Zhu Yuanzhang and Empress Ma were talking and eating.
The braised sparrow meat has no bones. Remove the meat and discard the small pieces. Put it together with the bones and give it to Xiaqiu Village.
Xiaqiu Village simmered these in high-pressure barrels, then turned them into jelly and sent them to the library for snacks to the health workers and children.
The bones are pressed into a crispy state, which makes it delicious when you eat it.
"Sparrows are so annoying. When the autumn harvest comes, they will wander around the fields in groups. They even dare to go to our experimental field, just to catch them and eat them."
Zhu Yuanzhang poured some braised sparrow soup into the rice plate and said that he hated sparrows.
"You can't catch them too hard. This thing requires a balance. When the crops are immature, the pests need sparrows to eat them."
Queen Ma talked about the knowledge she learned from Xiaqiu Village. You can't kill all the sparrows, otherwise the food production will be reduced.
"The sparrow meat is made like this, and it tastes better than chicken." Zhu Yuanzhang didn't know about other things, so he just took two bites and praised it.
"Xiaqiu Village specializes in using pressure cookers, and the food we eat is secondary processed. I heard that northern sparrows don't fly to our south like wild geese in winter. How do they survive? It's so cold."
Queen Ma had never been to the north, so she couldn't understand. Sparrows are everywhere in the world. Where are they when the water drips and freezes in winter?
…
"Chief, I have been feeding soybean sparrows to the people passing by these days. How will they survive the winter?"
Zhu Xi also asked the same question. He knew that there were migratory birds, the most common ones being wild geese.
“In nests in hay, or in trees where other birds have abandoned their nests.
Sparrows can build their own nests, but they prefer to take advantage of existing conditions.
Like swallows, they will make nests under the eaves of ordinary houses. Most swallows want to migrate south, so sparrows can occupy other people's nests.
The weather in the south of the Yangtze River is not very cold, so the situation of sparrows building nests under the eaves of other people's houses is not as good as in the north.
When people in the north see swallows and sparrows building nests in the eaves of their homes, they will never catch them, nor will they allow their children to dig out their eggs. "
The head of the village told Zhu Pang what he heard from Hanhan. He had never been to the north.
"Why is that?" Zhu Biao was also interested.
"Sparrows are afraid of too much noise and are afraid of cold in winter. When building their nests, they will choose a well-insulated location, preferably facing the sun and without too much movement.
If the house faces south, it must be the main house. There is no big movement, which means that the family is harmonious and there are no quarrels.
So others will say that this family has a good family, with swallows and sparrows making nests, and is blessed.
In addition, where the sparrows make their nests, there will be a vegetable patch in front of the house, where they can grow cucumbers, eggplants and other vegetables, so that when there are insects, there will be food. "
Li Chang analyzed it from another angle, in terms of the living habits of sparrows.
"Indeed, with a main house, no quarrels, and a vegetable plot, life will not be too bad for such a family."
Zhu Biao agreed with the mayor's statement that if there is a main house, there must be a side room, which proves that the family's financial conditions are adequate.
"In three days, we will arrive in Baofeng County. What is there?" Zhu Fang also wanted to prepare for get out of class first.
“Iron, coal, salt, and clay were used to make porcelain there during the Song Dynasty. There are several types of soil, some are very good and suitable for growing a large number of crops, and some have poor soil quality and require special classification for planting.
In view of different soil conditions, the court could not collect rent according to the previous method of collecting land taxes, otherwise people would still grow wheat in their homes and the yield would be seriously reduced.
The fertility of some land is difficult to extract, so perennial plants such as purple-flowered groundweed must be planted.
Some places are drought-stricken and there is only a certain period of time each year when things can be grown, usually wheat.
However, oil crops such as soybeans and sesame should be planted, or if watering is possible, cotton should be planted. "
During this trip to Baofeng, we wanted to see the coal mines, bitter salt mines, and normal salt mines. The village chief paid the most attention to them and memorized many things.
"Let's take a look after we go there. We should be planting winter wheat. It'll be harder when it's grown, so we need to travel to more places."
Zhu Biao knew that it was not easy to change the collection of land taxes. The court did not know the situation of each piece of land in the local area. The land that should be harvested had to collect grain, hemp and cotton, and some places had to plant mulberry trees and raise silkworms.
Whichever species the people do not sow, they will be punished and must hand it over.
In Xiaqiu Village, mulberry trees are not planted because raising silkworms is troublesome, but cotton is planted because cotton is needed to weave cloth and make clothes.
The dedicated hemp fields were converted into cotton fields, and rice fields were used to grow two kinds of hemp in rotation.
Let's wait and see at the place first. If that's the case, we will have to arrange for someone to go to other places to record the soil conditions in the future.
Isn't it a trap to force people to grow cotton in a place with abundant rainfall that is suitable for growing rice?
…
Three days passed by in a flash, and the team finally arrived at Ruzhou, but did not go to Ruzhou County. Therefore, the Ruzhou magistrate and other officials ran from Ruzhou County to Baofeng County.
Today is August 14th, and tomorrow is the Mid-Autumn Festival.
The team will set up camp and stay for a few days. What vegetables, fruits, and furs are available in the people's homes can be brought and sold.
Just like they did along the way, the team spread out sticky bird nets to catch sparrows.
There is no need to kill them all, as long as there are fewer groups, it will make the people feel more relaxed.
If you don't dig out the bird's nest, you won't keep shouting and beating gongs and drums to scare the sparrows from flying. They will die from exhaustion if they don't dare to fall down.
It is even more impossible to smoke or poison.
The people who grew beans and rice led the sparrow-catching team to their own fields, saying sad things such as how the sparrows harmed the food.
The kids came in to wash their hands and faces and were given popcorn sticks and fried sparrows.
After frying too many times, half of the pot of oil will be left, so replace it instead of adding more oil because it is needed to make soap.
There are also iron plate sparrows, and this one even produces oil! Let’s stop cooking and make soap together.
The magistrate, the magistrate, and the magistrate from Ruzhou are here. The officials from Ruzhou County will not come, but the magistrate, county magistrate, chief administrator, and dianshi from Baofeng County must come.
In addition, Zhao Li came over with all the people in his Zhaojia Village. He was the boldest one who sold bitter salt.
He bribed county officials, bought a salt guide, and sent the village's bitter salt to the market in Dangtu County for sale.
After that, he sold it three times and made a lot of money. The well that produced bitter salt was expropriated by the court, and they helped boil the brine.
At the same time, he also used the money from selling bitter salt to bring a lot of livestock back to the village. Everyone worked hard to farm and raise pigs and poultry.
Life is good now, and people in the village wear beautiful new clothes and come to see their benefactor.
"Kowtow to His Royal Highness the Crown Prince and His Highness King Qin." Zhao Li called on more than 700 villagers to kneel down.
"Stop kneeling, there are still pregnant women here." Zhu Xi saw an old man and a pregnant woman. Who would be responsible if something goes wrong while kneeling?
The guards went over to stop them, while Zhu Biao looked at the people in the village, mainly looking at their faces and whether their clothes were of no use, as they could be provided at any time.
They all look good, at least they don't look disheveled, and it's normal for their skin to be rough due to the boiling salt.
Zhao Li knelt down and kowtowed. When he got up, he looked at the chief: "Yichang, we followed the idea you helped us come up with last time, and now life is really getting better."
(End of chapter)
