“Side Ploughing” by People of Qiang Ethnicity in Baoxigou Village

Specialties
This place abounds in herbs for traditional Chinese medicine such as notopterygium, Buibus Fritillariae cirrhosae, poria cocos, cordyceps sinensis, etc. A large amount of these herbs are shipped out to other areas of China every year.
Here are few crops, with wheat, buckwheat and corn as the main ones, due to the cold climate and infertile soil. Local farms have opened terraced fields on the mountain slopes by “side ploughing and shallow sowing”. But because of the high altitude, local farmers have to wait until the next summer to harvest if they plant wheat seeds in autumn of the previous year. Some farmers have experimented growing Sichuan peppercorn on mountain slopes and received good results. The output of Sichuan peppercorn is quite big now.

Quote from pages 30 & 31 in Investigation Report on The Qiang and Rong Ethnic Minorities by Zhuang Xueben