Lu Ming

Chapter 319 Field Crops
Right now, there are three sources of saltpeter for the senior staff.

1: The excrement of all permanent residents, plus some finished products of stinky fish and rotten shrimp that have been nitrated.

2: Saltpeter brought by Westerners from India.

3: The saltpeter collected from Ming Dynasty.

The current situation is: except for the first channel that can produce saltpeter stably, the latter two channels are very unreliable, and the arrival of goods is intermittent, so they can only be used as unplanned materials.

So what about the use of saltpeter?

The first place is naturally the army.Whether it is black powder for troops or diatomaceous earth nitroglycerin for mines, a large amount of saltpeter is needed as raw material.

Ranked second is the kiln base itself.Industrial production needs to consume a large amount of three acids and two alkalis, among which nitric acid is essential and one of the most widely used chemicals.

After the consumption of the above two departments, if... if there is still a little saltpeter left, then the agricultural department may get a little urea for farming.

Therefore, from the very beginning, the grain company never counted on urea, a major agricultural killer.You know, the cultivated land area in Tainan is currently 30 mu, and in the next few months, Mi Shuo’s plan is to double the total cultivated land, so it doesn’t matter if the urea is available or not.

Unless one day the fleet lands in the Bay of Bengal, and then brings mining machinery and small railways to the earth king who occupies the saltpeter mine there, there will be no solution to this shortage of raw materials, and Mi Shuo and the others have long been mentally prepared.

This is why Liang Letian and the others unanimously decided to expand the soybean planting area during their inspection today.

Leguminous crops have rhizobia and have natural nitrogen-fixing ability, which is equivalent to their own nitrogen fertilizer, which circumvents the problem of urea to some extent.Therefore, in the newly reclaimed wild land, a wave of leguminous crops must be planted first to fertilize the land.

This kind of lack of fertilizer in the land will not be seen in later generations-the land compaction caused by excessive fertilization by farmers can be seen everywhere.

Therefore, the golden soybean has become the most suitable crop under the current agricultural situation in Tainan.

Soybean is one of the most productive soybeans. It is native to China and is called "shu" in ancient Chinese.This crop is not only rich in vegetable protein, but also produces soybean oil, which is one of the most important social crops.

Soybeans are extremely versatile. First of all, glycerin used to make mine explosives can be extracted from soybean oil.In addition, the paint made by mixing soybean oil and tung oil is exactly what the current kiln area can produce.

Soybeans are not only used to make food, various soy products, and soy sauce; its protein is also extracted to make various foods. Some synthetic steaks, crab sticks, etc. are mixed with soybean protein. Can't eat it.

The bean cake that has been squeezed out of soybean oil is a high-quality protein feed, and livestock are very fond of it.In addition, bean cakes can also be used to fertilize the fields, but this usage was replaced by chemical fertilizers in later generations.As the officials here are too poor, all the bean cakes are used to feed the livestock, and there is no surplus as fertilizer.

In later generations, soybeans originated in China have become one of the most productive crops in the world.Relying on the vast plains, those countries in the Americas have become soybean exporters. China imports 3 million tons of soybeans every year for feed and oil extraction.This has also become one of the country's weaknesses: once the trade war started, feed and meat prices immediately began to fluctuate.

This is unavoidable: regardless of industry or agriculture, the wealth that the plains can generate far exceeds that of the mountains, but the cost is far lower than that of the mountains.

After confirming that all the newly reclaimed cultivated land will be launched into the soybean project, Liang Letian and Mi Shuo returned to the electric tricycle and continued to drive east.

Not far ahead is the regular field crop area.On the endless plain, there are large potato fields, sweet potato fields and corn fields.Ant-like farm workers are working in the fields, and tractors the size of black spots can be seen moving slowly in the distance.

These three are the staple food crops that are finally selected by grain companies after screening.

The Tainan Plain is warm and humid all year round. The average temperature in July and August is around 33°C. Even in January and February, the coldest months in winter, the average temperature is around 16°C.

In addition, the local water source is abundant, so except for some tropical plants, most of the crops can be sown and grown in the Tainan Plain. It is nothing more than a matter of yield.In fact, many northern crops grow better in warmer Tainan.

In the Tainan Plain of later generations, the main crops were rice and sugar cane.There is not much market for these two kinds of "high-end goods" in the present, or in other words, the time-traveling crowd cannot afford to serve the two uncles in a short period of time.

Both rice and sugarcane are crops that require a lot of fertilizer and careful management in the field, and this is where the current shortcoming of Chuozhong lies.

Economic crops like sugarcane, without enough fertilizers, will have low yields. Although everyone knows that sugar was a hard currency in the 17th century, it is difficult for a smart woman to live without rice. Right now, it is better to consider filling one's stomach first.

