Volume 3: Dragon and Snake Movement Chapter 351: Oranges grown in Huaibei are bitter oranges
"Ahem, they are all seeds. Even if I showed them to you, you might not recognize them!"
Under Zhu Ying's piercing gaze, Lao Xianyu seemed unusually cheerful. He took off a bundle and handed it over, smiling and saying, "Look, this is what I made when I was free! Hey, I used to drift on the sea a lot, and I didn't have any other hobbies, so I often brought back some random things. I would plant anything I thought was delicious, even if I didn't know what kind it was."
"Over time, I have grown a big vegetable garden. I don't even know what many of the things are. The so-called secret garden is just like what the Second Young Master said, just for the sake of sounding good. But since I am older and don't go out to sea very often, this is the only hobby I have left, so I kept it hidden and didn't want outsiders to know. I really wasn't teasing the Second Young Master before."
"Also, I trusted the wrong person in the past and took him to one of my old vegetable gardens. But that guy turned out to be a worthless person and stole vegetables to sell. When I questioned him, he retorted. I was so angry that I razed the entire vegetable garden and moved it to another place. Over the years, not to mention Xiao Huasheng, even Yunhe has never been to my new vegetable garden. The second young master is the first outsider to come."
Zhu Er snorted angrily when he heard this: "According to what you said, if you take me with you, then you still think highly of me? Don't you see who I am? How can I think highly of your garden full of edible things?"
But he suddenly saw Zhang Shou glaring at him, and he came to his senses and quickly changed his words: "I heard what Ah Liu said after he returned from Cangzhou. I came here to look for seeds with good yield and quality. But I am not after money or a career, I just want to do something solid. Besides, you have to show all your skills when you get to the capital, right?"
That's not necessarily true! If he arrived in the capital and found that the old emperor was a tyrant who ate, drank and had fun all day and ignored state affairs, or a mediocre ruler who was manipulated by court officials and trapped in the palace, or a suspicious ruler who seemed to have an iron fist but actually liked to play with people's hearts... he would rather pretend to be incompetent and leave!
As Lao Xianyu thought about it, he very attentively handed one of the bundles to Zhu Ying. Seeing that Zhu Ying actually untied the bundle and saw the paper packages inside, he let Zhu Er hold the bundle and opened the packages one by one, examining the contents with great interest. He glanced at Zhang Shou and handed over another bundle, then smiled so much that all the wrinkles on his face were smoothed out.
"Dr. Zhang, you are a doctor of the Imperial College and you have a lot of knowledge. You actually know how to make the best use of all the ingredients I mentioned earlier. Can you please take a look at these seeds now? To be honest, I don't recognize some of them."
When Zhang Shou learned that Xian Yunhe had never been to Old Salted Fish's vegetable garden, he realized that the vegetable garden was indeed Old Salted Fish's biggest secret. On the contrary, the stone tablets that Ah Liu had just carried in were probably insignificant to Old Salted Fish. He didn't recognize them anyway . At this time, he did not take the bundle, but directly untied it in Old Salted Fish's hand and took out a paper bag from it.
Zhu Er was upset when he saw that Zhu Ying was treating him as a bag carrier. He complained, "Yingying, you have never even planted flowers, let alone these seeds. How could you possibly recognize them? I have looked in that vegetable garden before, and I have never seen more than half of the things there. I just couldn't recognize them. Even though your brother-in-law is knowledgeable, he definitely doesn't know what they are!"
As he spoke, Zhu Er looked at Zhang Shou and saw him taking out a black seed with white hair from a paper bag and turning it over and over again thoughtfully. He suddenly became uncertain.
After all, Zhang Shou grew up in the countryside, so it’s impossible that he really... farmed, right?
Sure enough, the next moment Zhu Ying rolled her eyes at him in anger: "When I first met Ah Shou, he was leading people in the paddy fields and talking about a good harvest! Even if I don't recognize these seeds, he definitely knows them!"
Old Salty Fish had been listening attentively to everyone's words. When he heard that Zhang Shou had actually worked in the fields, he immediately apologized with a smile, "I don't believe what you said, Miss... Looking at Dr. Zhang's character and appearance, even if he was born in a small family, he would have been treated like a treasure. How could they bear to let him work in the fields?"
"I didn't say he worked in the fields himself!" Zhu Ying raised her eyebrows slightly and smiled slyly, "What I meant was that Ah Shou only knows a little about farming."
