When Li Chao left Danjiangkou, he was a little disappointed. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

The Danjiangkou Reservoir in later generations, what a miraculous project, it is the largest populous freshwater lake in Asia. The water area of the reservoir reaches more than 1,000 square meters, and the water storage capacity reaches nearly 30 billion cubic meters.

The widest part of the reservoir reaches more than 40 li, and the deepest part reaches 27 zhang deep.

In later generations, this reservoir was built to have many functions such as flood control, shipping, irrigation, and power generation.

Li Chao inspected the Danjiang Estuary on the spot this time, and he originally wanted to see if he could build a reservoir here, not to mention that such a big dam could be built at once, but the construction of a low dam to stop the water would at least play a great role in shipping and irrigation.

Although the Nanyang Xiangyang Basin is a very fertile basin plain, this place has always been short of water. There has always been a saying that water is as expensive as oil in the Nanxiang area, and if the Han River can be cut in half, the water of the Han River can be diverted or the water of the Danjiang River can be intercepted to irrigate the Nanxiang Basin, then it can irrigate a large area of fields.

In later generations, the Danjiangkou Reservoir was able to irrigate 3.5 million acres of land. The water-scarce land has been turned into a commercial grain base.

But after actually watching it, Li Chao was a little disappointed.

The status quo is not satisfactory, and it is very difficult to intercept the Han and Dan rivers. Even if the Danjiang River is only intercepted and dammed, it will be a super project.

The narrowest part of the Danjiang Estuary is at least 100 zhang wide.

Building a dam 100 zhang wide, especially to intercept a river as hundreds of miles long as the Danjiang River, and the amount of water is so large, is not only a big project, but also quite technically difficult.

Building a dam is much more difficult than building an embankment.

Damming is just a constraint, but damming is an interception.

With disappointment, Li Chao left the Danjiang Estuary and headed down the river towards Xiangyang. From the Danjiang Estuary to Xiangyang, the shipping situation is still good, but because the drought is too severe, there is little water in the river, and some areas that can be navigated have also become a little dangerous.

Fortunately, the experienced boatmen were able to pass safely.

But if you want to go upstream, it will be more troublesome, and you have to let the slender man pull the fiber a little bit to cross the beach. In the past, when there was water, after crossing Xiangyang, there were many places in the Hanjiang River section that had to be stretched across the beach, and the further upstream you went, the more such beachheads there were. This has also caused the upper reaches of the Han River to have many people who have been on the riverside for many years.

"Teacher, you see that there are many people on the river, there are many people who don't have any clothes, what are these people, they don't wear clothes, are they Southern Barbarians?" Cheng Qian and a group of children looked at the shore in front of them, rows of people bent over the shore, carrying ropes on their backs, these people all had a strange characteristic, that is, they were all undressed.

"These people are slender men!" Li Chao replied.

The slender man on the Han River is also a group of ancient professionals, but he is also the hardest working person. Some poor men, with a lot of strength, begged for a living on the river.

The line of dry fiber drawing is the hardest. No matter what kind of season, even if it is a cold winter, when crossing the beach, you have to jump into the river to pull fiber. It is cold in winter and hot in summer, and clothes are wet, dry, dry, wet, and sweat stains, which are the most prone to damage. Therefore, many slender men are often naked when they pull fiber. In winter, they wear a coat.

When he had crossed the beach, he went down to the river and returned to the boat, where he put on his clothes again.

Because they often walk in the river in this way, especially in winter, they go down naked, so the slender men often have rheumatism and joint disease, and it is very serious. When the weather changes in winter, my legs often hurt and I can't get off the ground.

The portionmen often lived near the beachheads, built on stilts, and were hired by passing boatmen. Generally, when the ship goes down to Xiangyang and Jiangxia, it hires a slender man to accompany the ship, and the slender man at this time is the most relaxed, because there is no need to pull the fiber downstream, and you can rest on the boat. It's just that you have to carry the goods when you dock, and when you get back, you'll be tired. The river section before Xiangyang is fine, there are few beaches, and boats can cross.

Only after Xiangyang, it is more troublesome, often to encounter the beach, must pull the fiber.

The Han River is a very important river, even compared with the Yangtze River, in ancient times, China's center of gravity has been in the north, and the Han River, is an important channel that communicates the south and the north, especially when the capital of the Central Plains is in Luoyang or Chang'an, the materials in the southwest and southeast are often along the Yangtze River into the Han River, and then go upstream, to Xiangyang, and then from the Tangbai River to Luoyang, or into the Danjiang River through Shangzhou, through the Danba Road to Chang'an Bashui.

This year's weather continues to be dry, and it has been dry for two months, and the water level of the Han River continues to drop. Originally, many sections of the river that did not need to be drawn are now also needed.

For merchants, this undoubtedly increases the cost and the time to sail.

In Li Chao's view, this will undoubtedly make it more and more difficult to transport grain from southeast Bashu and other places.

In the evening, the flotilla docked.

