Li Man of Laogou Village in Qinglong has spent 36 years greening barren hills
After a moderate rain, the mountains and ridges of Laogou Village in Qinglong Manchu Autonomous County are full of life, with chestnut trees and apple trees wrapping the hillsides like green belts.
Li Man, 62, came as usual to the continuous green mountains of Dongzigou in the village to tend more than 150 newly planted apple saplings. "These were planted this year. They look small now, but they grow fast. In another three to five years, they will bear quite a lot of fruit." Looking at the thriving young saplings, he smiled with relief.
It is not just the more than 150 apple trees in front of him; the chestnut trees, apple trees, hawthorn trees, pear trees and walnut trees covering the mountain behind him are all the accumulation of his 36 years of toil, like Yu Gong, without rest through wind and rain.
Determined to clothe the barren hills in green
Laogou Village is located deep in the mountains of Qinglong, with high mountains and deep valleys. Arable land per person is less than 4 fen, and villagers long relied on resold grain to live. After the household contract responsibility system was implemented, the village contracted out both flat land and barren hills for household management. To let his whole family eat their fill, Li Man set his sights on the bare ridges: "The village has little flat land and many barren hills. The way out has to be afforestation on the barren hills. Even if I plant only 100 trees a year, after several decades life will have a foundation." He made up his mind: open up wasteland and plant trees!
Once his mind was made up, Li Man went up the mountain without even saying a word to his wife, Liu Guirong. Unexpectedly, after starting to dig into the mountain in 1980, he kept at it for 36 years.
Laogou Village has high mountains and steep slopes, and beneath the thin layer of soil is hard rock. Because he was unfamiliar with the mountain's "temperament," Li Man stumbled on his first attempt at digging into the mountain. After digging for a whole day, he had cleared only an area the size of a kang, and he was almost completely exhausted.
"Why not stop digging? When will this ever end?" the next morning, looking at Li Man about to go up the mountain again, his wife advised. "What do you know? This is the condition our village has. If you don't dig and I don't dig, when will our poor days end? If you don't plant trees and I don't plant trees, what will the children eat and drink in the future?" With that, Li Man went up the mountain again.
Digging into the mountain is physical labor, and not the slightest laziness is allowed. For each tree pit, he first had to use a pickaxe to break open the large stones, then use a hammer and chisel to break them into small pieces, then pile the small stones up bit by bit, gathering little by little to form stone walls winding around the mountain. After the stone walls were built, he still had to search everywhere for soil and fill them level; only then was the tree pit formed. Because the barren mountain slope is steep, the land enclosed by one stone wall could hold only one row of trees. The more than 6,000 trees that have survived to this day were built up bit by bit by him with hundreds of thousands of stones. The most worrying thing was watering; bucket after bucket had to be carried up from the gully. "The water in the gully is as thin as a child's pee," and filling one bucket took half a day of waiting, then it had to be carefully carried bit by bit up the mountain to water the trees and keep them alive.
Thirty-six years, more than 13,000 days. Only Li Man himself knows clearly how those long days were passed one by one. In spring, when the cold is still sharp, after taking out the pickaxe and shovel and working for only a short while, his hands were covered with cracks from the wind. In summer, there was not even a place on the mountain to rest in the shade. Once the sun beat down, his whole body felt as if it were on fire. The water brought from home was gone in a few gulps, and in the end his tongue root was as dry as a wooden stake. Autumn was the busiest time of the year: the family's crops had to be harvested, and when he found spare time he still had to dig into the mountain, busy on both sides with not a moment free. In winter, with ice and snow everywhere, a person would freeze stiff after staying outside only a short while. Even so, Li Man persisted. He said rural people are not afraid of these things; after swinging a few pickaxes, the body warms up.
Although digging into the mountain was hard, as time went on Li Man got used to it. What he could least bear was that, in order to buy saplings and fertilizer, the family fell more than 20,000 yuan into debt. At the time, this was an astronomical figure, pressing on him so hard that he could hardly breathe. To make the forest reach scale and produce returns sooner, Li Man worked even harder, and the clanking sounds of striking in the mountain grew louder.
The family's good life now was all dug out bit by bit by him from the mountain
A share of hard work brings a share of harvest. After enduring the hardest years, Li Man was finally able to breathe a little. Through careful management, the saplings grew one after another. When autumn came, red apples and golden chestnut burrs hung all over the branches, dyeing the once barren and bare ridges with the most enchanting colors.
By this year, Li Man had planted and kept alive more than 6,000 fruit trees of various kinds. The fruit trees extended from the foot of the mountain all the way to the top, in dozens of layered tiers, becoming the family's most reliable and stable source of income.
Li Man kept 1,000 fruit trees for himself and his wife, bringing in more than 20,000 yuan a year, and they live with some surplus. Li Man handed the fruit trees to his two sons to manage. "Young people have lively minds and learn new techniques quickly. With them handling it, I don't have to worry about it anymore, and I'll go dig into the mountain again." Li Man placed happiness in the hands of his children, and this was also the original intention he had held to over these years.
Taking over this family enterprise from their father, the two children naturally knew its weight. Every day they also tied themselves to the mountain, pulling branches, watering and tending it carefully.
A share of effort brings a share of return. Last year alone, Li Man's family earned 150,000 to 160,000 yuan from selling various fruits. Through several years of accumulation, both sons' families built new houses and even bought cars, and their lives are not the least bit worse than city people's.
Driven by example, every household goes up the mountain to plant trees
Spring wind and rain transform and nourish silently. The villagers saw Li Man's 36 years of persistence and effort. Taking him as an example, everyone also began digging into the mountain and planting trees, and the bare mountains and barren ridges of Laogou Village were gradually covered in green.
Cheng Shuqing, secretary of the village Party branch, said: "Li Man is an example and has motivated everyone. Now every household goes up the mountain to plant trees, and the forest and fruit industry has become the village's wealth-building industry. Now the whole village averages 1,000 chestnut trees and 500 apple trees per household."
Villager Li Jiang was among the earlier ones to follow Li Man in digging into the mountain and planting trees. He now has more than 2,000 chestnut trees and apple trees, and last autumn he earned more than 30,000 yuan from selling fruit. He said: "This is better than anything else. There is income every year, and income can increase every year. Isn't this what ordinary people want?"
Digging into the mountain and planting trees let the people of Laogou Village taste the sweetness. "In our deep mountains and old valleys, the air and water are unpolluted, and the soil is sandy, loose and airy. Every autumn when the fruit comes down from the trees, five or six groups of regular customers come to snap it up, and demand exceeds supply." Last year apple prices were generally poor, but Laogou Village's apples sold for 4 yuan per kg, and the whole village sold more than 500,000 kg.