Chapter 1873: High-Quality Strawberry Seedlings

Why can high-quality green-light strawberries and strawberry seedlings during the natural disaster years sell for such a high price? Of course, because they are scarce.

In the tenth year of the natural disaster, Xia Qing used two strawberry plants exchanged from Yang Jin to breed 15 strawberry seedlings. In the eleventh year of the natural disaster, those two two-year-old old seedlings no longer produced stolons, and the 15 new seedlings from last year each produced a few stolons, breeding 5-9 new seedlings, and the number of strawberry seedlings in Xia Qing's territory increased to 102.

Then, all strawberry seedlings no longer produced stolons or bred new seedlings.

Because after the evolution of the Blue Star, the reproduction method of strawberries underwent significant changes.

Strawberry seedlings bred from seeds can produce a small number of second-generation seedlings through stolon reproduction, while second-generation seedlings can no longer breed new seedlings through stolons.

The reason for this situation is that after the evolution of the Blue Star, a compound appeared in the juice of strawberry seedlings that inhibits the growth of strawberry stolons but is harmless to humans. Breeding experts call this substance stolon inhibitor.

Xia Qing specifically consulted Zhang Tao on the issue of strawberry breeding and learned that this inhibitor exists in trace amounts in strawberry seeds, but when reproducing through stolons, the concentration of the inhibitor inherited by the first-generation seedlings from the parent plant doubles, which is exactly at the critical point where a small amount of reproduction is still possible; while the concentration inherited by second-generation seedlings from first-generation seedlings doubles again, completely blocking stolon growth.

Zhang Tao once adopted gene technology to strip the stolon inhibitor from strawberry seeds.

But strawberry seedlings after stripping the inhibitor, when planted in the open, the Qi element content in the plants will grow rapidly, becoming Qi-susceptible plants; if planted in standardized greenhouses that isolate Qi elements, although the strawberry seedlings grow vigorously, they will no longer grow flower buds or bear fruit.

Food was scarce during the natural disaster years, and strawberries were fruit crops rather than grain crops, so breeding experts including Zhang Tao gave up research on strawberries and turned to overcoming the difficulty of breeding high-quality grain crops.

So over the past few years, strawberry breeding has maintained a seed germination rate of 1‰ and two generations of stolon reproduction.

Moreover, the first-generation seedlings bred in this way only bear fruit for the first three years, and the yield in the third year is significantly reduced. After that, strawberry seedlings can only be pulled up and eaten as green-light vegetables.

Therefore, humans cannot expand the scale of strawberry planting, causing strawberries to become luxury goods during the natural disaster years, and only a few people can eat them.

Xia Qing, a farmer, likes to eat strawberries very much. In the past year, she used various methods to cultivate high-Yi element X spinach, as well as various breeding techniques learned from Zhang Tao, on improving the germination rate of strawberry seeds.

Last autumn, she really made a major breakthrough, increasing the germination rate of strawberry seeds from 1‰ to 25%!

After making the breakthrough, Xia Qing immediately formulated a plan to use this technical breakthrough to improve the comprehensive strength of the territory alliance in the first district of the north.

She first gained the support of the idol and her best friend, and after discussing a detailed plan with Qi Fu and Yuan Yan, she convened a plenary meeting of all members of the territory alliance last winter.

A fool would not earn points if they could.

All members of the territory alliance in the first district of the north signed a confidentiality agreement at the meeting, and after returning home, they secretly built 10 rectangular wooden planting boxes according to the agreement, put in nutrient soil according to the fertilizer ratio provided by Xia Qing, and planted the strawberry seeds that were already in the germination stage.

Most of these seeds were purchased by Xin Yu and Zhang San and handed over to Xia Qing, and processed by Xia Qing, while a small part was kept by Xia Qing herself.

Strawberries after the natural disaster are peeled when sold, and seeds need to be purchased separately. Xin Yu is a major shareholder of the heavy alliance who is not short of points, and Zhang San is the person in charge of the research institute. These two types of people are big buyers of strawberry seeds.

The lords who learned the technology from Xia Qing each bred 800-1000 strawberry seedlings.

In order to keep the secret and make a fortune in silence, the lords did not put the strawberry planting boxes in the greenhouses, but hid them on the heated brick beds they built in their own houses.