She emphasized the words "somewhat understood" and then said calmly, "The reason why he talked to people in the paddy field about a good harvest was because he persuaded the villagers to dig canals to divert water into the fields and convert wheat fields into rice fields. Nowadays, there are many people from the south in the capital, and wheat is cheap and grain is expensive in the capital all year round. In addition, he raises tussah silkworms, collects silk and weaves silk, so every household in his village has a lot of income."
Old Salty Fish couldn't help but glance at Zhang Shou again. Seeing that he was still looking at the black seeds over and over again, he asked tentatively, "Does Dr. Zhang know what this is?"
"If I didn't even know this, wouldn't you be laughing at me?" Zhang Shou laughed, then looked at Lao Xianyu calmly and said, "Isn't this cotton seed? Did you bring this from overseas?"
Zhu Ying was fine, but Zhu Er was furious: "You old fool, you actually fooled me? These are just cotton seeds, and you lied to me that you brought them from overseas!"
The old salted fish was not in a hurry, and glanced at Zhu Er with contempt: "Cotton is not originally produced in our country. It was originally introduced from the west. The second young master claims to be a good farmer, don't you even know this?"
Zhu Er suddenly felt like a fully inflated ball that suddenly had a hole in it, and he completely deflated.
Seeing his guilty look, Zhang Shou interrupted him, "Okay, there's no need to keep talking outside, let's all go inside. As for the cotton seeds, just like what Lao Xianyu said, our country didn't plant them in the past, and even if we plant them now, the varieties are not very good. If there are superior varieties from overseas, and they are successfully planted, it can be said to be a more important achievement than new spinning machines and new looms."
After hearing Zhang Shou finish his words, he went back to the house holding the cotton seed thoughtfully. Zhu Er saw Zhu Ying quickly wrapped the seeds in her hand, stuffed it into his arms, tied the bundle again, and then hurried forward to chase Zhang Shou. Thinking about what he had just said, which would definitely be considered ignorant, he felt very uncomfortable.
The eldest brother is both talented in literature and martial arts, and his brother-in-law is good at mathematics and even has a "little knowledge" of farming. He really can't survive!
Old Salty Fish put away the bundle in his hand, then reached out and easily took the other bundle from Zhu Er, and then said to Zhu Er meaningfully: "Second Master, if you really want to be good at farming, you have to learn a lot from your teacher and future brother-in-law. Otherwise, if you don't even know a cotton seed, it will be a joke if you tell others!"
"Humph!" He snorted in dissatisfaction, but Zhu Er knew that the man was right. When he followed him into the yard, he said angrily, "My family is a noble family. If you don't have a talent for martial arts, you will be forced to study. Even if there is a farm at home, it won't be my turn to go. I didn't grow up in a small village. How can I recognize these things?"
At this point, he felt that this was a mockery of Zhang Shou's background, so he quickly changed the subject: "By the way, since you said that the cotton seeds were obtained from overseas, then I would like to ask you, how does it compare to the cotton we grow here? Is the yield higher, or is the quality better?"
The old man walking in front smiled but did not answer immediately.
After entering the house, he saw that Ah Liu had already placed the broken pieces of the stele neatly on the table in the middle. Peanut was looking at them curiously. Then he said, "This cotton is what I saw the locals grow when I was overseas. Whether it's the yield, the length of the cotton wool, or the toughness, it's better than ours."
Zhang Shou was still holding the cotton seeds in his hand and examining them. After a while, he looked up at Lao Xianyu and said with a half-smile, "But after you bring them back for trial planting, you should find that the results are average, far from as good as what you saw overseas, right?"
Lao Xianyu didn't expect Zhang Shou to make such an accurate judgment. After being stunned for a moment, he pretended not to notice Zhu Er's gloating and nodded awkwardly.
"Indeed. I have brought this stuff back several times, and asked others to bring it back several times, but the results were not very good, far inferior to tomatoes, peanuts and the like."
He was honest and simply recounted his failures: "One time it was because the ship drifted on the sea for too long. When we finally arrived in Cangzhou, it was too late to plant. When we planted the cotton seeds, they didn't grow at all."
"Once the cotton was planted too densely, many bolls could not open, so the yield was low and the bolls that were produced were small and light. I thought it was probably because of insufficient sunlight."
