Go back to 1980 and enjoy it

A guest house in Lingshan County.

With a full stomach, Deng Shirong said to the guest house staff: "Hello, I want to ask you something."

The staff member said politely: "Comrade, how can I help you?"

Deng Shirong said: "I would like to ask, are there any farms growing lychees nearby?"

Now that we have just entered the 1980s, there is basically no need to consider growing lychees on an individual basis. Therefore, before coming to Lingshan County, Deng Shirong's goal was those state-owned farms.

The staff member smiled and said: "Of course there is. There is a large farm dozens of miles away from here called Xinguang Farm. As far as I know, Xinguang Farm has planted at least several thousand acres of fruits, of which 7% are lychees. More than that.”

Deng Shirong's eyes lit up when he heard this and asked, "How do I get to Xinguang Farm? Is there a bus leading there?"

The staff said: "Xinguang Farm is in Luwu Commune. You can take a bus to Luwu Commune first, and then ask the locals how to get there."

When asked what he wanted, Deng Shirong thanked him and went back to his room to rest.

Compared with those hotels of later generations, the sanitary conditions of today's guest houses are really hard to describe.

There are four beds in the room (if you are not a big boss these days, even if you have money, there is no "standard room" for you to live in). Maybe Deng Shirong came early, so he is the only one in the room for the time being. The quilts on the four beds are all It exudes a strange smell. It is obvious that this smell is not the smell of one person, but a smell accumulated over many years. One smell can be remembered for a lifetime.

Today's hotels (guesthouses) are basically like this. Thousands of people cover quilts and store thousands of mattresses. The hotel charges a few cents and is only responsible for not sleeping on the street. As for the guests who change the quilt after checking out, as in later generations, that is totally unacceptable. Possible things.

People at this time were very particular about sleeping in the same clothes when staying in hotels. It seemed like they were sleeping but not sleeping. The main reason was that there were other strangers in the room. No one dared to sleep too hard unless they couldn't bear it anymore.

Deng Shirong's money and belongings were kept in the system space. He was not worried about losing his money and belongings due to sleeping too deeply. He was just that after staying in clean and hygienic hotels in later generations, he wanted to sleep well in a guest house with such poor sanitary conditions. It's impossible.

Fortunately, there was no need to cover himself with a quilt in this weather. Deng Shirong lay naked in his clothes and was basically half asleep and half awake for the first half of the night. He also knew that another guest had come to the room, but he had no intention of getting up to say hello. Instead, he continued to maintain this sleeping state.

In the latter half of the night, after getting used to the unpleasant smell in the room, Deng Shirong fell asleep.

In the morning, the biological clock made Deng Shirong wake up on time.

I went out to wash my face and rinse my mouth with water, then checked out and went out to have breakfast, then go to the station and take a bus to Luwu Commune.

After struggling until two o'clock in the afternoon, Deng Shirong successfully arrived at Xinguang Farm.

The traffic in this era really makes people unable to complain. After this experience of going out, Deng Shirong secretly swore that if it was not necessary in the future, he really didn't want to go out and suffer this crime again.

At the very least, we have to wait until transportation becomes more convenient and accommodation conditions improve before we come out.

Fortunately, it is not difficult to get in touch with leaders in this era. Deng Shirong successfully met the leaders of Xinguang Farm without much trouble.

After greeting each other, Deng Shirong said straight to the point: "Leader, I am from the Bangjie Brigade of Songshan Commune in Bobai County. The main reason I came here this time is to buy some fruit seedlings from your farm and plant them back. Is it okay?"

The farm leader smiled and said, "Of course you can. Comrade, what kind of fruit seedlings do you want to buy?"

Deng Shirong said: "I want to buy a thousand cinnamon-flavored lychee seedlings. Do you have any on your farm?"

The farm leader praised: "Comrade, you have such a good vision. The best fruit tree on our farm is Guiwei lychee. The thousand fruit seedlings you want are not available now, but we can start ringing the seedlings now, and they can be planted in early spring next year." ”

There are three ways to propagate lychees: seeding, ringing, and grafting.

These three reproductive techniques have been used from ancient times to the present, from China to the world.

The so-called sowing to seedlings is to eat the lychee meat and sow the lychee core in the ground. If it germinates and grows normally, it can grow into a lychee tree.

