Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 673 Chile's ambition

The evening sea breeze in the southeast Pacific is gentle. On the deck of "Grocery Store No. 2", Second Lieutenant Jiang Yaohui, the first mate of the former flagship "August [-]" as the interim captain, silently watched a group of sailors pulling the net.From time to time, his gaze stayed on a fifteen or sixteen-year-old boy in the crowd. This boy had an oriental face, was not tall, had dark skin, and was wearing a dirty sky-blue navy summer uniform. Is happily busy in the crowd.

There are even a few shiny fish scales hanging on his hair, which looks quite ridiculous.From the appearance alone, this person seems to be no different from those Ming poor fishermen from the east, with the same dark skin and the same vulgar language.But only Jiang Yaohui knows that this young man is not simple at all, because he is the son of Captain Ding Wei, a senior naval officer and a senior staff officer of the Ministry of the Navy. After graduation, he will formally join the Navy.

"Having a good father saves effort, I'm already a nanny." Jiang Yaohui secretly complained, he still remembers when he came to replace the unlucky captain Rossetti (staying in Araucan due to illness) the commander of the fleet quietly told him Looking at his own appearance, he told himself not to put this kid in danger as much as possible—of course, it is indeed difficult to encounter any danger on a water supply ship like "Grocery Merchant No. 2".

"Captain, there are a lot of fish in this net!" Corporal McKinley, who was the first mate, came over with two fresh fish, and said with a smile: "Look, the horse mackerel and anchovy listed in the illustration book. I roughly At a glance, about 80% are horse mackerel, which is an unimaginable amount. Most of the remaining catches are anchovies, and a small part are mackerel, mackerel and sardines (Chilean pilchard) Waiting for a few species of fish, it can be seen that the fish species here are relatively single, and the only fish that can form a fishing season should be horse mackerel."

"It might be the wrong season now," Jiang Yaohui said.

Although he is in the navy, he is not ignorant of fishing. In fact, most of the naval officers and soldiers on the east coast have fishing experience, so Jiang Yaohui said very expertly: "We traveled from 40 degrees south latitude to the north. The first time I cast the nets, I cast an average of 4 sets of nets per night. I have caught this kind of fish in many places. And when we caught the horse mackerel, they were in small groups migrating for bait, so I think we may have missed them. It’s the fishing season. Now that the fishing season is over, large groups of fish are starting to disperse and look for food. The next time the fishing season is formed, I’m afraid it will have to wait until winter.”

In fact, Jiang Yaohui was right.Chilean horse mackerel usually forages in the cold water area at about 43 degrees south latitude in winter. When the water temperature warms up in spring, they start to swim north along the road. At this time, they can reach as far north as 31 degrees south latitude. When they arrive here After that, they began to disperse for food, and the fishing season ended.Generally speaking, Chilean horse mackerel is best caught in winter because it has a slow escape speed and mostly stays in shallow water, which is convenient for trawling.

Therefore, the catch of this kind of fish is the highest from June to August, and the spring and autumn seasons (September-February of the following year) are so-so, with average production, while March-May is obviously the off-season for fishing.From this point of view, this has formed a strong complementary trend with some local fishing grounds.

From March to May, the fishing season for hake and squid near the port of Blanca is the peak fishing season, and around December there will be a large-scale squid fishing season near the port of Falkland Island, which is also very worth fishing.If you count the Chilean horse mackerel fishing season from June to August, if the fishing boats of the South China Sea Fishery Company are not afraid of the stormy waves in the Strait of Magellan, they can go to various fishing grounds throughout the year and earn a lot of money in storage.

"Well, I also think the season is wrong. It's a pity that there is no time this time. Otherwise, we can send some special boats here to conduct scouting and fishing, so as to determine the time, route and location of the main fishing grounds for the main fish in the coastal fishing grounds of Chile and Peru. .Of course, in fact, this is mainly the work of the South China Sea Fishery Company, and we are just helping out along the way." McKinley shrugged, and threw the lively fish in his hand into the wooden barrel beside him. It was uniformly pickled as part of the naval fleet's supplies.

"There is a horse mackerel fishing season off the coast of Chile, but I always feel that there may be a pilchard fishing season here." Jiang Yaohui shook his head, and then said: "But I can't prepare to judge, it's just a feeling. Maybe again Just go north and search a few more times and you'll know."

While the two were talking, the sailors not far ahead had pulled up a net of fish with the help of the steam winch. The moonlight was very bright tonight, and white fish were jumping around on the deck. Everyone on board Everyone is smiling.Most of the nets pulled up just now are horse mackerel. This kind of fish lives in relatively deep waters during the day, and only goes to the shallow layer to look for food at night. Most of the fish off the coast of Chile and Peru are like this. A virtue - so it is only suitable to catch them at night.

