The Great Emu War

The Emu War was a war between the Emus and the Australian Government, and the farmers. The government consisted of soldiers and military personnel. The farmers consisted of WWI veterans who were tired of their crops getting eaten, and the everyday farmers of Australia. The War was led by Major G.P.W Meredith of the Seventh Heavy Battery of the Royal Australian Artillery.

My topic covers the dates November 2, 1932 – December 10, 1932, making it a very short war. Although the war was short the amount of ammunition used was not. There were approximately 986 emus killed out of the 20,000. With that 986 emus being killed almost 9,860 bullets were used which is about 10 bullets per emu. Although 10 bullets per emu does not sound like a lot, for perspective it would have taken around 200,000 bullets to kill those 20,000 emus.

Learning about this topic allowed me to see and others to see that even if there is an invasive species. Killing them will not always be the answer. The war on the emus might have worked if they kept going but all it would take is for 2 emus to be alive for them to reproduce and make us start the war all over again. So in reality it is not a very efficient or practical way to get rid of a species from a specific area.

During this time WWI had ended not that many years before this event had occurred. Also the great depression was during the exact time period the Emu War was going on. Because of this many WWI veterans were given land to farm on because of their service. Veterans on this farmland were “promised” assistance in the form of subsidies if they were to increase the Wheat, and other grains that were hard to farm during the depression. Although the Veterans were “promised” subsidies they never actually received the payment.

The purpose of my research on this assignment is mainly because of the name. I saw the name on the board and thought it was funny and sounded interesting. I was pleasantly surprised when I started the project because of how interesting it really was. The project was boring at first because of the research but when it came to writing about it, it was very interesting to see how the events happened on paper.