Flowers in full bloom

Chapter 758: Many Uses

After the issue of Lop Ma was resolved, Hualei was very happy. In mid-September, the Ministry of Works personnel from the capital also arrived in Xichang. This time they came with a total of six people.

On the one hand, they had to gather local manpower to repair all the granaries. On the other hand, they had to select sites for two new granaries. Hua Lei asked Hao Shijie from the workshop to coordinate all matters, and she let go.

Because next, it is time to harvest corn, and the buds will be very busy. This year, although there were some losses due to the locust plague.

Fortunately, the corn was well protected and the loss was not great. Therefore, the amount of corn tax collected was still quite good.

The corn planted in the Bailiyun military camp was still affected in yield because of the burn of seedlings in the early stage. On average, the yield per mu was 50 to 60 kilograms less than that in the official fields.

However, the corn seeds he returned were not stingy at all. On top of Hualei's original amount, he directly gave her 20% more, which made Hualei feel embarrassed.

However, seeing these soldiers wearing special military uniforms pulling more than a dozen carts full of corn, they delivered them directly to the gate of the government office.

Hua Lei stopped being pretentious and said that she would let them take the things back, so after a few polite words, she accepted them all.

By the way, the soldiers who brought the corn back were also invited to have a simple meal in the dining hall of the government office. Yan Shanlin, Xiang Xuewen, Liao Xiaoqiang and others finally saw the flower buds up close.

As expected, just as they had imagined, Master Hua was not only good-looking, but also very friendly and spoke softly. When he saw them sweating profusely, he even asked the dining hall to bring them some iced green bean soup.

Unlike other high-ranking prefects, she not only ate at the same table with her, but also did not get angry when she saw her and others secretly looking at her from time to time.

He just smiled and advised himself and the others to eat more. When he left, Lord Hua also gave him a lot of salted duck eggs, fermented bean curd and pickled vegetables.

I also told a few of my friends with regret that because the weather was too hot, sausages and bacon had not been delivered recently, otherwise I could have sent some to them.

Mr. Hua is so nice! Xiang Xuewen, Liao Xiaoqiang and others took the goodies sent by Hua Lei back to the military camp to show off.

This time, Captain Bai went to patrol the border, which was a big loss, Xiang Xuewen thought to himself.

The letter from Uncle Han was rather regretful, because Xining Prefecture had suffered from drought and then locust plague, and out of the 300 catties of corn lent to Uncle Han, only less than 200 catties of corn were returned.

So, after receiving the letter from Uncle Han, Hua Lei also replied to him, saying that there was no need to return it in a hurry, and the 200 kilograms of corn that were retrieved could be kept for seeds and planted this year.

Ten days later, Prefect Bao of Xi'an Prefecture also wrote a letter to Hua Lei with the good news that the corn plantations in Xi'an Prefecture had an output of 620 kilograms per acre.

As the first year of planting, the yield is already quite good, and the buds are also very happy. And good news came from Changliang Prefecture.

They have already started making this year's litchi kangjina. Hualei asked them to help prepare the litchi for Emperor Shengwu. They picked the best and freshest ones. They just waited for Hualei's carriage caravan.

Upon hearing that all the lychees to be sent to Shangjing City were ready, Hua Lei immediately asked his guards to rush to Changliang Prefecture, and then took this year's fresh lychees and rushed to Shangjing City day and night.

The rest will still need Hualei's boats to help transport them to Shangjing City for sale this year. However, they will also send a few people to go to Shangjing City to study with Tian Xiaofu.

After selling all the lychees, they wanted to visit the Jiangnan shipyard to order a boat. In addition, they were already looking for a mule.

In addition, they have also reached a unified agreement with other people who want to get a piece of the pie. At that time, everyone will perform their duties and work together to strive to make Changliangzhou's lychee industry better and better.

Moreover, they also listened to Hualei's advice, bought a few barren hills, and prepared to start planting litchi trees. Looking at the thick stack of letter paper, Hualei was satisfied.

Teaching people to fish is getting better. I will slowly withdraw from the job and let them do things on their own. Happy things happened one after another. The lychee business was going very smoothly, and the sorghum here was also ripe.

Taking advantage of the good weather, the people began to harvest sorghum. This harvesting method was also mentioned by Governor Bao in his letter.

Generally, scissors are used to cut the sorghum near the sorghum ear after it is ripe, and then the sorghum seeds are rubbed out by hand. This method is faster.

However, considering that Xichangfu had a pedal thresher, Hualei changed the harvesting method and had people cut off the sorghum ear at an arm's length below it.

Then they were tied into small bundles, dried for a few days, and threshed on a pedal thresher in the same way as rice. Sure enough, it was much faster than rubbing the sorghum seeds by hand.

The most important thing is that after the sorghum ears are threshed, the remaining sorghum stalks can be directly used to make brooms, which are very useful for sweeping the floor. Xichang is very windy and sandy, so brooms are very useful.

If you cut the sorghum stalks short, you can make a broom for scrubbing pots. The handle can be long or short, and you can make it according to your needs.

Remove the top ears and leave only the slender sorghum stalks, which can be used as a sieve for steaming buns. It has many uses.

Therefore, Hua Lei asked the people in the workshop to make a few samples so that the people could learn from them and make them at home when they have time. She would then purchase them and help sell them.

The sorghum ears and flower buds cut off during the sieve making process are not thrown away but collected and will be recycled when the time comes.

Of course, the idea of ​​setting up a sorghum stalk workshop was also slowly forming in Hualei's mind. By then, Mr. Peng and the wealthy merchants in the city would be the customers of this sorghum stalk workshop.

After the sorghum was threshed, the windmill was used to winnow the sorghum seeds cleanly. Peng Dong's family was also ready to receive the sorghum.

It was originally thought that the people would exchange sorghum for rice and flour. However, this year because an extra crop of late rice was planted, the rice ears of late rice were already heavy in the fields.

Therefore, many people chose to sell sorghum directly, thus saving Peng Dongjia the cost of transporting rice and flour back from Jiangnan.

Peng Dongjia was very happy and was not stingy. He sent people on mule carts to go directly to the people's homes to buy sorghum.

This saved many people who didn't have mule carts or wheelbarrows a lot of trouble. Everyone was very happy.

Therefore, the sorghum was quickly harvested, dried, threshed and sold, and the process was carried out in an orderly manner every day.