Li Chao got off the boat and walked along the river beach, followed by a group of small radish heads.

"Give me your knife!" Li Chao said to Shangguan Yi.

Shangguan Yi hurriedly handed his saber to Li Chao, who pulled out the knife and dug it on the river beach.

Cheng Qian and the other children all looked at Li Chao curiously, why did the teacher play the digging game like them today.

A group of children also began to take out their knives and start digging, but they dug for a long time, but they didn't see anything.

Li Chao grabbed a handful of the excavated soil into his hand.

Wang Xuance, Shangguan Yi and others all came over.

Li Chao seemed to have something in his hand, something in the shape of a long strip.

"What's that?" Several people asked puzzled.

"These are locust eggs."

"Do locust eggs look like this?"

A group of people asked curiously, they had heard Li Chao say that there would be a locust plague this autumn, and there would be an even bigger locust plague next summer. They have also eaten roasted locusts and fried locusts, and even eaten relief cakes made of locust powder.

But this is the first time I've seen locusts dug out of the soil.

"These are locust eggs, and those little holes in the river beach are all locust eggs. There is an egg sheath in a hole, and dozens or hundreds of locusts can hatch in a single egg sheath. Locusts prefer to lay eggs on river flats, where there is a lack of vegetation and the soil is dry due to sunlight. ”

"Why?"

"This is the characteristic of locusts, they are afraid of moisture and prefer dryness. Where there is vegetation, the land is generally relatively moist, which is not conducive to the growth of locust eggs. Therefore, their favorite is the kind of river flats that are usually covered by water, but when the water recedes in the dry season, they run naked, this kind of river beach has no vegetation, and when the sun is shining, it will be very dry. This is most suitable for locusts to lay eggs, but under normal circumstances, the amount of water in the river beach will rise again when it rains, and the locust eggs will drown before the water overflows the river beach, so the number of locusts will also be greatly reduced, and it will become a disaster. ”

Li Chao looked at the river beach and pointed to the river beach full of small holes, "Do you know how many locusts can be produced here?" A place with a large table top can grow hundreds of thousands of locusts, and on both sides of this river, I don't know how many locusts will fly out at that time. ”

When I thought that a place the size of a table could grow hundreds of thousands of locusts, not to mention that Cheng Qian and other children were a little pale, even Wang Xuance and them were shocked.

"This autumn is dry, there is no rain, the river will not overflow, so we can only hope for heavy snow in winter. If there is heavy snow, most of these locust eggs may freeze to death, and if there are a few more heavy snowfalls, then not only can the drought be relieved, but the locusts can freeze to death for most of them. Gao Kan said.

"Under normal circumstances, rain and snow can kill most of the locust eggs, so in a normal year, although locusts are always present, it is difficult to form a large locust plague. But this year has been dry for so long, and even if it is winter, it will most likely be a warm winter with drought and no snow. ”

Shangguan Yi and they inhaled again and again.

"Then this is really a bad year, is it a warning from heaven?"

"It's just normal weather." Li Chao said indifferently.

That night, many people had insomnia.

In the past, I always heard Li Chao talk about locust plagues, but he didn't really realize the seriousness of locust plagues. Most of the locusts they have stayed on the locusts that can be eaten, and even if there are locust plagues, they are only records that they have read in books.

But today, on the river beach, looking at those dense holes, looking at those egg sheaths, and listening to Li Chao say that there will be hundreds of thousands of eggs in a place with a large desktop, they are really scared.

Sleepless nights.

Early in the morning, Li Chao got up, led the horse out for a walk, and when he came back, the prince came out with a dark circle under his eyes.

"Why didn't the teacher ask me to go horseback riding today?"

"Seeing that you slept soundly, I didn't call you, knowing that you slept late last night."

While talking, a fast horse arrived, but it was a report sent by Shannan Prefecture.

When he came back to the ship after receiving the official documents, the reports were transferred from Shangzhou, and some were even transferred from Xiangzhou to Shangzhou again. Li Chao opened the official reports of the sixteen states of Shannan East Province and read them one by one, and the most important thing was the report on grain and purchase.

There has been another increase in the states and in the amount of food bought.

It was already a million stones before, but now that it has only been a few days, it has added another three million stones, and after Li Chao made his way in Shangzhou, it added up to almost five million stones.

The big families took out a lot of grain, but the yamen couldn't come up with money to trade it now.

However, the big households did not dare to say that they had no money to pay at this time, so they brought the grain home, and the grain was first deposited in the official warehouses of the prefectures and counties, and the state and county yamen issued receipts to the large households.

Hit the white strip.

This can be regarded as a common means of the government throughout the ages.

But at this time, Li Chao didn't have much to do, the court was a court with no money, and now he bought so much grain from the place at once, how could he have the money to pay.

The local government has no money, and it is of course unrealistic to expect the imperial court to pay for it.

Li Chao is also a clever woman, and it is difficult to cook without rice.

At this time, it can only be played first. (To be continued.) )