The trivial military affairs mentioned by Zhuge Jin were arranged by Liu Bei personally, so he didn't bother with them anymore.
Zhuge Jin is just a guest who comes up with ideas, and he also has other big moves that he needs to hold back personally and tinker with trial and error.
As for planting overwintering mustard, this is the most urgent because of the need to compete for farming time. Liu Bei immediately gave the order that day. He asked Sun Qian, who had just arrived in Guangling, to take full charge of this agricultural promotion work.
Only those who really don't understand can ask Zhuge Jin for guidance, but don't overwork them.
In just a few days, Sun Qian obtained a large amount of mustard seeds in order to persuade farmers and people to try planting them.
Sun Qian also considered the issue of people's acceptance, fearing that he would not be able to effectively promote it to more people and more fields in a short period of time, so Sun Qian concentrated all the mustard seeds he obtained on the soil and cultivated seedlings in advance, so that he could wait for the rapeseeds to germinate. Don't delay,
In the next ten days and a half, as long as farmers and powerful business owners are willing to change their minds, the government can directly send the germinated seeds to them for planting. In short, I have used many methods and tried my best to seize the time and use various methods. But after all, it is the first year. How much effect can be achieved can only be said to be done according to the personnel and fate.
While the internal affairs campaign to encourage farmers is in full swing,
Liu Bei and Guan Yu's military actions to check for leaks and expand the results were carried out according to their own plans.
In just seven or eight days, some progress was made.
On the Huaiyin battlefield in the north, on August 14th, Guan Yu, who was defending Ji Ling, made a breakthrough first.
Guan Yu used the cavalry left by Liu Bei to stage a surprise attack on Xuyi behind enemy lines, forcing Ji Ling to retreat in fear of having his food routes cut off and his lair stolen.
Guan Yu also used the news of Guangling's change of hands to spread various propaganda to attack Ji Ling's military morale, and further urged Ji Ling to be chased away. Finally, half intimidated and half sent away, he completely forced him out of Guangling County.
Ji Ling was always worried about the opportunity that "Xiapi was stolen, causing Liu Bei's soldiers to feel homesick and have low morale" and was reluctant to waste it.
But at this point, Yuan Shujun's own Guangling was firmly convinced that it was lost, and the situation was completely different from before.
Ji Ling felt that Liu Bei should be able to stabilize his morale, and he would have no choice but to give up no matter how reluctant he was.
At this point, Yuan Shu's offensive against Liu Bei that he started this summer has completely collapsed.
In the future, if Yuan Shu wants to fight again, he will have to reorganize from scratch. It is not so fast, but it can ensure that Guangling County will not be threatened by military for the rest of the year.
After Guan Yu won a great victory, his cavalry was also quite tired and unable to travel hundreds of miles a day to report the news, so the victory report took two days on the road and did not reach Guangling County on August 16th.
As for Liu Bei, it happened to be August 16th, and finally relied on the strategy of attacking the heart to make a forced landing to pacify Hailing County. A Yuan Junjun Sima stationed there led his troops to surrender, which was regarded as a bloodless opening of the city.
Liu Bei got some extra grain from the warehouse in a small place like Hailing, which was about several thousand dan, and made a small supplement.
But the problem is that because Hailing County surrendered peacefully, 2,000 soldiers also surrendered to Liu Bei, and they needed Liu Bei's support from then on.
The few thousand kilograms of surplus grain were not enough for the two thousand people to feed themselves until next summer's grain harvest. At most, it was only enough for the local soldiers and officials to feed them until the end of the new year and the beginning of spring.
Liu Bei's troops are recovering and growing, but the food crisis has not eased at all for the time being. On the contrary, he has more and more food to eat.
Because of this worry, Liu Bei did not dare to delay after taking Hailing, and hurried back that day.
He just wanted to see for the first time how Sun Qian was promoting the promotion of mustard cultivation in Guangling.
