Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 897 Lightning Exploitation

Mungokee River Delta, December 1651, 12.

When the three ships of the East African Transportation Company sailed from the Port of Suez to the sea off Xinhua Bay, they were intercepted by a traffic boat sailing out of the bay, and then the three ships merged with a newly launched flute-shaped transport ship (loaded with A large amount of pioneering materials), turned around and sailed directly to the Mangoki River Delta in the west of Xinhuaxia Island.

The large ships on the east coast did not dare to approach the coastal waters densely covered with coral reefs. Therefore, they put down many small boats at anchorages in the open sea, and then transported them back and forth.This is not a joke. In "ancient times" (perhaps dating back to the Cretaceous), Xinhuaxia Island was probably connected to the African continent. This can be seen from the fact that the water depth of its west coast (Mozambique Channel) is much lower than that of the east coast. Come out—there are shoals and coral reefs everywhere under the sea, especially around Comoros Island, which is known as the Comoros Submarine Plateau.

The rivers and their tributaries flowing westward from the central plateau into the Mozambique Strait rushed down the terrain, etching the entire coastal zone of limestone, sandstone and volcanic rock in western New China into "corridors".In addition, a large amount of alluvial sediment carried by the river is distributed in a vast low area. After a long time, the land defeated the ocean, and the place that was originally the sea was silted up again and became a fertile alluvial plain.

Among these vast alluvial plains, the most famous and largest is the Bwana Basin with Mahajanga as the core, and the Manab Basin to the south of it—of course, given that an old With a stroke of the pen, the leader of the New China Exploration Team, Shi Qinjie, officially named this basin the Daqing Basin, meaning to celebrate the inevitable victory of the military campaign against the Manabo Kingdom.

The area around the delta of the Mangoki River, where the four large ships of the Dongan people were moored at this time, is the estuary delta with the largest area and the best agricultural conditions in the Daqing Basin.At the same time, this alluvial plain with an area of ​​more than [-] square kilometers is also one of the few deltas on the entire New China Island.

At the same time, the climate here is undeniably hot, with little rainfall.Even in the so-called rainy season (i.e. summer), due to the northeast trade winds in the northern hemisphere crossing the equator and deflecting to the southeast, coupled with the expansion of the low pressure belt originally located in the Mozambique Channel to the coastal land, and the interception of rainwater by the central highlands, these All of these have greatly reduced the precipitation in the western coastal basin, especially in the southwest, which is simply a semi-arid zone due to strong evaporation.

Since it was the first time that the people on the east bank developed the area around the Mangoki River, they did not have local weather data at hand. On the other side of the Mianhe Port, due to the negligence of the previous work, the recorded data on temperature, wind, sunshine and precipitation were also pitiful. Data on the Mungokee River delta are therefore left to guesswork.

The Agricultural Bureau under the New China Pioneering Team estimated that the annual rainfall days at the Morondava River Estuary should be about 60 days, and the annual precipitation should be 700 millimeters; and the data of the Mangoki River Delta may need to be reduced by three years on this basis. It means that the annual precipitation here is likely to be only about 450-500 mm, and the rain will be concentrated within one or two months; as for the Mianhe and Tulare areas, the annual precipitation can reach [-] mm. It's not bad to get started.The general trend of precipitation is that the further south you go, the less precipitation, and the cooler the temperature, the more coastal shoals and coral reefs.

As for the temperature that has an important impact on the sugarcane that the people on the east bank will plant, they are not worried about this, because the annual accumulated temperature is generally above 8000 degrees Celsius in the delta of the Mangoki River or in the area around the Mian River in the south (later generations The annual average temperature at the estuary of the Mangoki River is 24.9°C, the absolute maximum temperature is 38.2°C, and January, the month with the largest river flow, is 1251 cubic meters per second; Tulare is 23.8°C, and the absolute maximum temperature is 39.8°C), which is very suitable for The growth of the sugar cane crop.

In fact, this place has been targeted by the Xinhua pioneering team for a long time. It was around the time when Tahitian sugar cane was introduced to Guihuagang Botanical Garden. After landing here several times, I inspected the various conditions here, and finally found that the delta area of ​​the Mangoki River is the most suitable for the growth of this economically valuable crop.

Now, taking advantage of the east wind of this war, the New China pioneering team finally decided to set up settlements here, and then vigorously promote the planting of sugar cane. If necessary, they will set up machine sugar mills and wineries in the future to increase the economic added value of the products.The scale of this settlement is not small to be honest.According to Shi Qinjie's plan, this settlement is to be built as another important economic center for people from the east coast on the island, just like Tacheng Port, which is an important coal industry town, making it another big cash cow for the pioneering team government— —Probably still the most profitable one.

