The peony in the peony flowering greenhouse in Heze is waiting to be released.
Heze is the "peony capital of China", Guangzhou is the "four seasons flower city", although the two places are separated by more than 1,500 kilometers, but the culture is connected, the people are close to each other, the friendship is integrated, and a flower will closely link the two places. At present, in the Guangzhou New Year flower market, about 90% of the flowering peonies come from Heze.
For hundreds of years, more than 1,500 kilometers of "Xiaguang" flowering road has become a bridge and link between Heze and Guangzhou for economic and cultural exchanges. Pots of flowering peonies have met the aesthetic needs of the people of Guangzhou to love flowers and appreciate flowers, and also achieved the glory and dream of the people of Heze to "go to Guangzhou" to pan for gold.
Guangzhou ninety percent of the flowering peony comes from Heze
Meat hibiscus, Lu Hehong, Fugui Mantang, etc. are all popular peony varieties in the Guangzhou New Year Flower Market. Most of the spring peonies we sell are more than 3 years old, generally not less than 10 buds. On January 28, Xu Xiufa, a Heze man who started a business in Guangzhou, said.
Xu Xiufa has been engaged in peony sales, planting technology promotion and other related flower seedling industries in Guangzhou for more than 20 years, and founded Guangzhou Dexin Agricultural Development Company. He said that at present, 90% of the peonies in Guangzhou's Spring Festival flower market come from Heze.
Guangzhou is a flower city, the economy is developed, the citizens love peony flowers, I hope to be in the land of southern Guangdong from the peony from the hometown to promote well. On the same day, the "Hospitality Shandong, Good Product Shandong" peony theme promotion meeting was held in Guangzhou, Xu Xiufa said in an interview.
Heze has a long history of planting peonies, is the "peony capital of China", and enjoys the reputation of "Caozhou peony in the world" since ancient times. Guangzhou is known as the "flower city" and is the main flower producing area in China. Although the two cities are separated by thousands of miles, they share the same culture, personal affinity and friendship. "Peony Capital" hand in hand with "Four Seasons Flower City", Heze has a tradition of cultivating flowering peonies for many years, and tens of thousands of Heze peonies have won the "second youth" in Guangzhou every year.
Hospitality Shandong, good products Shandong" peony special promotion meeting.
Our flowering peonies have been on sale since around January 15th, and half of them are currently sold. On the morning of January 30, Mao Yizhang, a flower farmer of the Peony Office of the Peony District who is engaged in the production and sales of flowering peonies in Fangcun Flower Expo Park, Liwan District, Guangzhou City, said in an interview with reporters, "My wife sells in the flower market, and I serve the flowering peonies in the planting base." ”
65-year-old Mao Yizhang has twenty or thirty years of experience in "Xiaguang" flowering, and has cultivated more than 1,000 pots of flowering peonies this year. "At present, there are dozens of peony flowers in Fangcun in Heze, and there are also a few in Luoyang, Henan. Mao Yizhang introduced that the flowering peony in the Guangzhou flower market is generally not less than 10 buds, otherwise it will be difficult to sell at a high price.
A flower teaser. It is understood that during the Spring Festival this year, about 150,000 pots of Heze flowering peonies appeared in the Guangzhou New Year Flower Market to send warm New Year blessings to the majority of Guangzhou citizens.
The history of "Xiaguang" can be traced back to the Qing Dynasty
When, who, and where did the peony "Xiaguang" flower originate, it is now impossible to test. However, according to the existing historical materials and the local flower farmers from generation to generation, the history of Heze peony flowering can be traced back to the Qing Dynasty or even before.
With the rise of the Age of Discovery, Chinese textiles and porcelain were introduced to Europe. Peonies were an important part of textiles, embroidery and porcelain motifs, and attracted the attention of Europeans at that time. However, they believe that like dragons and phoenixes, peonies are also totems and cultural symbols of the Chinese nation, and do not really exist.
It was not until 1656 that the ** representative of the Dutch East India Company came to China and saw the peony with his own eyes, and someone reported it after returning to China, which is the earliest record of the peony seen by Westerners.