The planting temperature, humidity, and light were all strictly controlled according to the cultivation guide provided by Xia Qing.

After watching strawberry seedlings sprout from the soil one by one, everyone bit their fists and was ecstatic.

Because cultivating strawberries is a first-level secret of the territory alliance, everyone never discussed it on the lord channel. But every night, the lords who worked hard all day would count the strawberry seedlings in the planting boxes carefully several times, and then hide in the quilt and calculate how many points these strawberry seedlings could sell for and how many urgently needed materials and life-saving equipment they could exchange for, all laughing from ear to ear.

Especially Fu Fu Xiaodan, lord of Territory 22, and She Xing, lord of Territory 25, these strawberry seedlings are the hope that they can pay off tens of thousands of debts this year.

In the past two days, listening to the radio and the big speakers in the territory broadcasting over and over again how serious this natural disaster is, the lords have no bottom in their hearts. But no one dared to ask, for fear of leaking the first-level secret, being kicked out of the territory alliance, and paying double for the alliance's losses.

Even if their bones were smashed, they couldn't afford to pay.

Just at this time, Xia Qing convened the territory alliance meeting again, suggesting that everyone move the planting boxes into standardized planting greenhouses with explosive safety levels. How could everyone not be excited.

Are the lords not worried that Xia Qing will swallow these strawberry seedlings worth tens of thousands? Of course not worried, because Xia Qing is a big person with a face and a head, and it is impossible to ruin her bright future for these points.

So after hearing this news, the lords present were all beaming, only the online Eighteenth Lord Zhang Zhang Genyong and Twenty-Second Lord Fu Fu Xiaodan were terrified.

Tang Huai, who participated in the meeting online? He was in the Territory 7 isolation room, there were cameras in the room, and people guarding outside. So, he could only hide in the quilt wearing a Bluetooth headset to participate in the meeting and could not make a sound.

Territory 12 also planted strawberry seedlings, but the Tang family was not short of these points, so they didn't care as much as other territories.

What the Tang family cared about was that Xia Qing decided to take everyone to earn this wave of points, rather than covering up this technology to make a fortune.

During the natural disaster years when food and survival materials are scarce, making a major breeding breakthrough public for free is something only public research institutes would do.

Through this incident, Tang Zhengbo confirmed that the X-2 spinach in Hui 3 was also made public by Xia Qing. It was precisely because Xia Qing had this kind of spirit that she was accepted as an apprentice by Zhang San and recognized as a successor by Qi Qi Zhongye.

Tang Huai, who shouldered the heavy responsibility of getting along well with Xia Qing, if it weren't for the environmental restrictions that he couldn't make a sound, really wanted to roar: Alliance Leader is wise!

Also environmentally restricted and only able to participate in the meeting online, after Fu Fu Xiaodan asked, Tang Huai's expression became serious.

Territory 18 and Territory 20 wanted to put their planting boxes into the valley, but other members were afraid that the planting boxes of these two territories would carry bacteria and ruin everyone's strawberry seedlings. So all members online and offline were waiting for Xia Qing to make a decision.

Eighth Lord Xin Yu, who participated in the meeting offline, lowered her head and recorded the meeting points in her notebook, but actually locked onto everyone in the meeting place with her magnetic sense evolution ability, and then according to their magnetic field changes, screened out the Twenty-Fifth Lord She Xing, whose emotional fluctuations were the most obvious, as a key focus object.

Fu Fu Xiaodan online continued to strive, "The location where high-level Aspergillus was discovered in my territory is more than 500 meters away from the planting boxes. The danger investigator of Territory 7 checks once a day, and I check at least three times, and it has been confirmed that there is no high-level Aspergillus growing in the room where the planting boxes are placed, and it does not have the conditions to grow this fungus."

Zhang Zhang Genyong also followed closely to strive, "The distance between the planting boxes here and the location where high-level evolutionary Aspergillus was discovered is 653 meters."

They only dared to present evidence, not weep, beg, or throw tantrums, because people had already tried both tactics in front of Xia Qing, and neither worked at all.

Everyone was a human survivor who had climbed out of a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood and had fought for how many lives to live until today, and they knew how to look at people's faces the best. ===== CHAPTER 1874 =====