Cricket fighting is a hobby and gambling activity involving the fighting of male

crickets Crickets are orthopteran insects which are related to bush crickets, and, more distantly, to grasshoppers. In older literature, such as Imms,Imms AD, rev. Richards OW & Davies RG (1970) ''A General Textbook of Entomology'' 9th Ed. Methuen 8 ...

.CTV: Ancient sport of cricket fighting loses popularity in China
Unlike blood sports such as bullfighting and

cockfighting A cockfight is a blood sport, held in a ring called a cockpit. The history of raising fowl for fighting goes back 6,000 years. The first documented use of the ''word'' gamecock, denoting use of the cock as to a "game", a sport, pastime or ente ...

, cricket fighting rarely causes injuries to the animals. It is a popular pastime in China and dates back more than 1,000 years to the

Tang Dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdom ...

. However, the sport has been losing its popularity in China.

History

Cricket fighting was nurtured by Tang Dynasty emperors more than 1,000 years ago, and later popularized by commoners. In the thirteenth century, the Southern Song Dynasty prime minister

Jia Sidao Jia Sidao (August 25, 1213 – October 1275), courtesy name Shixian, was a Chinese politician. He was a chancellor of the late Song dynasty of China, the younger brother of a concubine of Emperor Lizong, who subsequently had a relationship of sp ...

wrote a how-to guide for the blood sport. Jia's obsession with cricket fighting is believed to have contributed to the fall of the empire. During the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...

(1966-1976) China's Communist government banned cricket fighting as a bourgeois predilection, but it is now undergoing a revival among a younger generation eager to embrace traditional Chinese pastimes.

Culture

Cricket season begins in summer and championships take place after the

autumn equinox Autumnal equinox or variations, may refer to: * September equinox, the autumnal equinox in the Northern Hemisphere * March equinox, the autumnal equinox in the Southern Hemisphere Other uses * Autumnal Equinox Day (Japanese: 秋分の日, ''Shūbu ...

in late September. In

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

, the Association for Cricket Fighting organizes cricket fighting events and championships. While it is illegal in China to gamble on cricket fights, the fights themselves are legal and occur in most big cities in China. Crickets are sold openly in street markets, with more than a dozen cricket markets in

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

alone. In 2010 more than 400 million yuan (US$63 million) were spent in China on crickets. Hotels in Macau have held cricket fights where bets up to thousands of patacas were waged on a single fight. Prized crickets have become famous, with funeral services on their death. In Hong Kong, the popularity of cricket fighting has declined since the 1950s and 60s, partly due to pesticides reducing the supply of fighters. In 2004, a champion cricket could cost more than $2,500. Lesser fighters could be bought from bird stalls for up to $30, or searched for in rural areas.

Care and breeding

The best crickets are from a few counties in northeastern Shandong Province. Crickets have pedigrees and would be carefully bred by knowledgeable keepers. Each cricket must be kept in its own clay pot and their diets include ground shrimp, red beans, goat liver, and maggots. Before fight night, female crickets are dropped in the pot to increase the male's fighting spirit.

Flight and anger

Crickets fights are arranged according to weight class. In a fighting container, handlers stimulate their cricket's antennae using a straw stick, causing the crickets to become aggressive. When both crickets are sufficiently agitated, a divider separating the pair will be lifted, and the two crickets will begin the match. The loser is the cricket that first begins avoiding contact, runs away from battle, stops chirping, or is thrown from the fighting container. Studies done indicate that the sense of "flying" encourages a cricket's fighting spirit. In one such study, a losing cricket put back into the ring will only go back to fight one out of ten times. If crickets are shaken and thrown in the air repeatedly, they will fight again six out of ten times.

Tournaments

The Yu Sheng Cup,Kaushi
"Cricket Fighting Contests in China"
''Amusing Planet'', 9 Nov 2011. Accessed 11 Jan 2015. another national cricket fighting tournament,"Chongming County" in the ''Encyclopedia of Shanghai'', pp. 50 ff.
Shanghai Scientific & Technical Publishers (Shanghai), 2010. Hosted by the Municipality of Shanghai. is held annually outside the Xilai Ranch in Lühua during the National Day holiday in early October, with a purse of .

References

External links

History of both singing and fighting crickets in China

Account of contemporary cricket fighting reprinted from American Way magazine

Article in ''Science Advances''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cricket Fighting

Fighting Combat ( French for ''fight'') is a purposeful violent conflict meant to physically harm or kill the opposition. Combat may be armed (using weapons) or unarmed ( not using weapons). Combat is sometimes resorted to as a method of self-defense, or ...

Chinese culture Baiting (blood sport) Insects in culture Insect-related occupations or hobbies Animal combat organized by humans