Many young and middle-aged knights who escaped when the tribe was attacked dispersed and reunited, and they have been following the mighty team.
They all knew that the bigger the team, the harder it would be to lead them, and they thought they might get the chance to steal the family.
Who would have thought that Geng Zhanghua sent so many patrols that it was impossible to follow the rules.
Those who followed were constantly discovered, and were subsequently chased and intercepted by more patrols.
Fortunately, Zhi, Yong, Shuang, Quan, Peng, Liu Chuanzong, etc. all announced loudly in Mongolian at the first time.
Inform the stragglers of Karaqin who were trapped in the encirclement that their family members had not been massacred.
If they choose to surrender, their children will be returned immediately.
If they were killed because of their stubborn resistance, their families would be implicated and they would become slaves from then on.
Most of the young adults who escaped realized that they could not survive the winter. In fact, they had long lost their fighting spirit. The reason why they still lingered on was because they couldn't let go of their home.
When they were surrounded and persuaded to surrender, no one was found who was willing to sacrifice their lives.
Of course, Tatars have not read the Four Books and Five Classics, and do not understand that "when the times are poor, we can see and draw pictures one by one."
They slaughtered the weak with great ferocity, but when faced with the strong, they knelt down without any psychological burden.
Therefore, dozens or even hundreds of Karaqin cavalry returned every day, and more and more people returned to the west.
Seeing the heavy snowfall, Geng Zhanghua breathed a long sigh of relief. As long as he intensifies his patrol for a few more hours, those who are hiding nearby to spy or follow secretly will have nowhere to hide!
After a day or two, the wind and snow on the prairie will erase all traces.
Even if the Jiannu and Karaqin people once again organized a coalition of tens of thousands of people, it would not be easy to accurately discover the whereabouts of this Biao people in time.
When Huang Yi led his men and horses to carry the captured goods to the winter camp of Hedanbaat'er tribe, heavy snow had just begun to fall!
He was so happy at that time that he actually shouted loudly: "Auspicious snow heralds a good harvest!"
The late Ming Dynasty was the Little Ice Age, and there were more extreme weather conditions, either drought or floods, or locusts blocking out the sun.
Coupled with the imperial court's civil strife, the official system collapsed, and a large number of people fled and became refugees. The government was completely unable to build water conservancy projects.
Therefore, if there is a little more rain, it will cause a flood, and if there is less rain, it will cause a drought. After the drought, if there is less rain the next year, locusts may cause a disaster.
Huang Yi knew very well that the demise of the Ming Dynasty was actually 30% natural disasters and 70% man-made disasters. Man-made disasters were far more destructive than natural disasters.
Together we can fight against natural disasters.
The territory and sphere of influence of the base area should be the territory of Zhangbei County, Shangdu County, Kangbao County, Chicheng County, and Xinghe County in later generations. There is broad space for development.
With the growth of strength, it is possible to capture the entire Bashang area. The total area here is as large as two Jiangsu provinces in later generations.
The terrain on the dam is hilly and plain, high in the southeast and low in the northwest, with a dense network of rivers and abundant water ponds.
There are water systems in the inner flow area of the Inner Mongolia Plateau, the Yongding River system, the Chahannur water system, the Angulinao water system, the Chaobai River system and the Baihe River Basin. There are many rivers and dozens of small and medium-sized lakes.
"The Romance of Fairy Wood"
There are also salt lakes that are two or three times saltier than sea water.
In later generations, Chicheng County was known as the "Pearl Beyond the Great Wall" and the "Water City in the North of Beijing".
The key issue is that the rivers and lakes here are naturally formed and flow freely across the river. Most of them are seasonal rivers.
Although there is no shortage of total water here, under natural conditions, crops will dry out during droughts and drown during floods.
The focus of the work in the base area is to build water conservancy facilities according to local conditions to manage small watersheds. More than 20 reservoirs of various sizes have been filled with water.
Huang Yi never blindly cultivates fields. From the beginning, he chose a basin with relatively flat terrain, thick soil, and lush vegetation.
Plots close to rivers are preferred. There are not many acres that meet the requirements of natural conditions. The vast majority of acres are dependent on manpower.
This requires reasonable planning of the location of the reservoir and calculation of the number of irrigation wells.
As the Han population increases, next year some people who are good at farming will settle down on the edge of the reclaimed basin.
Residences cannot be dispersed and must be concentrated in forts.
You can refer to the Hakka earth building model that is conducive to defense, with one village and one fort, where hundreds of people live together. When encountering an enemy situation, the whole village enters the fort to defend it.
The only way to mobilize all the people is to become a soldier. The common people in the base area know and have experienced the brutality of the Tatars and slaves, so they do not resist militia drills at all.
Hundreds of people working together to defend the village and fort, and more than 70% of them must be able to take up arms and fight.
The farthest village fort or village in the plan cannot be more than 200 miles away from the base city. As long as you hold on for a day or two, the base cavalry can come to rescue.
The arable land within a thirty-mile radius of the base city has been cultivated. Next, we will look for basins within a fifty or eighty-mile radius.
With such a long distance, even if there are horse-drawn carriages, it is unrealistic for farmers to live in the city and go out to farm every day.
It is necessary to build some simple shacks that can accommodate a hundred people to live and work during the frost-free period every two or three miles. It is necessary to build a small castle that can accommodate hundreds of people for the winter every ten miles.
Next year, the reclamation of wasteland will have to be carried out simultaneously with the construction of castles, simple shacks, reservoirs, irrigation canals, and irrigation wells.
In some cases, canals and irrigation wells were built first and then reclaimed.
The purpose of doing all this is to fight against the sky, use water conservancy facilities to fight floods and drain water, and strive to ensure harvests despite droughts and floods.
As long as the fields can be prevented from drying out and cracking, the chances of encountering a locust plague the following year are much smaller.
Moreover, Huang Yi will also encourage people in the base area to develop the breeding industry.
In fact, there is no need for encouragement. All that is required is to purchase eggs, duck eggs, and goose eggs in large quantities at a price that the common people find profitable.
At that time, in order to save feed, people would naturally drive chickens, ducks and geese to the fields to eat insects and grass.
Huang Yi also has an idea, that is, to make down jackets. By then, duck and goose feathers will definitely be purchased in large quantities, which will also increase farmers' income.
All in all, water is so important to the base area!
With this heavy snowfall, the water flowing out from the Yanshan Mountains next spring will be enough for the reservoir in the base area to store enough water for irrigation.
Since there is no shortage of water for irrigation, the harvest can be guaranteed, and there is no need to worry about the basic food rations in the base area.
All acres of cultivated land must be planted in rotation, including wheat, millet, highland barley, sorghum, sweet potatoes, potatoes, maize, etc. bred in Xu Guangqi's Tianjin experimental field.
Of course, some of them are corn seeds and wheat seeds from later generations.
These are all cold-resistant crops, and they should be the varieties that farmers in Heilongjiang Province keep for their own purposes.
Zhang, He Shouye and others thought that what Huang Yi gave them were fine seeds from Franji, so they treated them with caution.
The rice failed to sprout, which made them extremely frustrated. Fortunately, the yields of corn and wheat made their eyes bright.
