Into the Danzhai Kara village - visit the township of birdcage

Karaoke is definitely known to everyone, but not many people know about Karaoke Village.

Danzhai County, Karla Village is Guizhou Province's "birdcage weaving art township".

All the villagers here to weave birdcages for the industry, the preparation of technology has a history of more than four hundred years, is the county's most distinctive ethnic villages, but also one of the rich village, the whole village is Miao.

Not close to the village, far from the hill can be seen standing on a large birdcage, street lamps on both sides of the road are birdcage shape, everywhere filled with a strong birdcage culture information.

Even the roadside walls are carved with patterns of Miao people weaving birdcages, lifelike.

In Kala village, you can also often see such farmhouse restaurants.

Some people say that when you come to Kara Village, watching cockfighting and eating cockfighting are equally indispensable special experiences. The meat of the fighting chicken is so delicious? And the price is a little expensive. But you'll see below why it's worth it.

Look for the cockfighting, the roadside to see this, long legs lean look, should be the cockfighting.

In fact, looking for the wrong, fighting to beat the hair off the light, is the real cockfighting. The first thing you need to do is to get your hands on some of the most popular products on the market, and then you can get your hands on some of the most popular ones.

Now that we're in the Kara village, let's take a look at the homes. The young and strong people usually go out to do farm work, not all day around the birdcage.

If you go into the residential area, you will find that the village is quiet, and you will rarely meet anyone.

If you come to the right place at the right time, you might even come across the Mangtong Lusheng Festival of the Miao people in Kala village. This is one of the traditional festivals for the villagers of Kala to celebrate the harvest, and has a strong ethnic flavor.

Speaking of lusheng, we have to mention the birdcage, although the two raw materials are bamboo, but if the lusheng carries the spiritual culture of the Miao people, then the birdcage is to greatly improve the living conditions of the villagers.

According to statistics, 125 of the 151 households in the village are engaged in birdcage production, with an annual production of 100,000 birdcages.

Birdcage making in Kala village is family-based. An adult laborer making ordinary style bird cages can only compile a dozen a day. Then someone specializes in coming to the house to buy them.

The bamboo forests around Kala village have become the raw material of choice for birdcages. Generally choose the bamboo tips straight without pests and diseases in the bamboo age of three years or more, in addition to March to May bamboo shoots growth period outside the rest of the time can be harvested.

The Kara birdcage is made of two types of material: nanzhu and mizutake.

Nan bamboo is hard and strong, mainly used to make the cage ring, locally called the cage hoop, the bamboo long for the best, a nan bamboo can do about ten bird cage hoop.

The bamboo is a very flexible material that is mainly used to make cage wire, and the minimum length of the bamboo should not be less than 35 centimeters.

Whether it's nan bamboo or water bamboo, the green bamboo is stronger and more durable than the yellow bamboo. Because of the selection of materials are used in the local high-quality materials, so the Kara bird cage has the characteristics of not drying and cracking and deformation .

After selecting the right material, the bamboo is broken with a knife. This process of breaking the bamboo force to pay attention to the stability and accuracy. The bamboo will be divided into pieces so that it can be used to make cage hoops and cage wire. After breaking the bamboo, you need to put the water bamboo to make cage wire into a cauldron to steam and dehumidify the bamboo to finalize the shape.

After steaming, the bamboo will become more pliable and less prone to insects. In all the birdcage production process this is the most important part of the temperature control needs to be very precise temperature, too high will make the bamboo wire brittle and easy to break; temperature is too low can not achieve the purpose of dehumidification and moth-proof.

In order to maintain the durability of the birdcage, the villagers of Kala village will add some local herbs in the process of steaming, as for the recipe is confidential.

In addition to the ordinary birdcages, there are also very elaborate birdcages: round in shape, with beads made of wood or crystal glass on the top, and curved hooks made of antimony or copper to form a single bead hook or a double bead hook.

Cage door on the left and right of the bamboo square engraved with or double dragons playing pearls, double dragons playing phoenix or lion dance or Kunpeng wings and other patterns, some of the cage door above the horizontal square is also engraved with the peacock open screen, phoenix and sunrise and other shapes;

cage bottom outside the square mostly engraved on the bottom of the circle, "dragon and phoenix," "good luck and fortune! "Some of them are engraved with the picture of dragon and phoenix, which is very lifelike.

The cage is equipped with a standing pole, some of the standing pole is also engraved with two dragons grabbing the treasure or two lions dancing in the picture, the top of the two ends of the standing pole immediately adjacent to the edge of the cage were also hung in a set of beautifully colored ceramic cups; cage and then surrounded by a set of locally produced batik or embroidered pads.

Now, the village of Kara Miao compatriots to play their own unique advantages of traditional folk crafts, to take the form of "company + farmers" set up a "Danzhai County National Craft Birdcage Factory. Not only sell well at home but also exported to Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, Europe and the United States and other places. Birdcage production income, has become the main channel of income of the masses of farmers in Kara village.