Mules are large animals that are not much different in size than horses. They eat less than horses and can withstand rough feeding. They are not as picky as horses and are easy to feed.
However, it is much stronger than a horse, has great endurance, and has strong resistance to disease.
At the same time, it runs faster than a donkey.
It is a hybrid that combines the advantages of a horse and a donkey.
If you choose a male donkey and a female horse with good physique as the parent line, you can give birth to a large mule. If you are lucky, there will be ones bigger than horses. They are extremely high-quality draft animals.
With the big men in Longyou and Huangshui Valley, there is basically no need to worry about the mare.
It is not difficult to find a high-quality big male donkey with two or three heads, but it is more difficult to find a high-quality big male donkey with dozens or even hundreds of them.
Even if the Prime Minister of the Han Dynasty wanted to collect a sufficient number of high-quality male donkeys, it would take a lot of effort.
But Ghost King Feng is different.
As long as he expresses one meaning: I want a big jackass.
Not to mention the territory of the Han Dynasty, even in Guanzhong and the Kingdom of Wu, there were people who tried their best to collect big male donkeys and send them to him.
As long as you have enough raw material, brown sugar, honey and wine, there will be no problems!
As for Feng Gui Wang, as long as money can solve the problem, is it also called a problem?
With the big male donkeys and the horse resources owned by the Qiang Guards, as long as there is enough time, mass production of mules is not a problem at all.
With a large number of mules, it takes only a matter of minutes to form a motorized force of this era.
Mule-back infantry is more worthy of promotion than horse-back infantry in terms of logistical costs alone.
It’s still the same sentence: Eat less, have more strength, have enough endurance, and have strong adaptability.
Isn't this much better than mounted infantry?
Although it runs slower than a horse, it doesn't matter.
Because whether it is infantry on horseback or infantry on mule back, they are still infantry after all.
It is impossible for them to be so luxurious as to let them ride two horses and run for a long time.
After all, infantry often has to attack a city, and the baggage at the rear cannot keep up. No matter how fast you run, it loses most of its meaning.
This is a matter of trade-offs and balance.
King Feng Gui's desire to form a motorized force of the Three Kingdoms era was not a whim, but something he had considered.
He is not bragging. No matter who it is now, as long as they hear the word Feng Yong, no one dares to take it seriously.
Any enemy general whose military quality is above the average will pay attention to the attack of the infantry of Xiaowei Mansion.
If the enemy is prepared, the attack will be meaningless in many cases.
What Feng Yong has to do now is to prepare an ancient motorized infantry unit and unleash its attack capabilities beyond their imagination.
After launching an attack on a distant target beyond the enemy's imagination, you can also immediately enter the battle after reaching the destination.
When the time comes, you might be able to scare the other person to death.
Didn't Sima Yi just travel 1,200 miles in eight days a few years ago and frighten Meng Da directly?
I ask you if you are afraid of motorcycling!
Plus a large number of light and heavy cavalry equivalent to the torrent of steel in later generations.
Thinking of this, Feng Junhou almost laughed from ear to ear.
The way to always maintain an advantage over the enemy is not to hide your skills and hide them from others, because if you don't use your skills, it means you have no skills.
We must continue to develop new technologies forever, or take advantage of productivity to let the enemy always follow us and eat dust.
The path that the apprentice walks behind has been walked by the master before him. Are you afraid that he will jump to the sky?
The idea of hiding your skills for fear that your enemies will find out, and not even using it yourself, is called cowardice, inferiority, and ignorance.
King Feng Gui despised him!
Now, let alone the Wei thieves, everyone within the Han Dynasty, except for the insiders of the Xiaowei Mansion, felt that the Xiaoguan Mansion would not be able to recover in three years.
King Feng Gui made a trip to Hanzhong before. He basically complained about his poverty and had no intention of showing off his wealth.
Xiaoguan was a great victory, but it was also a hard battle. Not to mention the casualties of the soldiers, after the war, only the dead and injured horses were eaten by everyone while crying...
That is, the Prime Minister of the Han Dynasty and Zhang Xingcai knew that Feng Junhou had been working hard to increase the output of large livestock, so they would definitely have some inventory on hand.
But they also don't know how many trump cards Feng Junhou actually has.
After all, no matter how smart and capable Zhang Xiaosi is, he will always be limited by his knowledge before he has studied biology.
The mule is not a rare animal, nor does it mean that no one knows its advantages.
The key point is: with current technology, there is simply no way to reproduce them in large quantities.
Horses are difficult enough to raise, and stallions will often miss the mare's estrus.
This male donkey and mare... let it happen!
