Chapter 373 - Low-Yield Fields

A few months earlier, Wu Nanhai had easily purchased this land from the county government at extremely low prices. As for why such large riverside acreage remained uncultivated, the Agricultural Committee had assumed it was due to abundant land and scarce labor. But when Wang Tian heard the "leaders" had bought this land, he rushed to tell Wu Nanhai: bad deal!

This land had actually been repeatedly cleared by Fujian migrants, but they always abandoned it after one or two years.

"Yields are too low," Wang Tian explained. "Work yourself to death growing rice—one mu produces seventy or eighty jin. With poor care, even less. Two crops yield under two hundred jin of unhusked grain—not enough to fill stomachs."

"Seventy or eighty jin?" Wu Nanhai was nearly shocked. Seventy or eighty jin was just dried grain; hulling lost another 20-30%. He knew ancient agricultural productivity was low, but based on current observations, ordinary paddies along the Wenlan River with assured irrigation could manage three hundred jin per crop.

"The master doesn't know," Wang Tian continued. "Farming here is very difficult: no rain means drought; three consecutive rainy days means flooding. But even without drought or flood, Meitai Yang rice yields are still poor."

Wu Nanhai found this phenomenon strange, but lacking capacity for immediate development, he didn't investigate further. To avoid leaving vast acreage fallow, he had workers extensively plant legumes and green manure for silage feed—some from the other time-space, some found by the Long-Range Reconnaissance Team. Results were dismal. Except for passable alfalfa yields, legumes nearly all failed.

"Looks like this land is severely phosphorus-deficient. Soil improvement is needed."

"So low yields probably stem from soil problems," Fa Shilu said after hearing the description. "We haven't thoroughly surveyed Meitai Yang's soil and moisture conditions."

"Could soil pH be too high?"

"Possibly. Since we're creating high-yield, stable-yield fields, soil improvement is involved."

He casually scooped up some soil: "If I remember correctly, Lingao's soil should match Jiangxi and Guangdong's main soil types—primarily laterite. That makes improvement relatively easier—lime will do. If alkaline, we'd need gypsum."

He rubbed it slightly: "This laterite developed from basalt, plus alluvial sand from upstream. Generally quite sandy, but not problematic for paddy."

Just then, Chuqing returned carrying a large basket filled with bottled kvass and kombucha.

"The cafeteria was out of stock. I went directly to the food factory." Chuqing smiled. "Let me soak them to cool first." She carried the basket toward a stream at the slope's base.

These two beverages were now in full production at the food processing factory—semi-automatic bottling, hand-sealing. Bottles came from the glass factory, sealed with cork and wax. Lacking preservatives, they used only sugar and citric acid—very short shelf life. The taste wasn't great either.

But for transmigrators tired of tea and plain water, these beverages arrived at the right time, becoming cafeteria favorites. Many natives who'd curiously tried a bottle also came to like the taste—some simply from imitating transmigrator lifestyles.

Fa Shilu watched her submerge the whole basket in the stream. Low hills dotted this field plain's edges. Unlike the sparsely vegetated plains, the hillocks had dense vegetation, with many streams flowing between them. Some merged into larger surface flows joining the Wenlan River; some collected in hillside ponds; some ran along the surface then disappeared underground again.

"Such abundant water sources!" Fa Shilu murmured.

"Have you surveyed the water sources here?" He suddenly asked Yan Quezhi, who had been watching Chuqing's retreating figure and now snapped back:

"No—geological matters belong to the Long-Range Reconnaissance Team. I've been too busy helping the Construction Company build houses."

"Since you studied hydrology, you should know something. Are these surface flows spring water?"

"Not mineral springs, but good water quality. Clear, cold." Yan Quezhi was confident. "Should be rainwater accumulated underground then emerging."

"I see." Fa Shilu nodded. He called everyone: "Come, let's go down and investigate soil conditions on-site."

They descended together. Wu Nanhai brought his apprentice—a boy named Lu Jia selected from the school. Lu Jia's family were official tenants farming school lands. Official tenants bore heavy burdens, much worse than ordinary tenants. Lu Jia's father, wanting fewer mouths to feed, had sent the Lu Jia and Lu Yi brothers to the transmigrator collective—purely for food.

