"Da Lang, our family's grain has been weighed." An old farmer ran to Li Yansong and said, because he is the only son in Li Yansong's family, so people like to call him Da Lang.
"Really, Uncle Zhang, how much sorghum (the Shandong people's name for sorghum) can you grow per acre of land?" Li Dalang asked with a smile.
Although the fields here are close to water sources, the supporting canals have not yet been repaired. In the past year, everyone's efforts were focused on cultivating the fields.
So most of what we plant this year is dry land. What these immigrants from Shandong are best at is growing dry land crops.
Li Dalang grows corn himself, and the seeds are bought on credit from the town, and he still has to pay them back after harvesting the grain.
Most of the sorghum grown in Lao Zhang's home are seeds brought from his hometown.
In addition, Li Dalang's family also planted five acres of sweet potatoes (sweet potatoes) because he raised a sow and several piglets.
Sweet potato vines are good pig feed.
"Well, we harvested more grain than my hometown. I don't know if it's because the soil was rich in the first year of planting, and we harvested more than three stones per acre." Lao Zhang said cheerfully.
"Oh, then you have more than fifty acres of land, and you have to dig out more than a hundred stones of food. How can you eat it all?" Li Dalang said.
"Yes, I heard that the grain collected by the grain management in the town should be sold when the time comes. There is not much space to store so much grain! I am going to exchange some money to pay back the credit money." Lao Zhang said.
Lao Zhang also bought a cow on credit from the government.
Although they are prairie cattle and relatively stupid, they can still plow the land after being trained and trained.
For this large-scale overall immigration from outside the customs, Dong Shuheng's policy is to provide food resettlement in the first year so that everyone can survive the first winter.
In the second year, grain collection was tax-free for one year, allowing everyone to have surplus grain to sell and buy property.
In the third year, you will have to pay public rations normally.
Now the first autumn harvest outside the customs has just ended. Everyone is smiling.
No matter what the harvest is, all the food produced belongs to the family. At least it is enough for oneself to eat.
The fields that were planted last year finally harvested the first crop of grain this spring.
Needless to say, the fields here are all good black soil.
During the land preparation, a wasteland was burned, and the ashes of the vegetation were plowed into the field.
Although each family is allocated more than a hundred acres of land.
But not every family cultivates a hundred acres of land.
Some of these lands are adjacent to farmland and woodland.
In addition, the size of the fields planted by each family this year is also related to the amount of labor force each family has. Some families have more labor force and cultivate more land.
The Renaissance Army also introduced a policy that allowed these people to buy cattle, farm tools and seeds on credit from the government.
However, not every household has the courage to buy cattle on credit. On the one hand, everyone is worried that they will not be able to afford it. On the other hand, many people still do not trust the government very much. Those who bought cattle on credit will also open up land at a slower rate.
Hurry up.
As a result, the amount of land cultivated by everyone is different, and the food grown is also different.
Although there are many mountains and forests outside the customs, most of the forest resources in these mountains and forests belong to the state.
The Fuxing Army established a large number of forest farms outside the pass to specifically manage these mountain forests.
Li Dalang can take people up the mountain to hunt, but the trees on the mountain cannot be cut down at will.
In autumn, in order to prevent fires, the forest farm even seals the forest and does not allow casual entry.
Li Dalang has cultivated 40 acres of his own land, and the remaining 30 acres of land have not been reclaimed. He just planted some soybeans and vegetables on the wasteland.
These abandoned fields are intertwined with the dozens of acres of woods at home.
According to regulations, if you build a house or burn firewood, you must cut down trees from your own forest.
When Li Dalang first arrived here with fifteen families, it was a wasteland with few trees near the river, where their village was located.
Li Dalang's family consists of five people, including his wife, daughter-in-law and two children.
The two children are not very old. The eldest son, Li Lin, is just ten years old and can already go hunting with him.
My daughter is only five years old and her name is Li Ling. She usually follows her grandma and is a little shy.
Now he is a militiaman and a village chief. He looks quite majestic, and more than a dozen families in the village obey him.
But when he first left Shandong, he was also very depressed.
Every time he thinks back to the flood in spring last year, he still feels scared.
Shandong was originally controlled by the Renaissance Army, and the policy of reducing rents and interest rates made the people's lives much better than before.
Although Li Dalang's family was a tenant farmer, he was still able to survive.
But when everyone was preparing for spring plowing, there suddenly came a flood.
Fortunately, the people from the Renaissance Army warned in time. Everyone fled to Guzi.
Fortunately, he was fine, but his house was destroyed by the flood.
Later, everyone was organized by the government to leave their homes.
People in the government said that their hometown would become a big lake in the future.
Some landowners are unwilling to leave and want to stay because their own land is there.
But the Li family was originally a small family with no land. They could just move if the government allowed them to move.
Li Dalang once heard the elders in the village say that their hometown used to be a big lake.
Otherwise, why would there be the name Heze!
Li Dalang packed up some of the belongings he brought with him when he fled and put them on the left side of the wheelbarrow, and then asked his wife to sit on the right side with her daughter Ling'er in her arms.