The sisal-woven fishing net is extremely strong, and it looks like there are five to six hundred kilograms of fish in it.At this moment, under the command of some seniors, the sailors have begun to pick and choose the catches. The smaller fish are divided into one pile, the medium-sized fish are piled into another pile, and the larger fish are immediately processed and pickled. The navy will keep them for their own enjoyment.

"You can catch so much horse mackerel in non-fishing seasons. How rich are the horse mackerel resources along the Chilean coast! Sir, I suggest to write a report to the superior immediately and ask the South China Sea Fishery Company to send ships here as soon as possible to conduct scouting. Try to determine the distribution of fishing grounds and the time of fish season formation in the shortest possible time. The reserves of this fishing ground are as high as ten fishing grounds in Port Blanca, and it would be a pity not to develop them." Corporal McKinley said with a serious face, "The Spaniards are really white. Blind this good place, they don't even have a few ships along the coast, the only ships are all bullshit smuggling ships, and there are ships hunting seals, in short, there is no serious hunting Fishing boats, this fishing ground was completely wasted by them. Since the Spaniards are not interested in fishing grounds, we, under the guidance of Tianzun, should take this responsibility and manage this gift from Tianzun well."

Jiang Yaohui squinted at the Irish boy who believed in Taoism, and then said slowly: "It's not the time yet. Although we have mastered the sea power in the southeast Pacific, we still don't have a stable foothold here. Yes. , we lack a home port on the Pacific coast, and we will always negotiate peace with the Spaniards in the future. It is conceivable that the Spaniards will find it difficult to agree to our ships entering the Pacific Ocean, because this will threaten the safety of their silver transportation lines."

"Damn it, isn't it also possible in the south of Chile? The vicinity of Chiloe Island is an ideal supply point during the peak horse mackerel fishing season. If we just want to stop here, it should be easy?" McKinley is still a little bit unwilling, after all After seeing the rich fishery resources on the Pacific coast far beyond the Atlantic Ocean, no one can bear the temptation to come here to fish. The abundant fishery resources here will largely solve the current problem of insufficient domestic cod supply.

"No." Jiang Yaohui was also a little depressed. In fact, many people in the Navy have already asked whether they can permanently occupy a port on the Pacific coast.This port will be a dual-use port for both military and civilian purposes. It can be used for fishing boats to enter and exit for supplies (the catch can be processed on the shore), and it can also be used as the home port of the naval fleet.

In today's East Coast Republic, the home port of the First Fleet of the Navy is Zhenhai Port, and the home port of the Second Fleet is Xinhua Port. These two fleets are also commonly known as the Atlantic Fleet and the Indian Ocean Fleet in private.With the existence of these two fleets, some radicals in the navy can't help but start fantasizing about the establishment of the third fleet, the Pacific Fleet.If the Pacific Fleet is to be established, the coast of Chile is definitely the most suitable place to build a home port at this stage.

Moreover, the South Pacific immigration route within the Navy, which has been operated on the map for N years, also urgently needs to obtain a port off the coast of Chile, so that the long-distance immigration ships can dock at the port for maintenance-it is impossible to start again without repairs and maintenance. .In this route, the immigrant ship departs from Jinshan Port or New Zealand, and goes eastward along the northern edge of the westerly belt, with both wind and water. Judging by the speed of the "sprint champion" immigration special ship, it takes about [-] days. to the coast of Chile.At this time, the immigrants went ashore to rest, and the ships also entered the port for maintenance.

There are two ways for the repaired ship to go. One is to enter the Atlantic Ocean through the Strait of Magellan, and then drive back to the mainland to load the cargo. After loading the cargo, it will sail to Australia via South Africa and New China to complete the voyage around the world; The Peruvian cold current went northward to Peru, then sailed against the southern equator to the Philippines, and then tried to turn back to Jinshan Port in Australia.

The latter method is obviously very unrealistic, because places such as Peru and the Philippines are extremely sensitive places in Spain, and they are easily attacked or intercepted by the Spaniards.In addition, there is no supply point on the south equatorial countercurrent route, and the weather conditions are not very good. It is extremely hot and stuffy along the way. It is definitely a nightmare for oceangoers. Most of the sailors on the ship may die. rise.

It is obvious that, no matter which of the above routes, people on the east coast first need to obtain a port on the coast of Chile - a port with strategic depth (you can farm, build piers, castles and forts), rich in resources (preferably with fishing grounds nearby) A port that can provide protein supplements to immigrants), and at the same time has the conditions (coal, iron, timber) required for the establishment of primary industrial facilities.

(End of this chapter)