As one of the representatives of productivity, livestock breeding knowledge has subverted this phenomenon.
Posture is power!
King Feng Gui, he is proud!
"Chief Huishan, there are 2,632 mules that can be used now."
"A little less."
Seeing that the mountain leader seemed dissatisfied, Zhou Lu became a little nervous:
"For a mountain leader like this, the mule needs to be two years old before it can be used, but it cannot yet pull heavy objects. Only when it is two and a half years old can it be considered fully usable."
When Zhou Lu said this, Feng Yong reacted:
"You mean, this is the first batch?"
"Yes, Chief Shan."
Zhou Lu nodded quickly, "In half a year, in just half a year, the student can produce five thousand head for the mountain chief, all of which can be used."
He was probably really anxious, and he was a bit arrogant in his words. I don’t know how he produced it...
"Don't be nervous."
Feng Yong waved his hand, "You have done a good job. There should be no major battles in the Captain's Mansion this year, so there is no need to rush this matter, and there is no point in rushing."
From trying to accumulate experience to fully promoting it, this is a process that needs to be perfected. Zhou Lu has been able to achieve this step, which is already very remarkable.
Zhou Lu received praise from the mountain leader and smiled a little sheepishly:
"Since the mountain chief said this, students don't have to be afraid. After this time next year, the number of mules we can use will be at least 16,000, if not more, 20,000 is also possible."
The more than two thousand heads are just the first batch. Due to the maturity of the technology, the stalls can be spread out. The second batch and the third batch will be doubled, which is similar to the compound profit.
"Okay, that's good."
Feng Yong nodded approvingly.
Longyou's excellent mares should give priority to producing foals that can be trained into war horses.
And if you want to produce good draft mules, it is best for the mare to be one that is good at drafting, rather than a war horse used for charging.
Fortunately, the Huangshui horses produced in the Huangshui River Valley, also known as Hequ horses in later generations, have great advantages in this regard.
"Students discovered that although the war horses used by the cavalry were taller than the Huangshui horses, the mules they produced were not as durable as the mules produced by the Huangshui horses."
Zhou Lu held a brochure and while flipping through it, introduced to Feng Yong the current situation of mule breeding.
"So the mares used by students now are all Huangshui horses. Firstly, they don't have to compete with the cavalry for horses, and secondly, the mules they produce are the best."
See, this is the benefit of intellectuals sinking to the grassroots level.
Feng Yong nodded repeatedly.
Why did I give Liu Hanzi so much face and publicly praise him a few days ago?
It's not all because he married five Hu women.
Of course, marrying five Hu women is also an important reason.
Another important reason is that in the past few years, he has been able to continuously deliver high-quality Huangshui horses to Xiaowei Mansion.
Whether it is exchanging or buying, even if you sell your appearance, you are still dedicating yourself to the country.
As long as he can remove a large number of horses from the Hu tribes in the Huangshui River Valley and allow those tribes to indirectly become the horse breeders of the Qiang Xiaowei Mansion, he will have done a great job.
When those barbarians get used to this method, it will be a natural thing for the Huqiang Xiaowei Mansion to implement household registration for all people.
Feng Yong stood up straight and looked into the distance. There were horses, cattle, sheep, and mules, all separated by fences.
The herdsmen on the pasture are holding fodder and constantly feeding it into the trough.
Some fences were open, and someone was driving the horses further away. The horses began to run, the ground shook slightly, and the horses' hooves were like thunder.
"That's choosing a war horse, right?"
Feng Yong pointed to the running horses, walked forward, and asked.
"Exactly."
Zhou Lu quickly followed and explained, "The best horses here, or the top horses, will be picked out and sent to a special horse farm to be used as stallions."
"Then tell me about the war horses."
During the battle at Xiaoguan, the Xiaowei Mansion was bleeding heavily.
As the Colonel Protecting Qiang, King Feng Gui inspected various pastures below to express his attitude.
"Yes, Chief Shan."
"Does each of the selected stallions have a pedigree record?"
"Director Huishan, the students will personally check the pedigree files of these stallions before filing them on file."
Recording the pedigree of stallions was not proposed by Zhou Lu.
It was proposed by Feng Yong.
The reason I mentioned this is because of the lessons learned from Hanzhong Ranch and Yuexun Ranch.
Although Feng Yong knew about eugenics and breeding from his previous life, because the ranch did not establish pedigree files in time, there were still some foals that were degenerated or even congenitally deficient.
This made King Feng Gui think of some practices of later generations.
Although the bloodline files of later generations have often changed their taste, and are used by some people to show off and brag.
But King Feng Gui had studied high school biology after all, and he quickly figured out the benefits of establishing a bloodline file.