Let’s take a look at the other open source income-increasing food channels that Zhuge Jin has been tinkering with and how they are being deployed.
But in any case, after Hailing was captured, Liu Bei's military defense pressure was indeed relieved a lot.
Because his territory was finally completely wrapped up by the natural geographical barrier formed by the rivers and seas.
From the north to the Huaihe River, the entire northern border, except Mi Zhu's hometown of Qu County, is south of the Huaihe River, with the river as a barrier.
In the same way, it reaches Hangou in the west, the Yangtze River in the south, and the sea in the east. Two rivers, one river and one sea completely surrounded his territory. The enemy could not attack without a naval force, and Liu Bei could temporarily farm with peace of mind.
…
After a night and a day's march, Liu Bei returned to Guangling County extremely exhausted and fell asleep.
When I woke up the next morning, it was already August 18th.
He didn't even have time to listen to reports from all parties before going to bed last night, and he didn't even have time to read the good news that Guan Yu sent to Guangling two days ago.
After washing and dressing hastily early in the morning, Liu Beicai drank gruel and took the time to read the situation reported by Guan Yu.
Seeing that Guan Yu actually expanded his victory in the process of forcing Ji Ling back, and captured more than a thousand prisoners of Yuan's army who were slow to escape, Liu Bei didn't know whether to be happy or worried.
He is so poor now that he drinks blood and cannot feed himself.
After putting down the good news, Liu Bei inevitably went through the recent changes in the size of the army, battle losses and captures in his mind.
"Before the war, our army had more than 14,000 men. In the final battle of Huaiyin, the number of casualties reached two to three thousand. The battle of Guangling had fewer casualties. It was all because Liu Ye retreated cowardly and did not fight to the end with our army. However, Coupled with the subsequent peripheral operations when Yun Chang was forced to retreat from Ji Ling and our army captured Hailing, the cumulative casualties and escapes should be hundreds.
The total number of casualties totaled to at least 4,000. Including the fleeing soldiers, the total losses exceeded 5,000, leaving only 9,000 of the 14,000 veterans.
Even if there are one or two thousand lightly wounded soldiers who can slowly recover and return to the army in the future, there will definitely be soldiers who are homesick and run away because their families are with Lu Bu during this period. If the two offset each other, it will be difficult for our old veteran troops to recover to the level of 10,000. There are more than 100 people.
When Yide destroyed Leibo, he captured more than 600 prisoners, and some of them were incorporated and reformed. During the decisive battle at Huaiyin, two to three thousand people were captured, and more than a thousand were captured here in Guangling. Two thousand people in Hailing surrendered directly, and more than a thousand people were captured when the Ji Ling tribe retreated. Taking all these into account, the total available troops in the future can be restored to a total of 16,000 to 7,000, which is a slight profit compared to before the war.
It's a pity that these six to seven thousand prisoners of war are disloyal, and their families are all in Huainan and Lujiang. They may not be able to use them with confidence within a year and a half, but they have to spend food to support them first. At most, they can help them first. Plant mustard greens, and imitate Cao Cao in setting up military camps after spring, but at least for the first half of the year, you can only go out and not enter..."
After Liu Bei took stock of his military situation in his mind, he was not worried about the current size of the army. After the war, the total number of troops had increased slightly, so he was only worried about not being able to feed them.
…
After taking stock of the current situation, Liu Bei felt that it was time to take charge of government affairs personally and supervise the progress of people's livelihood.
So after breakfast, he immediately found Sun Qian and asked him about the situation of the winter mustard.
Sun Qian reported with a grimace: "In the past five or six days, we have tried every means possible. Unfortunately, no one in Huainan has ever done farming like this before. Even if they heard that farming can be done in Jiangdong, most people in Jiangbei are still worried about it." too cold.