More than a century later, around 1786, Joseph Banks, the owner of Kew Gardens in England, read this article and looked at many Chinese paintings and became interested in peonies. He asked the East India Company surgeon, Alexander Duques, to collect peonies for him in Canton, and then sent them to Kew Gardens. In 1789, one of these peonies produced highly double-petaled red flowers, which was the first Chinese peony to be introduced to Europe.
At that time, the peony that appeared in Guangzhou should be the flowering peony, in China at that time, only the Heze flower farmers went to Guangzhou to promote the flowering, so in 1656, the Dutch East India Company ** representative saw the peony, should be the Heze flowering peony. The peony collected in Guangzhou in 1786 should also be the peony for Heze. In 1789, the first peony flowers that bloomed on the European continent were the Heze peony introduced by Guangzhou.
Zhao Shouwen, an older generation of peony practitioners in Heze, recorded in the "History of Heze Peony" (manuscript) written around 1915: "Heze flower farmers promote flowers during the Spring Festival, and there are people in Beijing, Tianjin, Suzhou, Hangzhou, and Fuguang. ”
Heze peony "Xiaguang" route
Just as the Silk Road has the "land Silk Road" and the "maritime Silk Road", the "Xiaguang" route of Heze Peony also has the "land" and "sea" routes.
According to the old flower farmer Zhao Shouxian's recollection, at that time, there were no cars and trains in "Xiaguang", and the transportation was inconvenient. The vast number of flower farmers use wooden wheelbarrows to push the peonies used to promote flowers to the Luokou Wharf in Jinan, and then load them onto the "flat-headed" wooden sailing boats that transport goods in the Yellow River, and sail down the river to the port of Tianjin. From there, we will change to a sea boat, follow the coastline to the mouth of the Pearl River, and then go up the Pearl River to Guangzhou.
There is no logical problem with Zhao Shouxian's statement, but the theory of "sea route" leaves us with a question to ponder, that is, who first thought of going to Guangzhou, 3,000 miles away, to promote flowers? Why go to Guangzhou to promote flowers instead of other southern coastal cities? Who was the first or the first to "eat crabs"?
Heze flowering peony for sale in Guangzhou
In the interview, Zhao Xiaoqing, an expert on Heze peony who was the first batch of "Xiaguang" to promote flowers after the reform and opening up, gave his own answer. According to its introduction, before the Qing Dynasty, the main income of Heze flower farmers planting peonies was the sale of peony seedlings. Every autumn, the peonies grow, and in addition to selling them locally and in the surrounding areas, flower farmers will also try their best to open up the market driven by profits. As a result, some innovative flower farmers packed peonies, loaded them onto trucks, and sold them all the way south. "In order to ensure the survival rate, the peonies sold at that time generally carried soil balls. Under normal circumstances, each truck carries two or three packs of peonies, each package of 60 peonies. Zhao Xiaoqing recalled. This group of flower farmers started from Heze and went all the way south, through Henan, Hubei, Hunan to Guangdong. "Wuhan, as the thoroughfare of nine provinces, is an important node, where flower farmers have to sell some of the peonies, and the rest are loaded to Changsha. In this way, I went all the way to the south, selling as I went, selling less and less, selling lighter and cheaper. Zhao Xiaoqing said, "From Changsha to Guangzhou, the weather is getting warmer and warmer, and the peonies with soil balls begin to sprout and bloom. The flower farmers in Heze summed up their experience and found that the peonies in Heze could bloom naturally in Guangzhou and other places in winter, so they began the journey of 'going to Guangzhou'. Guangzhou people love flowers and enjoy flowers, and also provide market conditions for Heze peony to "go to Guangzhou".
According to Zhao Xiaoqing, the theory of "going to Guangzhou" by land is not imagined out of thin air by "opening the brain", which is recorded in the "Panyu Chronicles". In the local historical records, the people of Guangzhou refer to the Heze flower farmers as "peony merchants". After the two sides got to know each other, Heze flower farmers began to cooperate with the local people to cultivate and sell flowering peonies. Heze people out of technology, Guangzhou people out of the venue, looking for sales channels, this cooperation model has continued until now.
Heze newspaper reporter Jiang Peijun.