The landing operation of four large ships lasted for several days before it ended. One thousand Polish prisoners of war who were "amnesty" (that is, obtained free status) because of their outstanding performance on weekdays, plus more than two thousand were intercepted by Shi Qingjie The Ming immigrants (official officers and soldiers from Shandong and their families) paddled across the shallow waters near the sea, landed in large numbers near the mouth of the river, and planted a flag of the East Coast Republic of China, officially Claim your sovereignty here.

Although the drought in the entire western region is the main tone and the yellow grassland is the main tone, there are still vast forests distributed near the mouth of the Mangoki River.Compared with the dark and dense forests around Xinhua Port, the forests in this place are "brighter", which often means that the trees in the forest are sparser.

Most of the tree species in the forest are common mangrove tree species, such as branch palm, raffia tree (raffia), East African sugar palm, sour jujube, Sakyamuni banyan, and the famous baobab tree.For these trees, the New China Pioneering Team actually has a protective attitude.For countless years, the area of ​​these bright forests has been greatly reduced due to the unrestrained logging of the local indigenous people and the continuous wildfires.The reduction of the forest area will easily lead to desertification of the soil in these semi-arid areas, and eventually the ecological environment of the entire area will deteriorate dramatically.

Therefore, among the four big ships that came this time, one ship brought about 20 pieces of red bricks and a small amount of lime cement—enough to build ten sets of eight sets of standard houses on the east coast.The immigrants who arrived here earlier will use these building materials to build a small brick kiln, small lime kiln and small cement kiln. The local limestone resources are rich and there is a lot of clay, which is suitable for the development of these basic but extremely important building material industries.As for the houses where these immigrants lived temporarily, it was very simple. One ship was filled with all kinds of wood leftovers accumulated over the years in shipbuilding and furniture making by Xinhua Shipyard and other units, which were used to build houses, warehouses, livestock pens and so on. It couldn't be more appropriate.

As for the location of settlements, it is actually very particular.It is now the end of December, and the raging river has filled the riverbed of the Mangoki River (during the dry season, a considerable part of the riverbed is exposed, and the sandy riverbed is covered with reeds and aquatic plants), so this It is doomed that the people on the east bank cannot set up settlements too close to the river bank, in case the river flow suddenly increases-a common thing, depending on the amount of rainfall on the central highland upstream-and floods to both banks causing Besides, there are quite a lot of swampy areas on both sides of the river, and there are many mosquitoes. If they are not properly renovated, it is easy for the residents to suffer from malaria and die. Therefore, the location of the settlement should be considered in the south. wonderful.

Based on this consideration, McKinley, an official of the Ministry of Agriculture who presided over the local pioneering work (former Irish escaped slave Charles McKinley, one of the inventors of 108 medicinal wine, and the brother of the current Navy Sergeant McKinley) decided to set up the settlement. Not far from the later Morombe.The land here is relatively dry and does not breed any mosquitoes, but there are also some small tributaries of the Mangoki River. If they are properly renovated, they can still be built into an artificial lake, which can be used as a source of drinking water and domestic water for local residents. ——The premise is to build a water treatment and water supply facility, which is especially important in tropical areas with harsh environments, and can effectively reduce mortality.

At the same time, the name of this settlement has already been given, that is, Xinlaibao, to give some thoughts to the local pioneers from Laizhou Prefecture, Shandong Province (at the same time, the Mangoki River was also officially named Xinlai River ).The only shortcoming of Xinlaibao is probably that the port conditions are poor, and it is impossible to park large ships—even medium-sized ships cannot be parked. It is estimated that small fishing boats with shallow drafts can enter and exit, and it is quite troublesome.In short, there is a lack of all the necessary conditions to form a port. In the future, if the sugarcane and sugar palm industries develop rapidly, and sugar pressing, wine making, and other deep-processed desserts become popular, how to ship these high value-added commodities out for sale is still a very difficult task. What a headache.

No way, the New China Pioneering Team can only come forward and ask the mainland for permission to build a coastal railway between Xinlaibao and Mianhe.Anyway, the terrain here is a coastal alluvial plain, and there are no geographical barriers to building railways. However, the only place that can be used as a high-quality deep-water port is the Cotton River—Tulair, and other places are either shallow or densely covered with coral reefs. , are not suitable for building a port.I believe that the executive committee will finally agree to this plan after the demonstration, because there is only one sea outlet suitable for building a port in the entire Daqing Basin area, so the communication in other areas really can only rely on railways, otherwise it is impossible to carry out rapid development. develop.

On December 12, the four flute-shaped ships that had been unloaded set sail and sailed to Xinhua Port along the southeast trade wind (continuing to transport construction materials).The settlers who stayed in Xinlaibao, after scaring off a small group of Sakarava nomads who came to spy, also threw off their arms and started the construction of settlements in full swing.

(End of this chapter)