Chapter 217 Animal Husbandry
In the past, many scholars did not dare to serve Qin Chuan, because Qin Chuan was a thief in the past, and they were afraid that after the imperial court recovered Jingle Lan County, they would settle accounts with them.
Since Zhu Youzhen personally took out the charge of Qinchuan traitor and appointed him as a guerrilla general, many down-and-out scholars and poor scholars from Jingle, Lanxian and nearby prefectures and counties have come to vote.
Qin Chuan established his own internal affairs system with reference to the six-ministry and six-room system of the imperial court, and set up the Department of Officials, the Department of Household Administration, the Department of Science and Education, the Department of Industry, the Department of Military Affairs, and the Department of Criminal Law, and added the Department of Finance to manage money, grain, and taxes.
Although Wencheng is a newcomer, he has long been famous, and there is a father who is a big official at home, compared with Wang Jizong, he can better suppress those down-and-out scholars and poor scholars.
The household department of the Ming court was in charge of land, household registration, and the taxation of money and grain, and Qin Chuan divided the money and grain taxes to the finance department, retained other functions, and added the related functions of water conservancy and irrigation and animal husbandry, with Wang Jizong as the director.
The Department of Science and Education belongs to the cultural department, in addition to the establishment of schools in various counties and villages and towns, but also set up several scientific research departments, Qin Chuan put those who specialize in strange and obscene skills, delve into literature and geography, and specialize in strange and obscene skills, all put into me, and all kinds of people who are more specialized in various industries are also engaged in part-time scientific research there, with a group of people who have learned to engage in physics, chemistry, machinery, medicine, etc., and Song Zhiting, who likes Danqing ink and poetry, is the director.
The Department of Industry is responsible for the hard work of guns, gunpowder, mining, cement, brick burning, etc., with the most prestigious Chen Zhan as the director, and Li Xuejing and Yan Sanqi as the deputy directors.
The Military Affairs Department is in charge of military affairs, so Qin Chuan naturally serves as the director.
The Criminal Law Department is in charge of criminal law and security, and an old bandit named Niu Sanchun from Jiujishan is the director, this guy is lame, he can't go to the battlefield, he is a good and evil person, and he is principled and reasonable, so Qin Chuan let him take charge of the criminal law.
The financial secretary is in charge of the financial power, and all expenses such as money and grain, taxes, and salaries are naturally headed by Qin Chuan himself, and he plans to hand them over to his wife in the future.
Below these seven departments, there are various departments in charge of corresponding affairs, Jingle City and Lancheng County still retain the original departments and corresponding officials, these people still belong to the imperial court officials, eat the food and salary of the imperial court, listen to Qin Chuan's words, and govern according to the decrees of the seven departments under Qin Chuan, simply put, local institutions.
Each village and township has a village chief or town head, and also has a clerk and a financial officer, who is responsible for clerical and financial work, and there are also various li chiefs under these three village officials, based on the Ming Dynasty's Lijia system, with a lichang and ten Jiatou to maintain the law and order of the village, and a batch is rotated every year.
The Guan Di Army, which was previously responsible for maintaining law and order in various villages, gradually withdrew from various villages.
Luo Daniu, Li Dingliang, Liu Youzhu, Luo Ba, Lao Huang and others also gradually withdrew from civil administration, and the military and government were separated, and the army was only responsible for fighting wars, and civil affairs were handed over to Wang Jizong and Wen Cheng.
In the past, when there were few people, when Qin Chuan took the big pot rice route, the people under his hands ate and drank Lazar all paid by the public middle school, like Wang Jizong, who paid for five or two months a month, and three meals a day were covered by the public middle school.
But when the territory expands and the number of people under your command is large, this method will not work.
Therefore, Qin Chuan reformulated a set of salary system, considering that the price of grain is now as high as two taels of silver and one stone, it is impossible for him to raise the salary to the standard of grain price, so he adopted the method of wage plus grain subsidy, and established a clear hierarchy system.
For example, Wang Jizong and other directors of several departments have as much as six taels of food and a monthly subsidy of two stones of grain, while an ordinary director of the household administration department has only two taels of food and one stone of grain, and the officials at the grassroots level only have one tael of taels and eight buckets of grain subsidies.
In the Ming Dynasty, an official who did not enter the stream had three stones of grain in the month, compared to the amount of money formulated by Qin Chuan.
But an official under his command can buy five buckets of grain for one tael of silver a month, and the subsidy is about one stone and three buckets, which can feed a family of five, which is not low for many down-and-out scholars.
In a few years, when the price of grain falls, the value of cash silver will naturally increase.
The big pot of rice for civil affairs officials has been canceled, and all officials have solved the problem of eating by themselves, and those who have families naturally do not worry, but those who do not have families have to hire helpers or go out to forage for food, which has correspondingly increased the employment rate and the catering industry, and several restaurants have been opened in Lou Fan Town in just a few days.
The army's big pot of rice should naturally be retained, and Qin Chuan once again increased the army's food to ensure that there was meat every day, so that those big-headed soldiers could eat enough.
