The Emu War, also known as the Great Emu War, was a nuisance wildlife management military operation undertaken in Australia over the later part of 1932 to address public concern over the number of emus said to be running amok in the Campion district of Western Australia
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” The Great Emu War ” – Episode Credits
Hosted By Marc Bluestein, Jen Wilson, & Mark Tauriello.
Original episode & story concept by Jen Wilson.
Audio & Visual Production by Marc Bluestein.
Show Notes by Jen Wilson
” The Great Emu War ” – Show Notes
Question: If there was ONE animal living on this planet that you would like to never see again, what animal would it be and why?
Tonight I am taking us back to Australia, to discuss the Great Emu War of 1932.
Before we get into it, I would like to set the scene for you.
After World War 1, a large number of discharged soldiers were given land by the Australian government to take up farming within Western Australia. Many times these areas of land were agriculturally marginalized which means little to know agricultural or commercial value.
With the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, many of these farmers were encouraged to increase their wheat crops. The Government promised to assist them in the form of subsidies, however they failed on their end. With that, wheat prices began to drop.
The farmers were PISSED ! They decided to take matters into their own hands by refusing to deliver the wheat in the midst of harvest season. So they were doing their harvesting but saying “Fuck you, I’m keeping your damn wheat”.
If shit couldn’t get worse, there was an arrival of about 20,000 emus ! Emus normally migrate after their breeding season heading to the inland areas. The cleared land and additional water supplies that were being produced by the Australian farmers, was a very big turn on for the emus. The cultivated lands were discovered by the emus and they thought it was an amazing habitat. They were like, “FUCK YEAH ! WE WANNA LIVE HERE TOO!”
The emus began to raid the land! They ate all the farmer’s crops! They left such big gaps in the fences so rabbits could get in and even cause more damage. They said, “You’re not gonna give us your land? Well we’re gonna bring in operation rabbits!”
The Farmers were like, “Fuck this”, and voiced their concerns and were sent to meet with the Minister of Defense. Since all these farmers all served in World War 1, they knew their shit. They knew how effective machine guns could be. The Minister agreed, deploying these men for battle.
There were a few conditions to this though. Wanna hear?
- Machine guns were ONLY to be used by the military.
- All troop transportation had to be financed by the Western Australian Government.
- The farmers would have to provide food, military accommodation and also pay for the ammunition. Kinda fucked.
Military involvement was supposed to begin October of 1932, but was postponed due to an intense period of rainfall which scattered across the farmland. This caused the emus to scatter even wider across the region.
By early November, the rain stopped and troops were deployed. The men traveled to Campion, a town which today is abandoned. 50 emus were sighted, but they were out of target range. Locals tried to herd the emus together into an ambush, but the emus had their own tactic. The emus split into smaller groups so they would be harder to target. This caused the use of machine guns to be a complete failure, and maybe killed a dozen emus day 1.
Two days later, an ambush was established near a local dam. About 1,000 Emus were spotted. This time the military was a bit smarter and waited until they were in range to shoot. The gun jammed and only 12 emus were killed that day.
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