The same goes for rice.Paddy fields that need water storage not only easily attract terrible mosquito corps, but also require fertilizers, sophisticated irrigation systems, and field management. In short, rice is delicious and difficult to grow.

Therefore, the sown area of ​​these two crops in Tainan is not large at present.

What really jumped on the stage were potatoes, sweet potatoes and corn.

The Age of Discovery was the era when the East and the West began to communicate closely, and many plant seeds were spread in this era.Among them, potatoes, sweet potatoes and corn were basically introduced into Ming Dynasty during the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties.

The three American crops that have sprung up suddenly are the real "gospel for rulers", "the killer of dynasty stability", and "the crops that are most resistant to climate anomalies in the Little Ice Age".

It's a pity that brother Chongzhen was one step too late, one step. Tears rushed, all Chinese actors have collectively supplemented their calcium.

As people who are well versed in history, they will naturally not let go of these three big killers.Therefore, in the existing more than 15 mu of mature fields under rotation, most of these three crops are planted.

In later generations, the yield of improved potatoes can reach 3000-7000 jins per mu.Yes, this is not launching satellites, and it is not uncommon for some places to produce tens of thousands of catties per mu.

On the other hand, due to the poor conditions in various aspects, the yield of potatoes per mu is usually around 1500-1800 jin.Of course, as far as the existing conditions are concerned, this output is satisfactory enough, and we cannot ask for more.

The yield per mu of sweet potatoes is about the same as that of potatoes.These two crops can not only be eaten now, but also provide raw material starch for food factories to make various foods that are easy to store.

As for corn. In later generations, Taiwan's corn industry has embarked on another path: fruit corn.

Fruit corn is a type of super sweet corn.The skin is thin, juicy, and can be eaten raw. The thin skin breaks when bitten, and the juice overflows, just like a fruit.

Naturally, the cross-country would not grow such petty bourgeois things - ordinary corn suitable for field cultivation is their food.

In addition, in addition to large fields of corn, on Kinmen Island, where the water and soil are suitable, the grain company also arranged for sorghum and corn fields to be reclaimed. Later generations of Kinmen sorghum wine are well-known, and it does not hurt your head after drinking it. It is a very good Taiwanese specialty.

The above three crops are the confidence to travel through the crowd and immigrate from the Ming Dynasty.These high-yield and fast-growing crops, coupled with the rice purchased from Hangzhou and South Asia, have resisted the population that has inflated like a balloon.

The reason why the Golden Dragon Empire, which lived in a remote corner, was able to develop rapidly was rooted in this endless farmland.

Liang Letian walked through the fields for a long time along the dirt road before reaching the hilly area close to the central mountain range.

The scenery along the way is very monotonous: except for the newly opened soybean fields, which are the staple grain fields that are thriving, the rest are bare and abandoned fields.

Due to the lack of fertilizer here, the arable land is usually left unused for a year or two to restore the soil after one or two seasons of planting.This method is also often used in large farms of later generations. Whether it is a hardened field with too much chemical fertilizer or an ordinary field with insufficient soil fertility, the soil fertility can be restored by abandoning it.

From Chikan District Government to the east, after about 40 kilometers, there is a hilly area.And here is not far from the Central Mountain Range.

Below the soil layer in the mountainous area is a gravel layer, so the cultivated land area in the hilly area is zero.In other words, no one will come here to farm until the millions of acres of land suitable for farming in the middle of the plain are developed.

So if this is the case, what are Liang Letian and the others doing here?

There are water conservancy projects in the hilly area.

The central mountain range is the birthplace of all the streams and rivers in Tainan.The lake reconstruction project in the hilly area near the central mountain range is a key project of the Ministry of Agriculture this year.

The importance of water conservancy projects to agriculture cannot be overstated.The agricultural sector and the infrastructure sector, including the previous large office, have also invested considerable resources in water conservancy.

With regard to water conservancy, this is not just an issue of the agricultural sector.The traversers had suffered a great loss in water conservancy - just a few months ago, Chen Youguang, the first traverser who died abnormally, died in a summer storm.

After that incident, the water conservancy construction, which was originally steady and steady, suddenly increased by a gear.Travelers who experienced the power of the original storm in the 17th century quickly mobilized a large number of manpower and equipment to start repairing water conservancy.

The main canals of the farmland that have been repaired before are all widened, and the creeks and rivers that were only dredged and rectified before are all widened and deepened. For mainstream streams like Xingang Creek, the Infrastructure Corporation even transferred a small Haidilao to start dredging and widening.

While a series of agricultural canals and river water conservancy projects were being excavated aggressively, the Central Mountain Range series of reservoir projects to completely solve Tainan's water conservancy problems were also put on the agenda.You know, because too many resources needed to be used before, the original big office planned to build the upstream reservoir in two years.

What Liang Letian and the others came to inspect today was the prelude to a series of reservoir projects: the lake reconstruction project in the hilly area.

(End of this chapter)