Rongnongno Loc: FL

Emus, which feature on Australia’s coat of arms, can grow up to 1.9m tall. The long-necked, shaggy-coated, flightless birds can run at up to 50km/h. They communicate by drumming, grunting and booming through an inflatable neck sac – a sound that can be heard up to 2km away.

In 1932, soldiers armed with machine guns were deployed in Western Australia to battle huge flocks of the giant native birds. Their annual migration from the arid interior to the coast had increasingly met the rapidly expanding wheat belt, to the delight of the emus and the horror of the farmers.

Drastic measures were deployed. In early November 1932, the Seventh Heavy Battery of the Royal Australian Artillery, under the command of Maj GPW Meredith, arrived in Campion, about 320km (200 miles) from Perth to face an invasion of as many as 20,000 emus.

They carried Lewis light machine guns and 10,000 rounds of ammunition.

Clearly it would be no contest, and so it proved: the emus prevailed with only light casualties.

Looking back in July 1953, two decades after the war, Sydney’s Sunday Herald wrote: “The enemy is the tough, prolific, gangling marauder of the sand plains whose species, ever since the beginning of agriculture in the state, has invaded, in a frenzy of hunger, some of the finest fields at the time of ripening of the harvest to shear off crops with voracious beaks and to trample with great webbed feet 100 plants into the earth for each one eaten.”

bcheary Loc: Jacksonville, FL

Interesting. I have seen those birds up and close. Kinda like ostriches. You don't want to tangle with them.

charles tabb Loc: Richmond VA.

And I thought EMUS worked for an Insurance Company

insulator Loc: JASPER, ALABAMA

A few years ago my wife and I raised emu's. They are a red meat but you have to know how to cook it properly. At one point we had about 250 birds. The can hurt you if you don't know how to handle them. They are easy to catch if you know how. They can kick from the front or side but not from the rear. We helped build a processing plant. It was an interesting hobby(job, business).

go2hale Loc: North of , Abilene, TEXAS

Very interesting !

Schoee Loc: Europe

A great Aussie insult involving Emus is “May all your chickens turn to emus and kick your dunny down”. A dunny being an outdoor toilet building.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Wild!

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

I thought of that too.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

I've seen "domesticated" or "tame" Emus from time to time where I live (California). Once for a day or two had to put up with one at a temporary petting zoo at a Sears Store. The bird was really obnoxious as were the Goats.

insulator Loc: JASPER, ALABAMA

The ones we had were for most part gentle, we had one named George that would put his head on my shoulder. We put small plastic footballs in their pen and they would play with them. They were fun to watch all the stupid things they would do.