"Panda" silkworm baby spit "golden yuanbao"

Little silkworm babies are valuable. Photographed by Guangzhou Daily reporter Wang Weixuan

After the "80s", the scientific research girl specialized in unpopular sericulture The silkworm seeds selected and bred spit out 380,000 yuan of silk per ton

Every morning, Zengcheng Zhengguo Town. Fresh mulberry leaves had just been plucked from the tree and immediately loaded onto the cart and sent to Tianhe. After the "80s", scientific researcher Wang Xianyan waited early here, saw a piece of fresh green leaves, she was full of joy, hurriedly held to the underground silkworm room, to the tens of thousands of top silkworm babies waiting to be fed, to send a delicious breakfast.

Looking around the small green space of Tianhe, surrounded by "tall" IT enterprises, creative industry parks, universities and colleges, there are a group of "silkworm farmers", focusing on the land under their feet, work and rest with the silkworm babies to get up early and greedy, regardless of the holidays, with their own sweat and research, the Guangdong silkworm seeds to the top level of the industry, out of a modern "Maritime Silk Road".

Text/Guangzhou Daily reporter He Ruiqi

Tanying: The management standards of the silkworm house are comparable to raising giant pandas

The Guangdong Sericulture Technology Extension Center (hereinafter referred to as the "Extension Center") is located in the Five Mountains of Tianhe this year, near the Guangdong Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Walking up the hill, a row of white bungalows appeared in front of you. All windows are tightly closed and blocked with thick hoods, and a ring of barbed wire is enclosed around the sills.

"Shhh, silkworm babies are sensitive to sound, temperature, dust, let's be quiet." Wang Xianyan said while changing into shoe covers and leading everyone into the silkworm room. The air conditioner and heater in the silkworm room are readily available, and the temperature and humidity can be controlled. The silkworm babies are scrambling to climb to the mulberry leaves and devour them, full of the sound of "creaking and creaking".

These silkworm babies are not ordinary varieties. If they are found to have been smuggled in by customs, they will be immediately detained and interrogated. Their scientific names, some called "Three Sleeping Silkworms" Cantonese Silkworm Fine Fiber No. 1, some called Yue Feng No. 1, Yue Feng No. 2, all of which are patented varieties with intellectual property rights, each of which embodies the lifelong efforts of several generations of scientists, and the economic value generated is also calculated in millions.

"The silkworm species here are not ordinary, they are all classified. The extension center is one of the two licensed units in Guangzhou that own 'original seeds' silkworm seeds, and only through our selection and breeding of the first silkworm seeds, mating and production, their descendants can flow into the market and distribute them to farmers for breeding. Wang Xianyan said that this is also why the security level of silkworm breeds is so high, specially taken care of during the day, guarded at night, and the management standards are comparable to raising a giant panda.

Breeding: After the "80", sericulture farmers raised national patents

The scientific research team gets out of the silkworm room at 7 o'clock every morning, without mobile phones, without Internet, and wearing white coats and squatting for a day. They regulate the temperature of the silkworm house to ensure that the young silkworms are well developed; the windows are closed tightly, if a little ash is scraped in, it will be a fatal "sandstorm" for the silkworm babies; they must also clean up the silkworm dung in time and check whether the mulberry leaves have pesticide residues... Like old farmers, the team works with silkworm babies at sunrise and sunset, sometimes leaving work at 10 o'clock at night.

However, as scientific researchers guarding the silkworm seeds in the province, their professionalism and exploration ability are indeed different from those of farmers. Coming out of the silkworm house, they rushed to the laboratory to take a sample to check the germ rate. The inspection standard is very strict, and once it is found that the standard is exceeded, it is immediately traced back to the source. Each batch of silkworm babies has a birth paper with a unique "ID card" number, and the variety, intergenerational, and date of birth are clear.

Weekdays are busy, and weekends and holidays sometimes become luxuries. Wang Xianyan is one of the front-line scientific researchers, who has worked for so many years and has only taken one wedding leave to travel. After 15 years of perseverance, she has become a dazzling new star in the field of silkworm science.

It is understood that as the second or third inventor, Wang Xianyan has obtained three national invention patents and one utility model patent. At present, as the first inventor, he has applied for a patent.

Value: One ton of silk is sold for 380,000 yuan

China is the first country in the world to raise silkworms and silk reeling, and Guangdong's sericulture industry is also one of the best. Once upon a time, the Production In the Pearl River Delta region was high, Guangzhou also had good land to cultivate mulberry silkworms, becoming an important port for silk exports. Historical records: In 1922, Guangdong's cocoon and silk production ranked second in the country, accounting for one-third of the country's total output, and raw silk exports accounted for more than 40% of the country.

However, in the view of the relevant person in charge of the promotion center, the "Guangdong silkworm" used to be only brilliant in production and the quality was average. Many varieties are only AAA grade, and the current price of silk in the market is as low as 300,000 yuan / ton. Coupled with the rapid economic development, Sangtian has become a more productive industrial park, and silk production has declined seriously. Improving the quality of silk has become a top priority. After the efforts of several generations of scientific researchers, more and more scientific research results have been achieved, and the silk level has finally been raised to 6A level. For example, the current "three sleeping silkworms" Cantonese silkworm fine fiber No. 1, can be reeled more than 6A top high-grade raw silk, cocoon silk quality is excellent, greatly welcomed by the market, a ton of silk price increased by 80,000 yuan is as high as 380,000, can be described as a small silkworm species spit out "real gold and silver".

Nowadays, a batch of competitive silkworm seeds in Guangdong Province in the hands of 300,000 farmers in the hands of spring silkworms spit silk, bringing a considerable number of economic benefits.

The continuous research and development of silkworm seeds is a new starting point for the modern Silk Road. Guangdong mainly focuses on the downstream industrial chain in the development of the sericulture industry, such as the design and production of silk clothing. From January to October 2015, China's cumulative exports of silk clothing were 861.162 million US dollars, and the export volume ranked first in Guangdong, followed by Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Shanghai and Sichuan.

Future: Do sericulture articles to develop rural tourism

Although the economic value of the sericulture industry is promising, the reality is that sericulture farmers are becoming increasingly rare. In the past, Zengcheng was still popular in the saying that "if you get a season of silkworms, you can get half a year's grain", but now, driving along the road, it is difficult to find a trace of a continuous mulberry forest.

The reporter visited many rural sericulture households and learned that the young and strong laborers in the village had gone out to work, leaving the old and weak women and children to take care of the silkworm houses at home. Raising silkworms is more difficult than planting rice, fruit trees, economic forests, etc., often the elderly in the family are older, and the silkworm houses are closed and dusty.

There is also an important international factor affecting the development of the sericulture industry, because silk can be hoarded for a long time and is often manipulated by the market. Disorderly competition, large price fluctuations, and increasing degradation of cocoon matter have led to damage to silkworm farmers and the entire cocoon silk industry.

This group of researchers thought a lot, and the development of the "Silk Road" is not only to transport silk, but also to expand related industries. For example, mulberry leaf tea, mulberry wine, mulberry branch papermaking.

Chen Liehui, associate researcher of the Promotion Center, believes that in the future, the use of sericulture themes to develop rural tourism and farmhouses, actively promote self-driving tours, etc., so that tourists can experience hand-picking mulberry silkworms, taste mulberry, mulberry leaf tea and other foods, will become a new highlight of the eco-tourism industry.