The Infamous Emu War

Written by Lauren Ko

When someone mentions Australia, what comes to mind? Kangaroos, koalas, a vast outback, and killing their national bird. Well, maybe not the last one, but this story is true. In 1932, Australia launched a military operation to kill its own national birds, the emu.

The emu is the national bird of Australia. It’s a large flightless bird that can run up to 50 k/m. In 1932, the world was in the great depression. Many farmers were losing money, so they moved to the city to find work, and the remaining farmers started having all their crops eaten by emus. So they went to the government for help, specifically the military and the Minister of Defense at the time agreed to help. He believed that this would show the farmers that the government took their concerns seriously. So in November 1932, three military officials went to the Campion district to hunt some emus. They had two machine guns and 10,000 rounds of ammunition.. A cinematographer also went with them to film some footage for the government.

("The Australian Army firing upon the Emus" -OverSimplified)

They first tried open firing on the emus, but they simply scattered in multiple directions, making them harder to shoot. Then they tried to wait until the emus were in range, but their guns jammed after a few rounds, and the emus left again. After 3 days, they had only killed 30 emus. They tried a few more techniques like shooting from a truck, but the emus were faster than the truck, and the terrain was rough. Another problem was that the emus were resilient; they were able to take a few bullets but still ran at full speed to safety. This made it hard to determine how effective these attacks really were. On November 8th, newspapers had covered the emu war and its great failure. Members of the Australian House of Representatives also said that they should’ve given medals to the emus since “they had won every round so far”. So the campaign was withdrawn until the farmers demanded that it continue, since the emus were still eating their crops. So the officers were sent out again until December 10th.

In the end, 986 emus were killed, with an additional 2,500 dying from their injuries. This number may not be accurate, as many claim that it doesn’t make sense for the amount of ammunition used. The minister of defense stated that 10 bullets were used for every confirmed kill. While this operation may have helped save a bit of wheat, ultimately, the emus went back to eating the crops. Australia later introduced a bounty system where farmers would kill emus and receive compensation. This proved to be much more effective, with 57,000 emus being killed in 6 months. However, this operation was called “inhumane,” and people accused the government of endangering the emu species. Today, emus are protected by a conservation act, and farmers protect their farms by putting up better fencing.

Emus are recognized as the official winners of this war. Since very few emus died in comparison to the whole of the emu population, the operation cost the military a lot of ammunition. So if you ever feel bad, remember the whole of the Australian government lost a war with a literal bird.

Bibliography:

1 (Kulik, Rebecca M. “Emu War | History, Summary, & Facts”, Encyclopedia Britannica, Published 9th November 2023, Accessed 10th October 2025.)

2 (Hoekstra, Kyle. “The Great Emu War: How Flightless Birds Beat the Australian Army.”, History Hit, Published 2022, Accessed 10th October 2025.)

3 (“Emu War- Oversimplified (mini-wars #4)” Oversimplified, Published November 15th 2019, Accessed 10th October 2025.)