This propagation method of sowing lychee seeds is the most traditional and oldest propagation method of lychees, and was most commonly used in rural areas in ancient times.

The advantage of propagating lychees using this method is that it is convenient and easy to do. You can plant them at any time as long as there is soil. But the disadvantage is that the growth cycle is too long. It takes more than ten years from sowing to growing into a mature tree and entering the harvest period.

According to the records of litchis, the ancients determined that the lychees produced by this kind of breeding will bear fruit after they are "one year old", that is, 12 years. Some varieties of lychee trees may take longer.

Seed-propagated lychee trees can easily mutate, form new varieties, and produce lychee fruits that are different from those of the parent tree, depending on the different climate environments and fertilizer and water conditions of the planting area.

For example, if you sow lychee kernels of the Guiwei or Feizixiao varieties now, the fruit produced by the lychee trees ten years later may become a brand new Guiwei or Feizixiao variety, and the quality may become better or worse.

It is this characteristic that has led to the rich variety of lychees in China. There are 208 lychee varieties in China, including 83 in Guangdong, 50 in Guangxi, 58 in Fujian, and 17 in Sichuan, Hainan and Taiwan (according to the 1996 edition of Chinese Fruit Trees Zhi lychee volume).

The ring-branch propagation technology is to select strong branches from the lychee trees that have already produced fruit, peel off (peele) the bark about 2 cm long in the whole circle of the branches, and then wrap it with nutritious and moist mud, and then wrap it around the branches. Wrap in straw or plastic wrap to keep it moist.

After 1-2 months, roots will gradually grow out of the peeled branches. After the roots have grown 2-3 times, cut them off together with the mud-striped branches for transplantation.

Experienced fruit farmers will also "fake plant" the sawed branches in a cool place to make the lychee seedlings have more roots and produce two more batches of leaves before officially transplanting them. The survival rate will be higher and the later growth will be better. quick.

There is still no accurate study of the time when the ring propagation technology appeared. However, based on observations of old lychee trees in Lingshan County, Guangxi, the hometown of Chinese lychees, and the roots protruding from the bottom of the lychees, it is inferred that the lychee branching technology in Lingshan County has existed for at least 1,000 years.

This ring propagation technique is somewhat similar to the method of creating human beings recorded in the Bible. Adam took a rib from his body to create Eve, the first woman in the world; and the ring branch selected a branch from the mother tree to grow and grow into another new lychee seedling (tree).

Ring propagation technology has two main advantages:

The first advantage is that if the selected branches are large and strong enough, the fruit seedlings can bloom and bear fruit in the second year of planting.

The second advantage is that since the new lychee seedling is a branch of the original mother tree, it can maintain the pure characteristics of the original lychee variety to the greatest extent and will not change no matter where it is propagated.

The only disadvantage is that you cannot circle too many branches on the same lychee tree, otherwise it will seriously damage the tree and affect the flowering and fruiting of the mother tree.

As for the grafting propagation technology, it is to sow seeds of lychees with strong local adaptability, drought resistance, cold resistance and disease resistance. The grown lychee seedlings are used as rootstocks and grafted with buds of other high-quality lychee varieties. This is lychee grafting. .

Grafting propagation technology not only adopts seeding propagation technology, absorbs the survival advantages of lychee rootstocks, but also brings into play the advantages of high-quality lychee varieties through bud grafting, achieving top-down grafting and complementary advantages.

Combining the above three lychee propagation techniques:

Although propagation by sowing seeds is convenient and easy, the cycle is the longest and prone to mutation.

The ring-branch technology has the purest genetics of the varieties and faster growth and results. It is a breeding method that can effectively protect famous varieties, but it does not have the taproot and is slightly less resistant to stress.

Grafting technology can produce seedlings in batches, which has the survival advantages of rootstocks and the fruiting advantages of buds, but the purity is not as pure as ring branches.

Deng Shirong is aware of the above three propagation techniques. When he came this time, his first choice was branch ringing, because ringing propagation is the best way to maintain the purity of the variety.

In addition, the mountain at home had just been divided and it would take some time to cultivate it, so what the farm leader said was in line with his wishes.

So Deng Shirong nodded and said yes, and then began to discuss the price of fruit seedlings with the farm leader, then signed a purchase contract and paid a 30% deposit in advance.