Cricket fight
Cricket fights ( Chinese 鬥蟋蟀 / 斗蟋蟀 , Pinyin dòu xīshuài ) arise when two male crickets meet.
Animal fights of this kind have been carried out as a national sport in tournaments , especially in the People's Republic of China and Taiwan, for centuries, often betting for money.
Preparation and process
The male crickets are held individually before a fight and stimulated directly beforehand by touching the antennae with a fine brush, a blade of grass or with a cat's whisker . It is very important that the opponents have the same weight, as a smaller cricket flees from a larger one and thus avoids a fight. There are also very fine scales , more recently also electronic ones.
There are several ways to prepare the crickets so that they are aggressive, for example special foods that contain shrimp . Another method is to shake the animals in your hand, throw them up briefly and then catch them again (the ancient Chinese called this "punishing").
When the animals are then put together in an arena, they touch each other with their antennae, straighten up and lock their mandibles wide apart. The real fight consists in the two males catching their mandibles, pulling and pushing each other. There are real shoulder throws like in a wrestling match . As soon as an animal shows its inferiority by fleeing, the fight is over. The winner stops and sings loudly. In rare cases there are fights that lead to the death of the loser.
History and dissemination
Even Jia Sidao (1213-1275), an imperial minister of the Southern Song Dynasty , wrote in 1260 a famous, detailed instructions for maintaining and selecting fighting crickets ( "Ts'u-chih ching"). Also in the Ming and Qing dynasties , cricket fights in the Beijing area were very common in autumn. The Chinese believed that aggressive crickets were the reincarnation of quarrelsome wives or great war heroes.
Cricket fights are carried out in China with the following species: Velarifictorus aspersus , Teleogryllus testaceus , Teleogryllus mitratus and Gryllus bimaculatus .
Growing crickets especially for cricket fights and then competing them in tournaments is primarily a hobby for men. A lot of money is wagered on which cricket will win. Women are mostly just spectators at the tournaments. Several hundred fans come to some tournaments.
Biological background
The fight of the male crickets is a rival fight in which each male wants to drive other males out of his territory. In nature, the males often have a small cave, from the entrance of which they court for females. Both recruiting and defending the area are indicated by the singing. In the unnatural situation in the arena, each male perceives the other male as a rival.
This behavior of the crickets was seen in neurobiology as a model for investigating the control of aggressive behavior. The likelihood of whether a cricket is more likely to fight or flee is influenced by several factors: crickets that have flown in the wind tunnel before , as well as those that have previously achieved a victory, are more aggressive than others. The hormone octopamine also increases the chances of a cricket fighting. Octopamine is known to control aggressive behavior in insects.
literature
- Eraldo M. Costa-Neto: Entertainment with insects. Singing and fighting insects around the world. a brief review . In: Etnobiología , 3 (2003), pp. 21–29.
- Hans A. Hofmann: The cultural history of Chinese fighting crickets. A contribution not only to the history of biology. In: Biologisches Zentralblatt , Vol. 115 (1996), pp. 206-213, ISSN 0006-3304
- Paul A. Stevenson and Jan Rillich (2012): The decision to fight or flee. Insights into underlying mechanism in crickets . In: frontiers in neuroscience , Volume 6, Article 118
- Thomas J. Walker and Sinzo Masaki: Natural History . In: Franz Huber , Thomas E. Moore, Werner Loher (Eds.): Cricket Behavior and Neurobiology . Cornell Univ. Press, Ithaca, NY 1989, ISBN 0-8014-2272-8 , pp. 1-42.
Movie
- In the realm of the Chinese fighting crickets. Documentary, Germany, 2013, 43 min., Script and director: Antje Christ, production: Christ Media, ZDF , arte , first broadcast: May 22, 2014 by arte, summary by arte.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Hofmann 1996, p. 210
- ↑ Costa-Neto 2003, p. 23
- ↑ a b Hofmann 1996, p. 207
- ↑ Costa-Neto 2003, p. 22
- ↑ Walker / Masaki 1989, p. 40
- ↑ Cigliano / Zhang, Metaleptea 33, pp. 15–16, online text ( memento of the original from September 28, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ↑ Stevenson / Rillich 2012
