Prime Minister Bizen

Since sweet potatoes were not as economical as potatoes in Ezo and would cause various problems, Hideka simply removed Ezo from the list of sweet potato planting areas.

As for sweet potatoes, they can still be grown in a small area in Iyo. After all, there are many mountains in the northwest of Iyo. The climate there is much warmer than that of Ezo, and because of the mountains, it is not easy to grow waterways, so it is suitable to grow sweet potatoes.

Of course, these are not suitable for Ukita Tadashi's family. He has resigned from the post of governor of Ezo, and he will go to Sanuki to retire.

Legally speaking, he will not have much to do with the Xiu family in the future, but since Iyo can grow sweet potatoes, Sanuki must also be able to grow them, and sweet potatoes require less water, which is just right for places like Sanuki, which are short of water all year round.

(About Sanuki, as the only great plain in Shikoku, why there is water shortage and why the grain production cannot increase, I have already explained it from a geographical point of view.

To sum it up, the Sanuki Mountains are elevated, preventing the warm Pacific Current from condensing into water vapor. Correspondingly, Awa has always been a land of fish and rice. )
Thinking of this, Xiujia took the initiative to throw an olive branch to Ukita Tadashi's family and said: "Uncle, I always think that the high yield of sweet potatoes, easy planting, and no need for a lot of water are the blessings bestowed on us by God, which is why I want to This is the reason for the large-scale expansion of planting in Ezo together with potatoes.

It’s just that the climate in Ezo is cold, and there is only one kind a year. It is indeed not as economical as potatoes, but I always think it is because of the climate in Ezo.

If it is possible to grow sweet potatoes in the south, with its characteristics of two crops a year, it will definitely bring about a huge increase in grain production and solve the problem of food and clothing for the common people.

To be honest with my uncle, I also grow sweet potatoes in Okayama, which can produce two crops a year, and I believe Sanuki can do the same.

Moreover, Sanuki is short of water. In previous years, we used to dig ponds to accumulate rainwater for the spring and summer crops in the coming year and the people's daily life, but this is not the root of the problem after all.

The fundamental problem is that there is a drought-tolerant crop that can be applied to Sanuki's land. I think sweet potato is a very suitable thing for Sanuki.

If it had come earlier, I would definitely promote it in Sanuki, but right now Sanuki is a neighboring country of my brother, and I have no right to interfere.

Uncle is in charge of planting sweet potatoes in Ezo. You should have seen his potential, and you are familiar with the way of planting sweet potatoes. Do you have any ideas about transporting them to Sanuki for trial planting? "

The yield per mu of sweet potato is definitely higher than that of rice. Before the emergence of hybrid rice, the yield per mu of rice in one season was only 4/500 jin, and the high yield waited until 700 jin.

Under normal circumstances, the per-mu yield of potatoes per season is 2000 to 5000 jin, while the yield per mu of sweet potatoes planted in spring is about 7000 jin, and the yield of sweet potatoes planted in summer is about 5000 jin.

The comparison between the three is completely different. It is not nonsense to plant sweet potatoes with a yield of [-] jin per mu. If Sanuki grows sweet potatoes nationwide, it is possible to know and do millions.

As the father of the Lord of Sanuki, the Ukita Tada family had grown sweet potatoes and potatoes for the Hide family in Ezo, so they naturally knew the pros and cons of sweet potatoes and potatoes.

This time, I took advantage of my position to transport some potatoes and sweet potatoes southward for my own selfishness when I traveled south from Ezo, planning to plant them in Sanuki.

Now being told directly by the Xiu family, he simply confessed to the Xiu family, "To tell you the truth, when I went south from Ezo, I did bring a stone of potatoes and sweet potatoes to plant in Sanuki. I hope Your Highness doesn't mind."

Zhong's attitude was very sincere. After all, these two crops, like cotton, were strictly kept secret by Xiu's family, but he secretly took some of them back.

The Xiu family was a little displeased with Ukita Tadaka's behavior of talking to himself, but this is looking at his own uncle!Blood is thicker than water!

Besides, I have been managing the bitterly cold Ezo for so long without any credit or hard work. People have said this for the sake of being honest, and the Xiu family can still say "No, I don't allow you to take it back, give it to me. Put it back?"

That was too ugly!

When Ukita Tadaka was honest, Hideka actually had only one answer.

In fact, the two present here are all smart people, and Zhongjia is completely honest about sweet potatoes and potatoes by borrowing a donkey downhill, so that it can also explain why these two crops will develop in Sanuki in the future.

But after receiving the expression from Xiujia that he didn't mind, he immediately said, "I personally prefer to grow potatoes. After all, he doesn't have as many problems as sweet potatoes. I just took sweet potatoes back as a backup."

That meaning is very clear, but I still don't trust sweet potatoes from the bottom of my heart.

Therefore, Xiujia persuaded, "It is really laborious to deal with the aftermath of sweet potato planting, but as long as it can be harvested twice a year, its output is ten times that of rice, and Sanuki has been a rich land of fish and rice since then.

Moreover, although potatoes are good, they are extremely water-hungry. They need a lot of water when they are planted, and they need to be watered every two days when they grow fast. Sanuki is already short of water, so why raise another 'rice'? "

"Although potatoes need water, the yield is indeed higher than that of rice." Ukita Tadaka is not satisfied with Hideka's analogy, but he also understands that potatoes are indeed not the best solution for Sanuki, which is short of water.

"I understand." As if he had made up his mind, Ukita Tadaka said, "Just a little more trouble, I will discuss this matter with the Quan family after I go back."

