After breakfast, Zhu Yuan came to the east courtyard, and the first thing he did was hold a meeting.

Today there is mainly one Wu Zhen.

three things.

The first thing is to ask Yao Feng to allocate manpower to conduct a detailed inspection and evaluation of the large and small ships brought by Wu Zhen as soon as possible, and select ships that can quickly go to sea with simple repairs in the near future. It happens that the shipyard is short of linen materials, and the craftsmen and civilians can turn to ship repairs.

.

The second thing is about the allocation of 20,000 men to Wu Zhen.

Although civilians from all over the country have been gathering in Mingzhou before, there has never been enough. This time, with 20,000 people coming, more things can be done.

However, first the first batch of teams to transport grain northward must be selected from all parties.

As a rough result of the discussion, it was estimated that the first batch of grain transportation would require 10,000 people, and the elite troops of Tianxing Guard brought by Wu Zhen to suppress the formation, totaling 3,000.

Two thousand of them were scattered on the grain ships, not only taking care of the nearby, but also taking charge of the boating. Tianxingwei was established in Jiangyin on the bank of the Yangtze River. Most of them were also naval forces, so boating was not a problem. The remaining one thousand people drove warships to accompany them.

Handle possible accidents, such as emergency rescue or encounters with pirates.

The other 7,000 people were divided equally between the fishermen recruited from the coast and the old tribe of the Fang family that Fang Li had recently summoned.

In addition, Zhu Yuan will also organize a group of technical talents from the Maritime Operations Department and many maritime merchants to be responsible for navigation, medical care, surveying and mapping and other matters.

Afterwards, Zhu Yuan laid out a map and discussed with everyone how to increase the scale of logging and stockpiling.

This is also another important allocation direction for Wu Zhen to bring manpower.

Recently, we have collected shade-dried wood that can be used directly. As one of the replacements, Zhu Yuan has sent people up the Yongjiang River to harvest suitable wood from the mountains on both sides of the tributaries in the upper reaches of the Yongjiang River, or from various islands off the coast of Mingzhou, and bundle it into wooden rafts.

Dinghai.

However, this is far from enough.

Zhu Yuan hoped to go upstream from the river estuaries along the southeastern coast and into the mountains to harvest shipbuilding timber on a larger scale, and to establish official shade drying of shipbuilding timber in Hangzhou, Dinghai, Taizhou, Wenzhou, and even in Fuzhou and Quanzhou in the south.

Reserve warehouse.

This is not only for recent replacement operations, but also for future considerations.

Zhu Yuan even thought that things would be less urgent in the future, freeing up manpower, and large-scale tree planting would be necessary while logging, forming a virtuous cycle.

Because whether it is transporting grain by sea, developing the navy, or even Zhu Yuan's other plans to open up the ocean, they will consume a lot of ships.

That’s right, it’s ‘consumption’.

Onlookers looking at maritime affairs, taking the most common fishing as an example, will inevitably wonder. The sea is there, and there are so many fish. Fishermen can just sail their boats into the sea and catch big fish. Why do most fishermen in this era, even

Worse than farmers? And, why are the abundant resources in the ocean seemingly invisible to all dynasties?

The reason is that boats, fishing nets, and other items are all high-cost consumables.

Perhaps it would be more appropriate to use a term from an online game in Zhu Yuan's previous life to explain it.

durable.

Boats and fishing nets not only require manufacturing costs, but also have "durability". When wooden boats are put into the sea, they are hit by wind and waves. Whether it is the tung oil and ash hemp applied on the surface, or the wood of the boat itself, it will be continuously corroded and consumed.

Not to mention fishing nets, three days of fishing and two days of drying. This means that in this era, linen fishing nets are not very durable. After a fishing trip, they need to be carefully cleaned and dried. Even if they are carefully maintained, these natural fiber nets are not durable.

Fishing nets will still gradually be corroded and rotted by sea water over a period of time.

Therefore, whether it is a boat or a fishing net, when the "durability" drops to zero, fishermen must replace it.

Think about the movie "Camel Xiangzi". After working hard all his life, Xiangzi only wanted a rickshaw of his own, but in the end he couldn't get it. Similarly, when ancient fishermen wanted to buy a complete set of boats and fishing gear, they never imagined it.

It's so simple.