Then he pushed the wheelbarrow and left his hometown with the migrating army.
They first followed the land route leading to the northeast until they reached a port. When they arrived, they boarded a ship.
This is the first time for their family to take a boat ride. It feels so uncomfortable.
Fortunately, the boat ride is not long.
The ship traveled all night, and everyone came to a port again, and then it was a long journey on the road again.
Fortunately, along the way, the government was able to provide two meals a day. Although the food was average, at least I was able to eat enough, which was a great blessing.
Everyone is grateful for this new government. If nothing else, just two meals a day can make everyone immerse themselves in following the government.
Not only that, if you get sick on the road, you can see the doctor. Not only that, you can also get free pills.
Li Dalang's mother caught wind and cold on the road.
I took the doctor's medicine and it took a few days and I was fine.
The road outside the pass is not easy to walk, and many small roads pass through the mountains.
The Qing court did not properly regulate the roads outside the pass.
As a result, many roads are in disrepair.
Fortunately, most of the migrating teams moved forward on foot.
However, by going around this way, I also walked a lot of distance.
They landed in the eastern part of the Liaodong Peninsula and then headed north. I don't remember how many days they walked. They finally arrived at their new home.
Li Dalang's family was not assigned to any acquaintances in the village.
The other fourteen families assigned to the same village as him were all strangers.
He is the only strong laborer in the Li family, and seems to be the weakest family in the village.
People sent by the government did not have time to stay in a village.
They will patrol back and forth in various villages.
Tell these new immigrants some rules.
For example, you cannot light an open fire in the forest, otherwise it will cause a forest fire, which is against the king's law.
Also, help them divide the land boundaries of each family.
It was already late summer, and there was no time to plant food. Each family could only set aside a small amount of land to grow some vegetables.
The green onions, cabbage, and pickles grown by Shandong people can all be stored in winter.
When Li Dalang was a child, he often went hunting with his father and knew how to dig traps and lay traps.
After arriving here, he discovered that there were far more prey here than in Shandong.
At the beginning, he set a few traps in the woods to try.
Unexpectedly, we harvested several hares and grouse in just a few days.
These immigrants have not eaten meat for a long time.
Li Dalang sorted these things and gave some to each of the more than a dozen households in the village.
Over and over again, after everyone ate the prey caught by Li Dalang, they would take the time to come over and help his family with the work.
Li Dalang has a small family, and his wife has bad legs and feet, so she cannot go to the fields, so she can only look after the children at home.
Usually only my wife and ten-year-old son help me.
Gradually, Li Dalang's prestige in the village became higher and higher. When it was time to choose the village chief, he naturally became the village chief.
In a few more months, winter will come. The fields are frozen and cannot be plowed.
The young men in the village followed Li Dalang into the mountains.
Before the Chinese New Year, they successfully brought back a few wild boars.
At this time, Li Dalang had been elected as the commander of the camp and selected as a militia member, and was assigned a flintlock rifle.
Otherwise, how could you dare to hunt wild boars!
When it comes to land reclamation, it is not a simple matter. Otherwise, each family would only clear out dozens of acres of land in a year.
The first step is to clean up the trees and grass around your own field, which is to bring out the entire isolation.
This is mainly to prevent the forest from being set on fire during wildfires.
There is no need to take care of the shrubs, and all the trees in the field that can be used will be cut down.
Although every family has dozens of acres of forest, these things now belong to their own family, so they have to save them.
Wood has many uses, at least it can be cut and sold for money!
In the second part, setting fire to the wasteland is not finished after the burning. The soil must be plowed, leveled, and the remaining tree roots removed.
This step takes the most time. These raw lands are all uneven, so leveling the land takes the most time.
For tens to hundreds of acres of large fields, drainage ditches need to be dug.
Therefore, even if he bought an ox on credit, Li Dalang could only clear out 40 acres of land.
The remaining thirty acres of land were simply tidied up during last winter.
Today I was busy with spring plowing, and then I had to take care of the crops. Li Dalang didn't have any extra time.
Fortunately, last winter, the furs Li Dalang got from hunting were sold in the town for a lot of money.
This spring, when the grain had just been sown, Li Dalang paid back the money for the cattle.
As for the seeds, he plans to return the corn directly after his own corn is planted.
"Da Lang, you're back, come in and have a meal!" After a day of busy work in the fields, Li Dalang finally returned home.
My wife has already cooked dinner, which is corn paste, steamed buns, and some pickled pickled vegetables. This is the Li family's dinner.
The mother-in-law and daughter-in-law were rubbing corn in front of the basket.
Use a flat iron awl to make a notch from the beginning to the end of the corn cob, and then follow the notch to easily remove the corn kernels.
The corn cobs harvested at home this year filled the wooden barn. The mother-in-law and daughter-in-law's task is to dispose of these corn cobs and separate the corn kernels from the corn cobs to reduce the space occupied.
Li Dalang also wanted to plow the land before winter came. Driving his cattle, he could plow ten acres of land in one day.
Not only that, but all the land that could not be reclaimed last year must be cleared before winter.