It is precisely because there are many mountainous areas here that these people not only do not have so much land to cultivate, but they are also always facing the threat of wild beasts in the mountains.
Zhao Feng sighed and said to these people.
"Fellow folks, I have a solution here, but I don't know if you are willing to try it."
The villagers nodded quickly. They could be said to have watched Zhao Feng's family become richer and richer, and even his house was still standing there.
Although Zhao Feng has now become a county magistrate, they have no doubts about Zhao Feng's method of making money, so now that they heard that Zhao Feng was willing to teach them a method, they couldn't help but ask.
"Master Zhao, just tell me quickly."
"Yes, since we are from the same village, you must help us!"
Zhao Feng smiled and nodded. The reason why he chose Zhaojiazhuang as his first point of view was because the people here watched him become rich, so his words were more credible in the hearts of these people.
Zhao Feng pointed to the mountains behind and said to the villagers.
"Actually, it's not that we lack land here, it's that we have no way to utilize the land. As you can see, these mountains are not stone mountains, but earth mountains with a layer of soil on the surface!"
"As long as we can utilize all these mountains, wouldn't there be more land?"
Hearing this, the villagers all showed puzzled expressions. Some of the older ones couldn't help but shook their heads and explained to Zhao Feng.
"Master Zhao, your thinking is too simple. If you grow food on the mountain, if it rains, all the food will be washed away."
"Yes, except for the trees that can grow on this mountain, there is no way to grow food on it!"
Zhao Feng smiled slightly and said directly to them.
"If we simply plant food on the mountain, of course it won't grow, but we can make the mountain look like one step after another."
“This field pattern is called terraces!”
"Just make sure that the places where the crops grow are all flush!"
Zhao Feng explained briefly, and then led the government officials to the side of the mountain, where he directly shoveled down part of the soil and built it like terraces.
"And in this way, when it rains, all the crops can be irrigated and the water can be fully utilized."
“In addition to being used to grow sorghum, it is also very good to grow rice!”
Hearing this, the villagers couldn't help showing shocked expressions as they looked at the terraced fields that seemed to have turned into one step after another.
"This seems to work!"
"Yeah, just make sure the land where these crops grow is kept level!"
"And there is water on the mountain. We only need to bring the river water down to irrigate. This is easier than before!"
Zhao Feng nodded and said to these villagers.
"That's what I mean. As long as we can turn these mountains into terraces, every household will have more land for farming."
"However, it is not very simple to turn these mountains into terraces, because these mountains are not as easy to cultivate as imagined."
The villagers couldn't help but nodded. The method they were currently using to reclaim wasteland was to use fences to dig up the land and make the originally hard land soft so that they could be used to grow food.
However, because the tools they used were very laborious, they could only rely on some livestock to plow the soil. But how could there be so many livestock in this very poor village?
Zhao Feng smiled slightly and said to these villagers.
"Don't worry, everyone. In order to help you reclaim the wasteland on these mountains and build terraces, I will design a plow for you that can save more effort!"
"With this kind of plow, we can easily turn these wastelands into fertile farmland!"
The villagers looked at Zhao Feng in disbelief when they heard this, but none of them doubted the truth or falsehood of Zhao Feng's words.
After all, Zhao Feng has created so many good things, especially these folks who know how capable Zhao Feng is.
Liu Wei felt a little incredible when he saw that these villagers trusted Zhao Feng so much. But after thinking about it, he felt that Zhao Feng's method of turning mountains into fertile farmland was indeed a very good idea.
You know, throughout the Great Zhou Dynasty, many places were mountainous, and there was no way to plant and cultivate in these mountainous areas, just because of the reasons mentioned by the people before.
But if all these mountainous areas were turned into terraces, it would be equivalent to directly increasing the land that the Zhou Dynasty could cultivate several times!
Moreover, the mountains in many areas are not particularly high, just hills, which are perfect for building terraces.
Liu Wei immediately made up his mind to report this matter.
After Zhao Feng finished talking to these people and asked them to turn these mountains into terraces, he asked them to clear all the trees on the mountains first.
I took these government officials back to the county government office, drew a drawing and gave it to the blacksmiths in the county town, and asked them to type out the thing.
The blacksmiths looked left and right and felt that this should be a new type of plow, but they felt that this plow was a bit weird.
Fortunately, these blacksmiths were quite skilled in their craftsmanship. It took them a few days to finally dig out the plow that Zhao Feng needed.
Zhao Feng immediately took the plow back to Zhaojiazhuang. Seeing that the people had cleared part of the land, he hurriedly led people to let these people try the benefits of the plow.
What Zhao Feng designed was an upgraded version of the Quyuan plow. The previous plow could only be pulled by one person in front and pushed by one person in the back. It was too laborious to open up wasteland, and it was impossible to rely on manpower. There is no way to do a lot of farming.
Now Zhao Feng's improved curved shaft plow can be pulled by two people in the front, and one person in the back is responsible for controlling the direction.
If there are livestock, this plow will be more efficient and less labor-intensive than before.
This is mainly because Zhao Feng changed the plowshare and designed it into a streamlined shape, which can penetrate deeper into the soil than before.
The common people tried it and found that the plow made by Zhao Feng was better than before!
Zhao Feng smiled slightly and took out other farm tools he designed, such as some hoes and pickaxes from later generations, and let the common people try them out.