This is why Xue Shu, the magistrate of Dinghai County, told Zhu Yuan a few days ago that 80% of the fish caught by Mingzhou fishermen each year comes from a rhubarb fishing flood in April.

Because going to the sea at other times, the fishing harvest may not be enough to make up for the "durability" consumed by the fishing gear of their own boats, not to mention the danger of going to the sea itself. Therefore, in many coastal areas in this era, fishermen only fished during the fish season every year.

After catching fish for one season, most of the rest of the time, they can only make a living by working for people or farming.

Zhu Yuan had previously sent the large sea-going ship he brought into the sea to try fishing, but Hua Gao objected. The same reason was that doing so would consume "durability".

Among the many Yuan Dynasty shipping data collected recently, one of the inconspicuous records is that during the peak period of shipping, the Yuan Dynasty required the local government to organize the construction of a number of large sea ships every three years, which also illustrates the consumption of ships by transporting grain by sea.

How big is it.

The wooden sailing ships of this era were used for high-intensity sea transportation of grain, with two round trips per year, and could only be used for an average of three years.

Zhu Yuan discussed it with Yao Feng.

Yao Feng said that if it is well maintained, it will not be a problem for a sailboat to last for more than five years.

This comes back to another question.

In this era, it is easy to build ships but difficult to repair them.

Especially for large sea-going ships, if you want to repair them, you must dig a large dock near the port. The sea-going ship sails in, closes the dock, props up the big ship, empties it, and spends some time drying it. Then, the craftsmen can start inspection.

Replace the severely decayed wood, re-caulk the joints with gray linen, and then apply waterproof tung oil.

After this series of operations, the time it takes to build a new ship is not much different. What's more, even after maintenance, it is still an old ship, and its safety is not as high as that of a new ship.

Therefore, if raw materials such as wood are sufficient, it is better to just build new ships.

The big ship was built, completed and launched on the shore.

Take three steps.

Simple, crisp and neat.

After all, it is true that wooden ships are not durable in this era, and it is also true that compared to transporting grain, the cost is not high.

Zhu Yuan had obtained a piece of specific data before.

During the Yanyou reign of Emperor Renzong of the Yuan Dynasty, about 50 years ago, there were merchants in Mingzhou who specialized in building ships to transport grain for the imperial court. The ships cost 90 ingots, equivalent to about 1,500 taels of silver, because at that time the Yuan Dynasty provided them with grain transportation.

The price is very high. Each stone is about 8 taels of treasure money. A thousand-material sea ship transports 1,000 stone at a time. It only takes one trip. If everything goes well, you can earn 160 gold coins.

Not only did you get your money back in one trip, but you also made money after removing other expenses such as manpower.

This actually shows from another level that the cost of ships in this era was not high, which was less than half of the value of a ship of grain shipped to the north.

Therefore, ships of this era are consumables.

Among them, wood, which has the greatest demand for shipbuilding, is abundant in coastal forests. Compared with the logging speed in the feudal era, it can be said to be almost inexhaustible.

After the three matters were discussed and assigned, more than half an hour had passed.

There will be another class later.

Zhu Yuan, Hua Gao, and Wu Zhen walked out of Mingyuan Hall while talking. They happened to see Zuo Qi supporting a skinny old man in his sixties, followed by three people of different ages who looked similar to the old man.

Similar men.

Seeing this person, Zhu Yuan immediately stepped forward with a smile: "Mr. Liu, have you made a decision?"

The old man is Liu Laoqi whom Zhu Yuan talked about in his first class yesterday.

Regarding meteorological observations, there are many capable people in the world who make judgments based on experience, but there are also some people who almost rely on some innate instinct to predict the weather, and the latter's predictions are often more accurate than the former's.

Liu Laoqi is the latter.

It's rare to see such a precious talent. Not only Zhu Yuan, but also Hua Gao smiled when he saw the old man and walked up to him.

After greeting everyone for a few words, Liu Laoqi turned to Zhu Yuan, bowed and said, "Sir, I... can't make up my mind, so why don't I bring my three sons here to see you?"

Zhu Yuan wanted to give Liu Laoqi an eighth-rank official position. Yesterday, he asked Liu Lian to negotiate in person. The result was that the old man wanted to grant this official position to his son.

I pity the hearts of parents in the world.

Zhu Yuan thought about it for a while and agreed.
Chapter completed!