There was a lack of pigweed in the north, and it was very unrealistic to raise pigs in an era when people were not enough, so the source of meat for the Guan Emperor's army relied more on animal husbandry.
After Wang Jizong handled the household registration and cultivated land affairs well, he began to be busy developing animal husbandry.
Today's soil erosion in the Luliang Mountains is not as serious as in later generations, with many meadows and more shrubs, which are very suitable for grazing, and the Lanhe Plain has only reclaimed low-lying land near the water source, and more than half of the gently sloping wasteland.
There is no shortage of cattle, sheep, mules and horses in Lan County, Qinchuan copied thousands of livestock from those big households, with sheep being the most, there are native Luliang black goats, as well as foreign tail Han sheep, Hexi goats, Mongolian coarse wool sheep and other breeds.
The spring is dry in the Lvliang Mountains, the rain is concentrated in the summer, the autumn and winter are dry and cold, and the western mountains are undulating and ravines, the vegetation is sparse and shrubs, the most suitable for this area is the goat, especially the Lvliang black goat that adapts to the high mountains.
Because goats can go up and down, they can eat everything, they are resistant to coarse materials, and they can also feed on shrubs and leaves, so they are easy to shepherd, and goats have strong disease resistance, especially Luliang black goats, which are not easy to get sick.
But the goat has a disadvantage, that is, the size is too large, among which the adult ram ewe of the Luliang black goat is only about fifty catties, and the Hexi goat is a little bigger, but it is only about sixty or seventy catties.
In contrast, adult Mongolian sheep are generally more than 100 catties, and the tail Han sheep weigh two or three hundred catties.
The tail of the Han sheep grows very fast, and the reproduction is also fast, with three litters in two years or five litters in three years, and one litter can produce two to six lambs.
Mongolian coarse wool sheep are more drought and cold-tolerant, very adaptable, can go up and down and are also resistant to coarse materials, and the meat quality is very good, but the disadvantage is slow reproduction.
Moreover, both types of sheep require large pastures or large amounts of forage to keep in captivity, and neither of them can climb mountains as easily as goats, so they are not suitable for mountains that are too high and steep.
Qin Chuan and Wang Jizong solicited the opinions of the original large herders, and decided to raise Luliang black goats and Hexi goats for the time being.
The second is the tail of the Han sheep, this kind of two or three hundred catties of sheep raise a head of three goats, and there are many gentle slopes in the hinterland of Luliang Mountain, especially in the area from Jingle to Lanxian, as well as the area of Yunzhong Mountain in the east of Jingle, and there are also many low gentle pasture slopes in the area from Loufu to Guandi Mountain, and these areas can raise tail Han sheep.
Moreover, after the grain output and forage planting increase, Qinchuan will increase the shepherding amount of this sheep.
Mongolian coarse sheep are not raised, although the meat quality of this thing is very good, but the reproduction is too slow, and there is no tail Han sheep size, simply discard, so as not to occupy the forage of the tail Han sheep.
Wang Jizong formulated a set of animal husbandry support policies, lent sheep to the common people, and lent them grain, and exempted all interest to encourage them to breed in large quantities.
However, Qinchuan has also imposed restrictions on the breeding area and quantity, such as the fact that a certain number of sheep can only be accommodated in a certain place, especially the number of goats, so as to protect the ecological cycle.
Because the goats are even cut out of the grass roots and eaten, if the number of sheep suddenly increases dramatically, it can gnaw the surrounding mountains to the ground.
Qinchuan also asked Wang Jizong to divide the herdsmen into pastoral areas, grazing in rotational grazing areas, and forcing the herdsmen to collect grass seeds and plant pastures.
For example, after the grass on this hill is eaten up this year, the hill can no longer be grazed next year, and grass seeds must be sprinkled to maintain the amount of grass in the pasture.
As soon as the support policy came out, the original sheep herders in Jingle Lan County were excited, and other people also signed up for adoption, and thousands of sheep were all divided in a short time.
In addition to civil animal husbandry, Qinchuan also continued to increase the breeding of military horses, in addition to the Yunding Mountain Military Horse Farm, and a slight military horse farm in Luya Mountain, which can accommodate up to 2,000 horses.
Horse farmers in the horse farms also have to maintain the pastures by rotating grazing areas and planting grass seeds, so that the horse farms do not become obsolete in a few years.
In addition, Qinchuan planned a large number of hillside lands, and planted a large number of shrubs or pastures such as satawang, donkey grazing, sheep firewood, sand penny, lentil beans, ice grass, vetch and alfalfa on these higher slopes that were not suitable for growing grain.
Among them, alfalfa absorbs a large amount of groundwater, and the planting range will not be very wide, and only some suitable places will be selected for planting.
Widely planted are satawang, donkey grass, ice grass, vetch, sheep firewood, penny, and other perennial weeds that are extremely resistant to cold and drought.
In addition to shepherding livestock, these grasses or shrubs can also prevent wind and sand, maintain water and soil, and the grass and donkeys can also fertilize the fields and even intercrop with crops.