"Once I finally managed to grow cotton, and the harvest was OK. I asked someone to gin the cotton, and I found that the cotton fluff was fine, long, and tough. It was indeed a good thing, better than what we have now. I wondered if I could mix the crops, so I took a batch of seeds from the best cotton field in Cangzhou. As a result, the crops got worse and worse... Oh, it really pissed me off."
Lao Xianyu went to great lengths to describe his failures. Seeing that Zhang Shou was listening attentively, he smiled bitterly and said, "I'm just angry. For things like tomatoes, sweet potatoes, and peanuts, even if the taste is different at first, they will be almost the same after three to five years of planting. But with cotton, I can't even remember how many times I've failed."
This time, Zhu Er was no longer in the mood to mock Lao Xianyu. He asked himself, if it were him, would he be so persistent just to grow cotton? Even Zhu Ying couldn't help but say, "I didn't expect you to have such patience."
Zhang Shou was both angry and amused. You know, when mainland cotton, which was often called American cotton, was introduced to China in later generations, it was said to have taken several decades. At first, the government tried its best to promote it, but the people were in mourning. Not only did it not produce any results, but the harvest was often small or even zero. Some people even worked so hard to grow so-called foreign cotton, which was not as good as Chinese cotton.
At that time, countless people, from government officials to businessmen to ordinary people, participated in it. It was a large-scale trial planting across the country, with ten tons of seeds involved. Did Lao Xianyu really rely on one person to promote such a great cause?
Since Lao Xianyu said before that he had people bring him seeds from overseas several times, it is obvious that he has people who travel across the oceans all year round to help him. So, then, is that person's vegetable garden really taken care of by himself alone, with no outsiders around?
But rich girls and young masters like Zhu Ying and Zhu Er didn't know about farming, but he did.
Even if you leave it alone for just one or two days, the weeds and bugs alone can ruin your garden, not to mention watering and fertilizing ! Especially for something like cotton that is susceptible to pests and diseases, overgrown weeds can easily attract all kinds of bugs, and it's simply not okay if no one takes care of it!
Just as Zhang Shou was thinking this, he saw Lao Xianyu suddenly looking at him. He looked at him calmly until the old man avoided his gaze very unnaturally. Then he knew that the old man was still guilty.
He did not expose the man's trick at the moment, but smiled and said, "How many cotton seeds do you have? It's not the bag I saw just now, is it?"
Seeing that Old Salty Fish was hesitant, he continued, "As far as I know, these plants from overseas, apart from tomatoes that we have never had here, such as cotton, which has local varieties , once the overseas varieties are randomly mixed with local varieties, even if the foreign varieties are excellent, the results of planting them together are often very bad. Where did you hear about hybridization?"
Although I don't know where Zhang Shou got this information from, Lao Xianyu still said hesitantly: "I heard that if you mix different varieties together and mess with them during pollination, you may be able to breed better seeds... This seems to be called hybridization?"
Zhang Shou almost spat out a mouthful of blood. At this time, he had no doubts. To be able to use such a term in this era, but not a time traveler - then, Lao Xianyu must have received some legacy from Emperor Taizu. Whether it was information, connections or anything else, in short, this was definitely a person who could not be let go!
Of course, we don’t know whether this is a variety of sea island cotton or upland cotton. Lao Xianyu should have introduced it to the local area for trial planting not long ago . If this is the result after many years of trial planting, then he really wants to shed tears of sympathy for their failure.
Regarding an article he had occasionally read in his previous life, which talked about the degeneration of American cotton, it claimed that until the mid-twentieth century, China had been constantly introducing and even cultivating excellent varieties, but degeneration was still a big problem. Nowadays, if we don’t first ensure that it is always self-pollinating to maintain the purity of the seeds and avoid degeneration, and then hybridize it with those Asian cotton varieties that are far inferior...is this funny?
If hybridization is to be carried out, it must at least be between different upland cotton varieties... Are these really a bunch of experienced farmers busying themselves for nothing?
Therefore, he had to say earnestly: "Oranges grown in the south of the Huai River are oranges, while oranges grown in the north of the Huai River are tangerines. The same is true for cotton. Just as different kinds cannot be paired, the types of cotton grown overseas are actually different from those grown in my country. Even if you want to hybridize, you have to bring back different types of cotton from overseas to cultivate seeds, and then try to hybridize them with each other."
"Otherwise, it's the same as the mule, which is a cross between a horse and a donkey, being infertile."
