# Old film showing Killing birds with flight exhaustion ? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 23, 2007, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229 "2007-09-23T21:59:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2007, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/1 "2007-09-23T21:59:09Z")
Many years ago on TV - this would have been in the UK - I saw a piece of black and white film footage possbly from the 50s or 60s that appeared to showed a village, or larger area, in country possibly China, Korea or Vietnam (?) that had a remarkable way of dealing with a wild birdpest problem, It appears that they got everyone, and I mean everyone. to go out and make noise and commotion all at the same time to keep them in the for long enough to see birds fall from the sky seemingly with exhaustion. I remember seeing the clip and villagers banging pots and pans etc to disturb the birds with the dead and dying birds falling to the ground. Am I misinterpreting this? Does this ring any bells with anyone? ---
**Author:** ![buckgully](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb9ed0/32.png) [@buckgully](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buckgully)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2007, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/2 "2007-09-23T22:38:05Z")
In the 50’s Chairman Mao decided to wage war on pests in China, and declared war on rats, mosquitoes, flies and sparrows (!?). They did exactly like you describe, chase the sparrows around till they died of exhaustion. I’ve seen old footage of people banging pots and pans and trucks full of dead sparrows. Then the locusts came, and there were no sparrows to eat them… Here’s a cite: > **[BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | China follows Mao with mass cull](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3371659.stm)** > > China is borrowing from its Maoist past by launching a "patriotic campaign" to slaughter civets and other wild animals suspected of spreading Sars. ---
**Author:** ![Chez\_Guevara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Chez\_Guevara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chez_Guevara)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2007, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/3 "2007-09-23T22:45:01Z")
Here’s another cite, \*viz. \* [The Chinese Sparrow War of 1958](http://zonaeuropa.com/20061130_1.htm). It may, however, contain some hyperbole: > [@](#): > > The massive extirpation force netted and scatter-gunned the exhausted birds or snared them with long, gum-tipped bamboo poles. At last report 310,000 sparrows had fallen in Peking alone, and an estimated 4,000,000 throughout the rest of Red China. The national hero was Yang Seh-mun, 16, of Yunnan. He had killed 20,000 sparrows by sneaking around during the day locating nesting trees. At night, China Youth proudly reported, he then climbed trees and strangled whole families of sparrows with his bare hands. I wonder what sphere of employment reaped the rewards of Yang Seh-mun’s unique talent and enthusiasm for the job. ---
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2007, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/4 "2007-09-24T00:04:24Z")
Thanks for the replies. That was what I saw. Maybe there is the film somewhere on the net. There’s a little more here: [http://zonaeuropa.com/20061130\_1.htm](http://zonaeuropa.com/20061130_1.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2007, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/5 "2007-09-24T00:05:29Z")
Sorry just realised that page was already posted. ---
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2007, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/6 "2007-09-24T00:05:55Z")
Sorry just realised that page was already posted. Not allowed to edit as a guest. ---
**Author:** ![Chez\_Guevara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Chez\_Guevara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chez_Guevara)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2007, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/7 "2007-09-24T00:31:49Z")
It’s not a problem. [QUOTE=buckgully] In the 50’s Chairman Mao decided to wage war on pests in China, and declared war on rats, mosquitoes, flies and sparrows (!?). [/QUOTE] An article in _The New York Times_ claims that up to 18m birds were killed before Mao was persuaded to reprieve the sparrow and wage war on the bedbug instead. ---
**Author:** ![Rrose\_Selavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bcef8e/32.png) [@Rrose\_Selavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rrose_Selavy)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2007, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/8 "2007-09-24T17:22:46Z")
My thought at the time of seeing it was maybe they had some kind of famine or their crops failed so it was a novel way of getting an emergency food supply. Not sure what sparrow tastes like though. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2007, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/old-film-showing-killing-birds-with-flight-exhaustion/420229/9 "2007-09-24T17:27:23Z")
[QUOTE=Chez Guevara] An article in _The New York Times_ claims that up to 18m birds were killed before Mao was persuaded to reprieve the sparrow and wage war on the bedbug instead. [/QUOTE] You can kill bedbugs by keeping them flying? Wow. Learn something new everyday!