Flowers in full bloom

Chapter 365: More People, Better Things

It is March now, and the planting season for wolfberries has almost arrived. The buds are ready to be cultivated from seeds to plant wolfberry seedlings.

First, soak the seeds in warm water for about twelve hours to ensure the moisture and survival rate of the seeds. Then put the seeds on multiple layers of wet cotton cloth to keep warm and moisturize to promote germination.

Half a month later, the seeds sprouted white buds. Then a flat area with convenient irrigation was selected in Baihua Village.

The land was deep plowed and then enough fertilizer was applied. Then the land was carefully leveled and shallow trenches were dug at certain distances, with a depth of one finger joint.

Mix the germinated seeds with fine soil and spread them in the ditch, cover them with a thin layer of soil, and then cover them with a straw fan to keep them moist.

After four or five days, the wolfberry seeds will emerge from the ground. They are very thin. At this time, you must be very careful not to let the grass fan affect the growth of the thin buds.

After another ten days, the wolfberry seeds will grow two cotyledons. In addition to timely replenishment of water, it is also necessary to prevent birds from pecking at these seedlings, so a cloth strip is tied to the wolfberry seedling field to drive away birds.

In this way, after about one and a half months, the wolfberry seedlings have four or five tender leaves. At this time, it is necessary to thin out the seedlings. Pull out the weak wolfberry seedlings to make room for the seedlings that are growing well.

However, because the area of ​​the barren mountain is so large, we couldn't bear to throw away the seedlings and buds even though they were a little weak, so we found a new piece of fertilized land to plant them and began to care for them more carefully, just to give it a try.

After thinning, very vigorous wolfberry seedlings are left. After timely watering and fertilizing, these wolfberry seedlings should be ready for transplanting in more than a month.

While raising wolfberry seeds, the wolfberry divisions and cuttings that were replaced were also planted. In order to protect the replacement and white cuttings that were brought back every day, Hualei also prepared the nursery ground in advance, and the cuttings were planted whenever they arrived.

They planned to grow some roots on the cuttings in Baihua Village first, and then transplant them to the barren hills to ensure the survival rate of the cuttings. In order to plant more wolfberries, Hualei tried every possible way.

After carefully removing the weeds and bushes from the northern slope of Dongshan Mountain, the land was deeply plowed and then sufficient base fertilizer was applied.

Dig a hole about one foot deep at a certain distance, place the divided plant in the hole, straighten it so that the roots can stretch naturally, then fill it with soil, tamp it down, and water it thoroughly to help the roots take root.

In this way, the ramets are planted. Because there are many people and the spacing between the ramets is relatively large, a large area of ​​wolfberry is planted very quickly.

After all the ramets were planted, the cuttings had grown a lot of roots in the nursery. Carefully dig up the soil with the roots and move them to the barren hill. Following the same planting method as the ramets, the cuttings were also planted on the barren hill.

After the divisions and cuttings in her hands were planted, the divisions and cuttings ordered by the Imperial Hospital also arrived in Hualei's hands. So, another half month of busy work. The area of ​​wolfberry increased by a large area.

After all the divisions and cuttings provided by the Imperial Hospital were planted, the wolfberry seedlings in Baihua Village could be transplanted. Uncle Fu and the pioneers were busy and hard at work on the planting.

After all the wolfberry seedlings were planted, there was no more vacant land on the north slope. Looking at the green wolfberry field, Hualei was very happy.

It is true that more people means more work. The number of pioneering workers, which was originally said to be reduced after the New Year, has remained at 450 people per day, working on the flower buds.

Sufficient labor has invisibly reduced Hualei's manpower pressure. What she didn't know was that in order to maintain this number of pioneers, Rong Jin had almost flattered him all his life.

Seeing Hua Lei getting up early and working late every day, Rong Jin decided that if his flattery was no longer effective one day, he would ask his grandfather to do it. His grandfather was better at flattering than himself, after all, his grandfather had been riding a horse all his life.

However, what Rong Jin did not expect was that before he asked his grandfather to take action, he asked his third uncle, who was the Minister of the Ministry of Revenue, to take action first.

It turned out that there was something wrong with a batch of corn seeds from the Agriculture Bureau. When planting corn in Huabud, the corn seeds were directly planted in the nursery ground after being exposed to the sun for two or three hours, without being soaked in warm water.

However, when planting in Guantian last year, a manager from the Ministry of Agriculture imitated the seedling raising methods of other crops and took a portion of corn seeds as an experiment. He soaked them in warm water for two or three hours and then embedded them in the seedling raising field.

After germination, a comparison showed that the germination rate of the soaked corn seeds was indeed much higher than the method of directly raising seedlings without soaking the flower buds, and the germination time was also more uniform.

Therefore, for this year's corn planting, the Ministry of Agriculture still wants to use the warm water soaking method to grow corn seedlings. This is not a problem.

However, the soaking operator did not control the temperature of the warm water well and misremembered the time, so he poured the hot water, which had only cooled for less than a cup of tea, directly into the corn seeds.

The corn seeds were all scalded to death because the water they were soaked in was too hot, and no buds sprouted. This loss was 500 kilograms of corn seeds.

Moreover, this person did not realize that he had made a mistake at the beginning, or he was afraid of taking responsibility, so he did not dare to say it out even after he knew it, and just let the mistake go.

Unfortunately, Hua Lei was on duty in the Seedling Department that day together with another colleague Zhao Yifei, and was in charge of this matter.

Because the germination status of the seeds soaked and planted every day is recorded with dates, the personnel on duty also have a work schedule, and the personnel on duty also have their own signatures to confirm.

So, when there was a problem with the corn seeds, Grand Minister of Agriculture Cheng looked through the relevant record sheets and signature sheets and directly found the problem on Hua Lei and his colleague Zhao Yifei.

And Zhao Yifei is a descendant of a prominent family, and his family background is many times more powerful than that of the weak Hua Lei.

So, Zhao Yifei shamelessly put all the blame on Hualei, saying that he had gone to the toilet several times because of diarrhea and had no time to take care of the corn seeds. He asked Hualei to look after them, and it was Hualei's negligence that led to the problem with the corn seeds.

When this happened, Hua Lei didn't want to shirk her responsibility. After all, she did make a mistake.

However, according to the rules of the Agricultural Bureau, the two people on duty will bear full supervisory responsibility for any problems that occur on the day of their shift. Of course, the direct operators are also responsible, but their responsibilities are different from those of Hualei and the others.