After talking about the fish in the paddy field, the topic naturally turned to the rice in the field.
Now that it has entered the summer season, under sufficient sunshine, the three-season rice that has grown has begun to bloom in the past two days. The carp just came to the water to feed on the rice flowers that fell from above.
The fragrance of rice flowers tells of a good harvest, and the sound of frogs sounds!
I had memorized this poem when I was in school. Unfortunately, Xiao Han, who had lived in a dry land since childhood, seemed to have only seen wheat farmers. It was only after he arrived here that he knew what Daohua looked like for the first time.
In the paddy field, those small, tender white flowers hang clearly on the ears of rice. When the wind blows, some fall into the water and are picked up by greedy fish in the blink of an eye.
Rice also needs flowering and pollination, which Xiao Han learned when he was in school. And Xiao Han still remembers that the principle of hybrid rice is to use different rice seeds to pollinate each other and then breed them to select varieties with high yield and good disease resistance.
The yield of native rice is really too low! Even if farmers work from dawn to dusk, at the end of the year, there is still very little food left. There may even be absurd things like farming a field all your life but never having enough food!
After Xiao Han learned about this, he has always wanted to increase food production through hybridization.
However, the three-season rice here grows too fast. When planted at the same time, other rice seeds bloomed first before they matured! So now he can only place his hope on the three-season rice grown in Xiaojiazhuangzi, because the local rice there is planted earlier!
See if they can bloom at the same time, then find a way to cross them. As for whether any good seeds will emerge, it depends on God's will.
The green rice fields are pleasing to the eye. Xiao Han is still thinking about hybrid rice, while Lao Feng stretches his arms hard, pulls a rice plant that has finished blooming, and starts counting the ears on it.
"What are you counting?" Xiao Han, who had come back to his senses, saw Lao Feng's actions and curiously squatted down to watch him counting grains one by one.
Old Feng smiled, and after counting the entire ears of rice, he said to Xiao Han: "Master Hou, look! This new seed is really good! Not only does it grow fast, but it is also big! This ear is full of One hundred and seventy-four grains! And I saw a big ear of it yesterday, and when I counted it, I found it was more than two hundred grains! Old man, I have lived for half my life, and I have never heard of a plant that can grow so many. I thought about it, If each plant grows so much, wouldn’t one acre of land be able to produce as much as four or five stones?”
(ps. In the Tang Dynasty, one acre of land was slightly smaller than now, and one stone was equivalent to 75 shi per mu in the Han Dynasty, which is equivalent to 334 jin per mu in today's market system. According to historical records, one stone for ordinary fields to produce food, and two shi for high-yield areas) .)
"The yield per mu is four to five kilograms?" Xiao Han calculated in his mind that the yield per mu is about 1,500 kilograms!
This number was an astronomical figure to Lao Feng, but to later generations, it was just a very ordinary real estate. At least Xiao Han knew that in his time, it was common for an animal to produce more than one ton per acre, and there was nothing strange about it. What really surprised him was that Lao Feng was so familiar with these yield data.
Looking up at Old Feng, Xiao Han asked in confusion: "Oh? Old Feng, you, the county magistrate, are so proficient in farming?"
Old Feng let go of the rice ears and gently stroked the leaves of the rice with his rough palms. He said with some emotion: "Master Hou is joking, I am also from a farmer's family. I have been working in the fields since I was a child, and now I still have several acres of thin fields at home. How can I not know these things?" ? But in this kind of land, with hard work all year round, whether we can have a good harvest depends on God’s face, how difficult it is!"
"Oh? Lao Feng, as a county official, you still have to work in the fields?"
"Haha, during spring plowing and autumn harvest time, even the emperor and queen have to go to the fields to cultivate and harvest crops. How can I be exempt from the vulgarity?"
"What? The emperor and the queen also have to go to the ground? Is it possible that the emperor is carrying a golden hoe to hoe the ground, and the queen is eating scallion pancakes on the ground?" Xiao Han suddenly laughed out loud, because he remembered a famous joke in later generations from Lao Feng's words. .
"What golden hoes and scallion pancakes did the Marquis talk about?" Old Feng didn't know why Xiao Han suddenly laughed and looked at him in surprise and asked.
"Golden hoes, scallion pancakes are..." Xiao Han was about to explain, but suddenly felt that the joke was a bit silly, so he tried hard to stop his smile and said to Lao Feng: "Ahem, it's nothing, nothing, I'm just curious about how the emperor farmed. Scenes?"
Xiao Han took it back mid-sentence, making Old Feng roll his eyes: "Master Marquis, don't you know? Every year at that time, the nobles of Chang'an will go to work in the fields with the emperor. Have you never been there?"
"Is there still such a rule?" Now, it was Xiao Han's turn to be stunned. He had come to Datang less than a year ago, so how could he know about such a thing? No one called him!
"Maybe I'm not good enough and they won't let me play..." Xiao Han scratched the back of his head and answered uncertainly.
"Um... maybe it's just unlucky timing!" That's bad. Although I don't know why the emperor didn't ask him to participate, it's always embarrassing to expose someone's shortcomings like this. Old Feng quickly made up a random reason to deal with it.
Being interrupted like this, the two of them lost their topic for a while and could only get up and continue walking forward.
Along the narrow ridge, the two of them soon arrived at the ditch beside the rice field.
The water in the small ditch is still clear, and because it is warmed by the summer sun, every evening before the sun goes down, there are always people who have worked hard for a day taking a bath in it to wash away the fatigue of the day.
Xiao Han also likes to bathe here now, and there is a special place for him in the upper reaches of the water! If I don’t swim twice a day, I won’t be able to sleep at night.
There were clouds in the sky, but I was also a little hot and sweaty along the way. Now that you have come to the ditch, it is necessary to wash your face!
Stepping on a few stones on the side, Xiao Han cautiously approached the water. As soon as he picked up a handful of water, suddenly a dog's head floated over from the downstream...
"Wang..."
"Ah!!! Xiaoqi!"
A sudden barking of a dog accompanied by a scream scared Old Feng and he quickly looked up!
In the ditch, a big dog jumped over the dragon's gate one by one, heading straight towards Xiao Han with countless water drops all over his body! Poor Xiao Han was covering his face with both arms, and subconsciously stretched out a foot, but he just hit the dog's head, and the big dog fell back into the water with its claws flying.
"Wangwangwang..." Xiao Qi fell into the water on his back. He didn't know how much water was poured into the dog's mouth. Anyway, Xiao Han could see that it was swimming and trying to vomit out...
"Get out!!! I just changed my clothes!" Xiao Han hurriedly fled back to the shore, then turned around and cursed at Xiao Qi!
This silly dog thought that he was still petite when he was small, and would rush into his arms when he went crazy! I wonder if Ren Qing can't stand its sudden attack?
Not to mention anything else, a half-sized wild boar ran down from the Qinling Mountains a few nights ago, and it was pounced on! As a result, he fell to the ground and didn't get up for a long time. Later, Ren Qing and the others heard the sound and came over, and then they cooked a big meal...
Xiaoqi felt a little aggrieved after being kicked for no reason. He climbed ashore, his hair trembling, and the water droplets rising up all over the sky printed a faint rainbow around him.
"Go back, stay away from me!" He scolded Xiao Qi and drove him away. Xiao Han angrily shook the water in his hand. Now he was no longer interested in washing his face. This dog had been soaked in water for who knows how long. How could he use it to wash his face?