I could only make a stopgap measure. On the one hand, I tried my best to use Zizhong's money and business travel channels to purchase a large amount of mustard seeds, and let the idle soldiers in the army cultivate the soil and cultivate seedlings to prevent missing the farming season. On the other hand, they also learned from Cao Cao's military garrison method and asked the soldiers to forcibly plant mustard in accordance with military orders.
Especially those prisoners of war from Yuan Shu's army. Now they don't dare to use them in battle, so they are all forced to farm first.
Over in Yunchang, I have also sent a letter detailing the cultivation method, and also sent some experienced farmers who know how to cultivate soil and raise seedlings to help Huaiyin County grow winter mustard, but it is estimated that there are fewer people willing to accept it than here. "
After Sun Qian finished speaking, he finally gave an estimated statistical conclusion: if only soldiers were stationed in the army, only seven to eight thousand people could grow winter mustard at most.
The army also needs to maintain combat readiness, and it is impossible for them all to disarm and return to the field. Otherwise, if Yuan Shu and Sun Ce find out that Liu Bei's military equipment is slack and launch a sneak attack, everything will be over.
And if the farmers can be successfully persuaded and the people can be fully mobilized, Sun Qian estimates that the sown area will increase by up to five times, and the combined number of soldiers and civilians will be able to grow to 300,000 to 500,000 people——
Of course, the young population of Guangling County is much larger than this, but Sun Qian had to consider that time was tight, and the most they could influence by persuading farmers was two or three counties, and they could only count on the relatively enlightened people among them.
Unfortunately, the effect of persuading farmers is very poor now, and only a few thousand people can be persuaded.
If there is no new booster, the final result may be that more than 10,000 soldiers and civilians are planting winter mustard, and they will be able to harvest subsidized military grain by the end of February next year.
Between the upper limit and the lower limit, there can be a difference of 30,000 in income from growing vegetables.
After Liu Bei heard this, he could not express his sadness or joy, but he felt deeply helpless in his heart.
He is well aware of the sufferings of the people and what they are worried about.
Although the government's efforts to encourage farmers have provided huge discounts to farmers, and Mi Zhu can buy the seeds and give them to farmers for free, the effort spent is, after all, the people's own.
Guangling has not been peaceful in the past two years. The people have been suffering a lot, and everyone has a lot to offer.
If you don't bother, at least you can lie down in bed for a few more hours during the winter off-season, which will reduce some basal metabolic consumption, make you hungry slower, and maybe eat one or two less whole grains every day.
In the years of war and famine, the people wanted to save even a little bit of energy. If the white vegetable seedlings are frozen to death and their strength is wasted, they may starve to death.
Liu Bei lacked any immediate means to enhance his credibility.
It can even be said that it lacks a little "miracle" to enhance its folk credibility.
"That's all, but let's do our best and let fate dictate." Liu Bei let out a long sigh and exhaled the turbid energy in his chest. He looked very tragic. Then he remembered that Zhuge Jin seemed to have other tricks, so he held on to the last bit of his life. Expectation, ask Sun Qian,
"By the way, how's it going with Ziyu? He went to collect Hailing a few days ago. Before leaving, he said he wanted to find ways to improve fishing and hunting and increase military food supplies. Has it had any effect?"
Sun Qian was not very knowledgeable, so he just told the truth: "It didn't seem to be effective a few days ago. It should be improved. My husband said that he was afraid that the effect would not be good, so he rashly made it public and made the people look down on him.
All I know is that he hired a lot of sergeants to cut down bamboo everywhere, and also dismantled some damaged bamboo and horses in the army. I wonder what he was building, maybe it was fishing gear? "
Liu Bei thought for a while and found that he had no other hope at the moment, so he told Sun Qian: "Let's go and look around today, observe the people's sentiments, and hear with your own ears what the people think about not wanting to plant winter mustard. We'll go there in the afternoon." Let’s take a look at Ziyu’s place, if there is any harvest.”
This is also treating a dead horse as a living horse doctor.