Xiujia swears that there is no such thing as Keng Zhongjia and Quanjia father and son. Sweet potato is indeed the most suitable food crop for Sanuki.

But the conversation between Xiujia and Zhongjia just made the whole atmosphere a little awkward, especially Zhongjia voluntarily admitted that he brought back the potatoes and sweet potatoes that Xiujia asked to keep secret, and Xiujia took the initiative to change the topic and talk about other things.

"I just heard from my uncle that the Hongzhiwu Mine can already produce more than 7 taels of gold, more than 2 taels of silver, and 3 taels of copper per year. The discount is nearly 10 taels, right?"

As expected, Ukita Tadaka and Naoka were born of the same mother. As soon as he talked about gold, he opened his chatter box and began to talk about the changes in Kitami.

As Ukita Tadashi said before, in just two years, more than 7 people in Kitami have gone to pan for gold. Now I know that 8 or [-] towns have been formed in the local area, and each town has more than [-] people. people.

Among them, Monbetsu and Engaru, which were built around the Konomai Mine, are the largest, followed by the earliest dock cities, Monbetsu and Fumi, which were all created around the Konomai gold pan.

Ukita Tadashi’s family made it clear that there are 6 months of snow in Kitami a year, and only 4 months are suitable for planting. The waterways will definitely not be able to be planted in such a short period of time. Before potatoes spread to Ezo, there was almost no agricultural cultivation there. possible.

But after the potatoes were spread over there, he deliberately asked people to take some of them to Yuanqing, which is the closest to Hong Zhiwu, to try to plant them, which can be done throughout the year.

Ukita Tadaka also said that Kitami is the most suitable for the cultivation of sweet potatoes. Anyway, it is a season of the year, and the yield of sweet potatoes is higher than that of potatoes.

But Xiujia knows that sweet potatoes are temperate plants after all, and it's okay to grow them in places like Ridao and Danzhen that face the warm Pacific current. Let Kitami grow sweet potatoes?Have you ever seen sweet potatoes grown in Siberia?
Ukita Tadaka also said that now more and more people are panning for gold in Kitami, which has greatly slowed down the progress of pioneering wasteland in Ishikari, and Kitami cannot be self-sufficient in food, and wants Hideka to expand potato cultivation in Kitami on a large scale.

Hideka wrote down all these reasonable requests one by one, and said that he would inform the next governor of Ezo.

After chatting about the expansion of the old collar, Xiuzhong took the initiative to report to Xiujia about the expansion of the pit in the past two years.

In a word, because Xiujia stopped the transfer of population from North Korea, the progress of Ezo's development has slowed down significantly.

In addition, in the past two years, many waterways in the southern Ishikari and Hidaka areas have been treated, the swamps have been drained, and the original forests have been reclaimed. Today, Ridaka, Danzhen Ryogoku, and the southern part of Ishikari are the limit that the current population can control .

Ukita Tadaka's family will do two things in the next two years. One is to gradually expand to the southeast of Hidaka, which will be easy.

Because it can be seen from the map that the southeastern part of Hidaka is divided into pieces by mountains, with one side facing the sea and three sides sandwiching mountains. The bottom of the basin can be used as a springboard to continuously expand into it.

There are aborigines in these pelvic floors, but also because of the pelvic floor, the tribe is not very large, and the progress is rapid under the circumstances that the officials of the Colonial Office use both force and gentle means.

Especially this year, they successively occupied multiple pelvic floors in Luxiang, Dongbie, Sanshi, Fuwu, Xionggu, and Jidi.

These basin bottoms are the largest collection of pastures in Hokkaido, Japan in later generations, and the milk produced here even supplies the entire northeastern region of Japan.

Ukita Tadashi's family vowed that every basin here has at least one stream passing through it, and if a little preparation is made to open up the wasteland, it will definitely be a land of fish and rice.

But Hideka is more concerned about the development of Ishikari. According to Ukita Tadashi, the development of the Sapporo area and the northeast of Ishikari is not ideal.

This is the most important plain in Ezo. All the tribes that can survive here are large tribes, and none of the tribes has less than [-] people. According to the tradition that all the tribesmen are soldiers, there are casually thousands of mobilized soldiers. This is different from Japan’s The mobilization power of the army is unmatched.

The key point is that people are not afraid of death. If they want to rely on their inability to control Ishikari, they must rely on local support to launch an attack on Ishikari.

Now the Ukita Tadaka family is trying their best to maintain peace with there, but they are also urging the Hide family to make a decision as soon as possible. As time goes on and the trade between the two sides deepens, the cultural advantage of the Ezo Governor's Mansion over the Ishikari indigenous people will gradually weaken.

As far as the current situation is concerned, some tribes in Ishikari already use iron weapons, and these weapons were traded with the executive office or the governor's mansion in previous years.

Sending troops to Ezo is impossible within 5 years. Toyotomi's family in Kanto does not have this ability, and their own Kanto has not been settled yet. How can there be spare energy to manage the affairs of Ezo.

Now that the expansion of Ishikari has reached a stalemate, we can only postpone the matter. When the Kanto side stabilizes, organize an army of 2 people to cross Ezo north, and the local army of Ezo will launch an offensive. That's it.

The conversation about Eizo was almost finished, and Xiujia expressed his gratitude to Ukita Tadashi's family here, and took out a gold sentence of 100 taels from his internal funds to Ukita Tadashi's family as his thanks to him.

Xiujia knew very well that as the governor of Ezo, Ukita Tadashi's family must have brought back a lot of the gold sand that Kozhimai scoured out. After all, he even brought back sweet potatoes and potatoes privately. Wouldn't it be more convenient to bring some gold sand?