One is to avoid inbreeding, which causes the horse population to degenerate in the second and third generations.
The second is to facilitate inbreeding, that is, backcrossing.
Because backcrossing can sometimes maintain certain advantages and stabilize them, of course, backcrossing more often produces offspring with congenital deficiencies.
To put it bluntly, it is convenient for management.
Of course, if there is an opportunity in the future to use bloodline files to deceive the wrongdoer, King Feng Gui will naturally not refuse.
Looking up, as far as the eye can see, there is a long dragon winding away to the north, that is the Yellow River.
On the other side of the Yellow River is Manyin County (near Jingyuan County in later generations).
After the Battle of Longyou, it has been the stronghold of the Wei army in Liangzhou.
Later, before leaving Xiaoguan in the east of Xiaowei's Mansion, General Guan sent Zhao Guang to lead the attack and brought this Wei army stronghold in Liangzhou under the control of Xiaowei's Mansion.
This move of General Guan Da was not just as simple as crossing the cup to regain Manyin County.
Instead, they pushed the Han's military front hundreds of miles westward, directly to the core of Liangzhou, Wuwei Guzang.
Because you can cross the Yellow River at the Manyin Ferry and then go west along the Great Wall, you can reach Wuwei Guzang unobstructed.
This road was the earliest Silk Road, but because of the hundreds of miles of wilderness, it was inconvenient for caravans to supply supplies.
In addition, walking from Longxi to Xiping and passing through Dadouba Valley can lead directly to Zhangye, Liangzhou, so caravans gradually stopped taking this northern route.
However, the hundreds of miles of wilderness from Manyin County to Guzang happened to be the battlefield where cavalry galloped.
Therefore, General Guan Da captured the Wei army's stronghold in Manyin County, which had a strong meaning of shocking the Wei army in Liangzhou.
The subsequent development of things indeed proved General Guan's wisdom.
Without the bridgehead of Manyin County, and the Xiping rebellion failed to take off, Wuwei Guzang finally did not dare to send troops to try to deal with the Wei army in Guanzhong.
Thinking of this, Feng Yong turned his head and looked behind him.
I saw the main wife and the mistress standing in the shade, not knowing what they were talking about.
Not far away from them, his two children were playing in the grass.
Feng Yong waved, Guan Ji showed a smile on her face, and waved happily, seemingly responding to her Alang.
King Feng Gui's expression froze, and then he sighed:
My husband is so weak! I obviously asked you to come here, but what do you mean by just attacking me like this?
Forget about the wife of the wife, the mistress didn't even blink at her, and actually just glanced at herself.
Feng Junhou took a deep breath, then put a smile on his face, walked over and asked:
"I want to go to the other side of the river to have a look. Would you like to go and have a look, Mr. Xi?"
"I remember that the second mother-in-law of the Xu family has been working there to open up wasteland in the past few months?"
Guan Ji did not answer immediately, but asked.
Feng Yong nodded, "That's right. In the past, they were growing bamboo heads there, but now the situation is different."
"I heard that the land in that area is very fertile, and water from the river can be directly diverted for irrigation."
"The second mother of the Xu family wanted to turn it into fertile farmland for a long time, but the fourth mother refused to let it go, so the matter was delayed."
"Now Siniang feels that the time has come, so she made arrangements."
It was not opened before because from that area, we could go straight to Wuwei Guzang, and the enemy could go straight to the crossing of the river.
If the battle in Guanzhong really ends in a stalemate, the Wei army in Liangzhou will definitely take action. The fighter planes are changing rapidly. Who knows what kind of waste the newly opened fertile land will be like?
Isn’t this a waste of effort?
After the Battle of Xiaoguan, Liangzhou has become cooked meat in the pot, so there is no need to worry anymore.
Guan Ji nodded after listening to Feng Yong's explanation:
"In that case, let Si Niang accompany A Lang. It's too hot today, so don't worry about the child too much. I'll just watch the child here."
Zhang Xingyi looked at the scorching sun in the sky and felt that if she really wanted to go out, she would be roasted out of oil, so she pouted: "Sister, I don't want to go either..."
"Snapped!"
Guan Ji slapped her and said angrily:
"If you don't go to your duties, who will? As a prince and a captain protecting the Qiang, Alang has to go out to inspect the petitioners. Are you more precious than a prince?"
General Guan Da's plausive words attracted Feng Junhou to look askance at him:
Do you have the nerve to say this? You don’t work in the school captain’s mansion? Why can you stay here to enjoy the cool weather?
However, General Guan was so powerful that neither of them dared to refute. One of them got into the car obediently, and the other angrily mounted a horse and headed north.