and large supermarkets could buy Yimeng whole scorpion. The difference is that in addition to buying live scorpions, special agricultural products trading areas can also buy dried scorpions, while large supermarkets sell processed dried scorpions or fine wine products made from scorpions.
Before March 20, Liu Wenguang was not the only one who was busy selling wild Yimeng whole scorpion and wild whole scorpion products.
In another scorpion shop in the county's commercial district, a female shopkeeper showed the live scorpion side of the store to the Peninsula reporter while saying that the live scorpions in his basin were artificially farmed, and the price of artificially bred whole scorpions was 550 yuan / kg, while the price of pure wild Yimeng whole scorpions was 650 yuan to 700 yuan / kg. The difference in appearance between the two is that the wild whole scorpion has eight legs and two claws, and the body is black, while the farmed whole scorpion legs and pincers are delicate and the body is yellow.
"Before March 15, there were a small number of wild Yimeng whole scorpions in the store, and now the wild scorpions are all sold out." The female shopkeeper said, "In the future, there will be no more purchases and sales of wild Yimeng whole scorpions, but those that are farmed can be sold." ”
"Catching 20 wild scorpions is a prison sentence, and no one is stupid enough to risk 20 scorpions." Sun Mou, another shopkeeper, said, "If no one captures it, there will be no acquisition, and if no one buys, there will be no transaction." ”
At present, although some local high-end hotels are still not open, some hotel managers told the Peninsula reporter bluntly that the scorpions in the future wild Yimeng whole scorpion dish will be replaced by farmed scorpions, or directly cancel this dish.
<h4 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > all people go up the mountain to catch</h4>
Yimeng whole scorpion scientific name quan worm, because it is mainly produced in the hinterland of Yimeng Mountain, Zibo City Yiyuan County, Linyi City Yishui County, Mengyin County, Pingyi County and Weifang City Linqu County and other counties, and because the scorpion growing in the above places has two claws and eight legs, different from the two claws and six legs of the scorpion in it, it is called "Yimeng Whole Scorpion".
Qiu Ben, a 47-year-old who grew up in Yiyuan, has been following his friends in the village up the mountain to catch scorpions since he was 10 years old.
"My hometown is on the hillside, and as a child, wild mountain scorpions were everywhere, and scorpions were often found under the stones in front of my house." Qiu Benhe said, "There are both large and small mountain scorpions, and the big mountain scorpion will be clamped in the bottle with tweezers, and the small mountain scorpion will cover the bottom of the stone on the spot." ”
For the children of Yimeng Mountain, catching scorpions at a young age seems to be a natural skill, whether it is a boy or a girl. These children, who grew up in the countryside, even went to the nearby hillsides to catch scorpions during their two-hour lunch break after school in the summer. On Saturdays or Sundays, the children here either follow their farm-doing parents up the mountain or flock up the mountain to catch scorpions. These teenage children catch as few as 10 a day by lifting stones and as many as 30 or 40 live scorpions.
"These childhood memories happened in the mid-1980s." Qiu Benhe said that in addition to children going up the mountain to catch wild Yimeng whole scorpions, there will also be adults going up the mountain to catch, adults will be mountain scorpion hunting as an income-increasing occupation, scorpion hunting "profession" from the annual valley rainy season to the beginning of September, a year can catch 5 months a year.
Going up the mountain to catch scorpions also brought childlike fun and income to Wang Songgang as a child.
"Scorpions caught a year sell for five or six hundred yuan, which was a lot of income for a 10-year-old child in the early 1990s." Wang Songgang said that this traditional method of hand-lifting stones with the participation of the whole people and the participation of young and old continued until about 2005.
The unique geographical environment, sunshine time and temperature difference between day and night in Yimeng Mountain Bring a rich gift of 5 months to the local scorpion catchers throughout the year. Behind the medicinal and edible value of the Yimeng whole scorpion is not only that it has two legs longer than the mountain scorpion in other provinces, but also its own scorpion venom and attack ability are more "scorpion overlords".
The number of wild Yimeng scorpions is shrinking year by year in the hinterland of Yimeng Mountain
<h4 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > threatened with extinction</h4>
After 2005, when the traditional capture method was replaced by an LED lamp, the whole scorpion weighing only 1 to 1.5 grams made countless rural people and even urban people in the hinterland of Yimeng Mountain flock to it.
Wang Songgang said that day and night out is the life characteristic of the wild Yimeng whole scorpion, this small reptile with stingers on its tail hides under the stones during the day and crawls out from under the stones at night to find food.
When the whole scorpion is looking for food on the slopes of the mountain in the dark, the farmer or city hunter will ride a motorcycle or drive a car, and start tracking at night with LED lights.
"This LED light shines on the mountain scorpion, and the mountain scorpion will reflect light purple fluorescence." Wang Songgang said that because fluorescence is easy to identify, some young people have abandoned the traditional capture method, brought LED lights and even dogs to the mountain in groups at night, began to professionally capture and sell, and formed an industrial chain dominated by scorpions in various parts of the Yimeng Mountains. Wang Songgang has also become one of the professional capture personnel and a link in the industrial chain.
As early as 2013, relying only on LED lights, Wang Songgang could catch up to one and a half pounds of wild whole scorpions overnight. At that time, a single night's battle result could bring him seven or eight hundred yuan in income.
"A large pure wild Yimeng whole scorpion can sell for four or five yuan." Qiu Benhe said, "The whole scorpion can promote the people in the city to climb the mountain at night, which is inseparable from the medicinal and economic value." ”
With the gathering of professional catchers at night, after 2013, the number of wild whole scorpions, which ranked first among the "five poisons", shrank year by year in the Yimeng Mountains.
"In the early years, I worked in the fields, and I often found wild scorpions under the stones, but now even if I go to catch them, I can't catch a single one." Yiyuan farmer Wei Fengshan told the Peninsula reporter, "(Mountain Scorpion) has been extinct. ”
When it is difficult to hunt wild whole scorpions by relying on LED lights, the fate of all scorpions may be dying. For decades, Wang Songgang and Qiu Benhe, who have witnessed, experienced and influenced the fate of the whole scorpion, will no longer hunt, buy and sell wild whole scorpions in the future.
"In half a year that a scorpion grows in the wild, it can destroy more than 10,000 pests." A person in charge of the Yiyuan County Natural Resources Bureau told the Peninsula reporter that the number of wild Yimeng scorpions is shrinking year by year, which is bound to affect the ecological balance; today, when this single body weighs less than 2 grams of the "head of the five poisons" is on the verge of extinction due to indiscriminate hunting, officials and non-governmental organizations are worried. (At the request of the interviewee, Liu Wenguang is a pseudonym in the text)