Zhou Shenggui in Pingshan County: searching for Dream Flower and Fruit Mountain in his whole life

Zhou Shenggui is checking the fruit hanging of walnuts.

He is an ordinary party member and a rural cadre who spent 30 years of youth and painstaking efforts to explore the fruit industry, traveled all over the country, cultivated new varieties of walnut that did not exist in the country, set up a special cooperative, and owned his own base of more than 500 mu. He led the development of planting industry on one side and made 473 poor households rich. He is Zhou Shenggui, an expert in fruit tree planting in the construction village of Xiaxi Township, Pingshan County, Yibin City.

According to Luo Jiabang, chief agronomist of the Pingshan County Agriculture and Forestry Bureau, Zhou Shenggui of Xiaxi Township is better than many professionals in fruit management skills, and is a very great soil expert. He was in his early fifties, lean, and in an ordinary costume, and there was nothing unusual about him. However, talking to him about the cultivation, management and cultivation of fruit trees (whether dried fruits or fruits) is really sensible and eloquent. 30 years of painstaking study and hard work have made him a veritable "expert".

From "gunner" to "expert"

Zhou Shenggui told that he went out to work after graduating from high school in 1982 and went back to his hometown to set up a fireworks and firecracker factory. But there was an unexpected situation in the sky, and a security accident cost him all his money. At that time, he was out of breath, wandering, confused, and the burden of family life.

Xiaxi Township is a place with green mountains and beautiful waters, where loquat, plum, peach and apricot, tea stone and chestnut have been produced since ancient times, but all of them are not on a large scale. Without a way out, he thought about it again and again and decided to make a fuss on his one-third mu of land-- the development of fruit. In 1998, with 1000 yuan in his arms, he got on the bus to Longquanyi in Chengdu, where loquat plants are famous all over the country. "We have encountered great difficulties in introducing loquat. No matter how high the price you pay, people will not sell grafted branches in large quantities." It was not easy to ask how many branches were to be sold, but they were all booked. When I transferred from this village to that village, the traffic was inconvenient, and when my mouth was dry, I lay on the edge of the field by the side of the road to drink water. When I was hungry, I ate some dry food. One village, two villages, three villages. After numerous round trips, he finally walked several villages in Longquanyi District, and finally found a family with the same surname. By managing the family origin and climbing the family, the family finally agreed to sell him more than 3000 big five-star loquat grafted branches. When he got the treasure, he went home and grafted all the loquat trees on his original land.

Later, Zhou Shenggui went to Chengdu and Meishan several times for inspection, introduced thousands of Dawuxing loquat, set up a loquat seedling base, and planted more than 200 loquat plants at home. It has experienced many difficulties not only in the introduction of fruit trees, but also in planting technology. "due to lack of knowledge and experience, many of the seedlings introduced in the beginning died, so they had to ask foreign technicians to guide them. They only come five or six times a year, but each time they charge a fee of more than NT $1,000, which was a large sum at that time. Later, they simply bought their own books to study and consult experienced professionals when they went out to study." Zhou Shenggui said that after several years of painstaking study and exploration, he finally became an expert in planting.

Ten years of love for a tree

"on the opposite hill, there is a big walnut tree and a small walnut tree next to it. I have been following it for 10 years." Zhou Shenggui pointed to the mountain opposite his house and told us that the big walnut tree had a large, fragrant walnut with a high rate of kernel production, and he would go up to the mountain to observe when it blossomed, borne fruit, and matured every year. "Walnut is self-propagating and self-changing. each walnut is a separate variety, and the walnuts change every year. Some of them may be very good a few years ago, but they will not be so good after that, so they need to be followed up for a long time." He said that after 10 years of tracking and determining that it was a good walnut tree, he moved the small walnut tree home to plant it.

It can be seen that Zhou Shenggui is a person who likes fruit trees from the bottom of his heart. Every time he goes out, he will keep an eye on everything and listen in all directions. Once he finds a good fruit tree, he will pay attention to it. In August 2010, he visited relatives in Leibo County, Liangshan Prefecture, and found that on the collapsed old dirt wall of his neighbor's house, a walnut tree bears walnuts that are not only large in size, but also have a large number and high yield. In the second and third year, at this time of year, he went to see it and found that the walnut was still bearing very well, so he went to the owner's house to learn more about it and bought the walnut produced by the tree. When it was ripe, he tasted it and found that it tasted good. As a result, began to pick back branches grafting, breeding. "judging by the spores of grafted seedlings and the taste of walnut, it is a walnut with good characters after crossing between improved variety walnut and local walnut." Zhou Shenggui said happily.

Cultivate new products and get rich together

The front and back of his house is full of walnuts, oranges, loquats, plums and so on. It is like an experimental garden. "there are four kinds of walnuts on a walnut tree." He said. For years, he searched for all kinds of fruit trees in the mountains, found new varieties, brought them back and cultivated them.

"I have planted more than 1,000 walnuts at different elevations to observe the fruit hanging, kernel, and taste of walnut trees of different heights, and strive to discover and cultivate 1-3 new walnut varieties. Ask the relevant departments to identify and apply for nomenclature, and promote them locally." He says this is his biggest goal right now.

Now, he has more than 1000 mu of orchard base, more than 700mu of landscaping tree base, more than 200mu of nursery base, and sells millions of seedlings such as loquat, plum and walnut every year. As a member of the Communist Party and a village cadre, Zhou Shenggui never forgot his fellow villagers. In 2006, he mobilized the masses to grow fruit. at present, there are 2000 mu of loquat and 2200 mu of walnuts, with an average income of 30, 000 to 40, 000 yuan per household. Last year, he took the lead in setting up the "Health and expensive Walnut Development Professional Cooperative" to drive 473 poor households. Now the villagers have any problems, just give him a phone call, he will be duty-bound to help growers solve the problem.

"Yinhong plum has developed now, but mellow plum may have a more promising future in the future." He recently found a kind of mellow plum in Guizhou Province, which has large fruit, strong sweetness, and high market price. he has organized village cadres and people to make on-the-spot visits and will focus on driving villagers to develop walnut and honey plum industries in the future.

All my life, I have a dream of Huaguo Mountain. Zhou Shenggui used his practical actions to lead the masses to move forward on the road of getting rid of poverty.