Lu Jia, being older and knowing more farm work, proved clever—so Wu Nanhai took him as apprentice.

The group dug several test pits at intervals across the wasteland, sampling and observing soil.

"Old Fa! Still laterite here. It's everywhere." Wu Nanhai called out.

"Right—the most common soil in southern China." Fa Shilu squatted at the pit edge. "This soil should have decent fertility. If rice yields only a hundred jin on such land, that's strange."

But the next round of digging quickly revealed the low-yield mystery. They began excavating large amounts of rust-colored paddy soil. This soil resulted from long-term poor drainage causing waterlogging—soil containing abundant rusty ferric hydroxide, high acidity, low nitrogen-phosphorus-potassium, very poor fertility.

"Strange—this should be caused by prolonged waterlogging," Wu Nanhai said. "But we're far from the Wenlan's monsoon peak water line."

"The water table here is high." Fa Shilu pointed toward the hills. "Stream water ultimately goes underground. This looks like a plain but underneath it's like a water-soaked sponge—classic internal waterlogging."

Yan Quezhi set up equipment and observed: "Mm. This terrain doesn't look it, but it's actually lower than surrounding areas. Combined with hill springs constantly replenishing, the water table is high—creating chronic hidden waterlogging."

"That explains such widespread rust-colored paddy soil," Fa Shilu concluded. "Meitai Yang was historically cultivated—quite extensively as paddies. It was finally abandoned due to soil problems."

He said this because paddy soil was essentially artificial—formed by annual irrigation accumulation from rice cultivation. Natural soil wouldn't develop this structure.

"Master, we call this rust-water paddy here," Lu Jia interjected. "Paddy surfaces often have oily red rust layers. Actually, there are also waterlogged fields—over by those hillocks—"

"Waterlogged fields?" Wu Nanhai was interested. "Has your family farmed them?"

"No." Lu Jia shook his head. "Farming here loses money. Except for Fujianese unknowingly clearing land, no county folk farm here."

"Let's go look," Fa Shilu suggested.

Soon they reached the base of a hillside. At first glance, ordinary wasteland—but closer inspection showed signs of past cultivation, with old field ridges still faintly visible.

"Fujianese farmed here before—eventually total crop failure," Lu Jia said. "Water just welled up from perfectly good fields, drowning the rice."

They dug more test pits. Conditions here were worse—water appeared almost immediately upon digging; some spots even showed springs bubbling up. Due to prolonged waterlogging, soil was oversaturated—extremely dispersed, clayey, paste-like, nearly untillable, with indistinct soil layers.

"This soil won't have good fertility." Wu Nanhai poked through the mud, separating out dead leaves and grass, mostly intact with almost no decomposition. "Organic matter basically doesn't break down."

"Too clayey," Fa Shilu explained. "Air can't enter. It's like a sealed environment—how would organic matter decompose?" He shook his head. "This type of field is even harder to work."

Wu Nanhai seized the teaching moment, giving Lu Jia a five-minute lecture on organic matter—what it was, why it decomposed, and the benefits of decomposed organic matter for cultivation. Whether he understood or not, the concepts were directly implanted.

"The key is drainage," Fa Shilu delivered the final verdict.

To change this situation, mere soil improvement wasn't enough—the fundamental issue of waterlogging had to be solved first.

"To solve waterlogging," Yan Quezhi said, pointing at the survey map, "we need to expand drainage channel scale. The water table is too high—needs to drop at least 1 to 1.2 meters for farming. If necessary, we'll add a dedicated pump. The planned five drainage branch channels may not suffice—we need three more."

"That means your levee project won't be small either."

"The levee is part of the Wenlan River Basin renovation plan," Yan Quezhi explained. "According to Director Ma's plan, the entire Wenlan's water level will be raised 100 centimeters for navigation. All riverside facilities are planned according to this scheme."

Per the plan, they would first build a riverbank levee along the development zone, separating river water from the entire high-yield field area to defend against possible monsoon flooding. Sluice gates for irrigation channels would be installed on the levee. Additionally, steam pumping stations would be installed, using steam engines for irrigation and drainage.

(End of Chapter)