Moreover, just to drive away a pack of wolves, such a massive effort wasted people and money, which to some extent also affected the reputation of the Ministry of Household Affairs. Therefore, the strategy proposed by Ouyang Bufan was the last resort.
"By the way! Are there any hunters here?"
Muchuan suddenly asked.
"Of course there are hunters..." Ouyang Bufan seemed to be able to guess what Muchuan was thinking, so he shook his head and praised, "Does Master Mu want to use the power of hunters to deal with the wolves?
It will definitely not be successful. There are at most less than twenty hunters nearby, so how can they possibly deal with a pack of wolves?"
According to foot surveys on the plain trails, the size of the wolf pack exceeds a hundred.
The combat effectiveness of twenty hunters against a pack of more than a hundred wolves is indeed disproportionate.
During the Tang Dynasty, the hunting tools of hunters were mainly daggers, bows and arrows. If they were in a flat environment, only one person could deal with a pack of wolves.
If it is in a complex and changeable forest, it will take three or four hunters to deal with a wolf.
For this reason, Ouyang Bufan insisted that it was impossible to use hunters to deal with wolves.
The problem is that Muchuan never mentioned using hunters to deal with wolves. He recruited hunters in the hope that they could help investigate the wolves' lair!
Wolves are group animals and they stay out at night. It would be much easier if we could find their dens and catch them all during the day.
On the contrary, if we rely on the human sea tactic to conduct inspections through soldiers, I am afraid that the wolves will hear the sound and escape first, making it almost impossible to find them in the vast forest.
After Muchuan expressed his thoughts, Ouyang Bufan and Sun Shitou immediately agreed.
Know yourself and your enemy and you will never be in danger. First find the hunter to find out the information and trends of the wolves, and then solve the problem in a targeted manner.
"Leave this matter to me!"
Sun Shitou patted his chest and took care of it in one fell swoop.
After two days passed, Sun Shitou found eight hunters to carry weapons and explore the forest. After exploration, they indeed obtained information about the wolf pack.
However, this information exceeded everyone's expectations. Everyone originally thought that there were about a hundred wolves, but later, according to hunters, there were actually a thousand!
The distribution of a thousand wolf packs is very scattered, usually in groups of twenty to eighty, distributed in caves, rivers, and wooden caves in the forest.
At the military camp in Chang'an Plain, there was a simple wooden house. At this time, Sun Shitou was reporting on the relevant situation.
After hearing the information, Muchuan's face dropped. He didn't expect that there were so many wolves! Even if we could find out the wolves' lair, it would be difficult to attack them! There were a thousand of them!
Generally speaking, wolves do not gather on a large scale. The number of wolves in a defense is usually around 500. It is very rare for a wolf pack to exceed 500.
Later, Muchuan took out the terrain map and looked at it, and finally understood why these wolf packs developed so quickly.
To the north of the Chang'an Plain is a mountainous terrain. The forest where wolves live is known as the "Da'an Forest". It has a vast territory and rich natural resources.
It is precisely because of the abundance of various resources that there are many herbivorous rabbits, antelopes, pheasants, etc.
From the distribution structure of the food chain, if there are many organisms in the lower food chain, there must also be many higher-level food chains. This is the main reason for the overpopulation of wolves.
In recent years, the environment of the Tang Dynasty has gradually stabilized, and the population centered on Gyeonggi Province has grown rapidly.
In order to make a living, make money, and store supplies, the rabbits and pheasants living in the Chang'an Plain and Da'an Forest have begun to be targeted by the common people, especially in the past year, the number of organisms at the lower end of the food chain has begun to decline.
The wolves couldn't get enough food, so they began to come out of the forest and attack humans.
After all, Muchuan had received twelve years of education and had a certain grasp of basic ecology. At this time, he explained it to Ouyang Bufan and Sun Shitou.
And Muchuan also made a conclusion: "The number of hunters surveyed is one thousand, so the actual number is probably about three thousand."
Ouyang Bufan and Sun Shitou were stunned when they heard that there were more than three thousand gray wolves. After all, one thousand gray wolves already gave them a headache, let alone three thousand.
Ouyang Bufan asked puzzledly: "Sir, how do you know there are three thousand heads..."
"Statistically predicted."
"statistics?"
Ouyang Bufan asked even more puzzledly.
At this moment, Muchuan slapped his head and remembered that there was no such subject as "statistics" in ancient times!
According to hunters' statistics on the wolves living in the den, the number is about a thousand.
But you must know that not all gray wolves live in dens. Even during the day, a considerable number of gray wolves are wandering around, either hunting or hibernating.
Therefore, in addition to the wolves in the den, including the gray wolves outside the den, the number of wolves should be multiplied by a multiple of three in a thousand wolves, which is three thousand.
Obviously, even if Muchuan explained, Ouyang Bufan and Sun Shitou did not understand the meaning of "statistics", but since Muchuan said so, it must be three thousand wolves. This is based on their trust in Muchuan.
.
Ouyang Bufan: "Then there's nothing we can do against these wolves?"
Muchuan: "There are no ways. I have a way, but I still need some information..."
Just when Muchuan was about to entrust Ouyang Bufan to help with something, a soldier outside the wooden house ran in in a panic.
"Three adults! Something bad has happened!"
Seeing the soldier in such panic and distress, Muchuan asked the soldier what happened.
As a result, before the soldiers could say anything, they could hear noises coming from outside, as if a group of people were gathering and making noise.
Muchuan and the others walked out and took a look. The scene in front of them shocked them.
On the black soil in front of the wooden house, many craftsmen, tenants, and agricultural workers gathered, and they protested one after another.
"Sir, you have to give us an explanation. What is going on?
Why have so many people died mysteriously recently?"
"I heard that there are wolves in the north of the plains, is it true?
Wouldn’t that put us in danger?”
"We are here to make money, not to die! We don't want to die, sir, you can't be so cruel!"
There were nearly a thousand people in front of us, holding hoes and hammers in protest, as if they were about to go on strike.
It seems that the news has indeed leaked out. These carpenters and tenants already know that there is a wolf pack in the northern forest.
In fact, Ouyang Bufan has ordered people to block the news in the past few days. Those soldiers are easier to manage and belong to the Tang Dynasty's own army. Even if they know that there are wolves causing chaos, they have to obey orders.
But the carpenters and tenant farmers came to build the dam as "hired workers", so they were naturally afraid of being attacked by wolves.
