Zhang Xiangwen has compiled some of the above works, which are beneficial to the development of China's old geoscience in the direction of new geoscience, but he is still not satisfied. He thinks that if he can go to all parts of China for on-the-spot investigation and combine the investigation results with new geoscience knowledge, the research results will not only help improve his own geoscience level, but also benefit the national economy and people's livelihood. After his footsteps, south to Lingnan and north to the Great Wall, he wrote twenty or thirty monographs on the basis of his investigation, which greatly promoted the development of geography in China.

(1) Zhang Xiangwen is a native of the Huaihe River Basin. He has visited the middle and lower reaches of the Huaihe River many times and has a deep understanding of the water system in the middle and lower reaches of the Huaihe River. He has written many articles, such as "It is not advisable to guide the Huaihe River into the whole river" and "Talk about it overnight", and put forward many constructive suggestions for harnessing the Huaihe River. In the early years of the Republic of China, there was a discussion about guiding Huai into the river, and Zhang Xiangwen opposed the whole Huai into the river. He believes that if the whole Huai River enters the river, most Huai River will pass through the culverts on the east bank of the canal and enter the low-lying Lixia River, endangering the land of fish and rice in Lixia River. When the whole Huaihe River enters the river, "where the water goes, the sand will follow", then the river center below Jiangyin will definitely increase the deposition of a large number of Huaihe River sediments, which will easily make "the sandbars connect with each other and cross the river center, and the river will not flow smoothly," which is the second harm ". In the future, if the Yellow River "collapses to the south, that is, it enters the river from the Huaihe River, then the rivers will be United, and the scene will be like a river, which will do harm to three people." In the early years of the Republic of China, there was also a proposal to follow the old course of the Huaihe River and guide it into the sea. However, the old course of the Huaihe River has been silted up by the Yellow River, the sea water outside the estuary is shallow, and the river is not smooth to the sea. Therefore, he believes that "the old course cannot be recovered" and therefore advocates that the water of the Huaihe River should be "divided into rivers and seas". The road to the river can be "from Jiangba to the east, following Gaoyou Baoying lakes, meeting the canal, and entering the river from Guazhou Sanjiangying". The road to the sea can be "from Zizi River to the north through the canal, to Liutang River, and from the mouth of the irrigation river to the sea". His opinion, obviously, only considers the problem from the perspective of venting Huai water, which seems to be thoughtless. Because water is also a valuable resource, it should be used.

(2) During the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, Zhang Xiangwen visited the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River and the mountainous areas of the Great Wall Plateau, and made detailed observations on the natural and human phenomena in various regions. When I visited the Rehe River, I saw in Guangrenling that "the stone color is muddy, black and porous" and thought that "it is almost formed by the condensation of volcanic rocks (slurry)". When traveling in Shandong, Zeng Dengzhou observed along the coast of Shandong Peninsula, and saw that Longkou was near the coast, and there were many cliffs, and there was a flat land under the cliff, which was as narrow as a belt. In some places, even "the foot of the mountain extended straight into the sea, and there was almost no land under the cliff". In this way, he not only explained the rocky shore nature of the coast of Shandong Peninsula, but also explained that these coasts were formed by the fracture of coastal strata. When he went to Jinan, he saw the north of the city. "The magpies and the mountains of China embraced each other, and the hills were connected, from west to east, faintly like long dikes. In the south of the city, there are mountains and mountains, surrounded by three parties; From the right, I realized that Jinan Huiyuan, with concave terrain, became a basin, and the springs in the marginal city were all bet by Nanshan, but were tied by the northern hills, and the flow path was narrowed, so the groundwater came out everywhere. " In this way, the reasons for the formation of Jinan springs will be clarified clearly. When he visited Wutai Mountain, "when the clouds are gathering, it rains more in the afternoon if it is not sunny for half a day." He explained: "Water vapor is a thing, and its weight rises because it is lighter than air. When the air is compressed, it will naturally excite ... In case of low temperature, it will first gather and become a cloud ... In case of a mountain where the air is quiet and stable, it will be a sea of clouds. When it reaches saturation, it will fall into rain when the temperature drops. This mountain, "His view, though not perfect, basically illustrates the reasons for the rainy mountains.

(3) Zhang Xiangwen was born in a peasant family and paid special attention to the situation of farmland water conservancy when he visited other places. Seeing the serious soil erosion in Shanxi, Shandong and the plateau outside the mouth, it is very regrettable that people's livelihood is poor, so some valuable opinions on preventing soil erosion are put forward.

During the Xuantong period, Zhang Xiangwen visited the Jehol area. On the way from Beijing to the Summer Resort, he saw many palaces, which were "within the palace walls, pines and cypresses were lush". However, in the vast Jehol Plateau, every time he saw "the four mountains were lonely and bare, and there were no trees to cover them. During June and July, the rain poured out violently. Zhang Xiangwen compared this scene with the towering trees in the imperial palace, and thought that the reason for this in the vast area of Jehol was that "people can't use land, and the fruit of it is useless". Another example is that when he visited the Taishan area in Shandong Province, he saw many places. "The ground is falling all around, so the rain is pouring in, but it is washed away and it is a ravine; It's sunny and rainy, and it's all diarrhea and nothing. " He believes that "the benefits of water springs are endless", and it is a pity that the mountains and rivers are allowed to flow away. Therefore, he advocated vigorously planting trees in the plateau mountainous areas in northern China to conserve water. As for the provinces in the northwest plateau, there is always a flood because of rain, a thousand miles in the bare land because of drought, a disaster caused by floods and droughts, and books are endless at the age of ... Today, if we want to make up for our shortcomings, afforestation is an important plan, especially to build lakes (reservoirs). Such as Fen, Wei and Jingzhu floods, "all should be built as dams around their natural bays to stop their storage." That is, the mountain stream, when it is flat and narrow, should gather stones as dams, so that the valley is deep [〖FJF〗] and the lakes are marshes. In this way, the soil will gradually become wet, and then engage in afforestation, which is also easy to flourish. " It can be seen that he thinks that to prevent soil erosion, it is best to combine biological measures of afforestation with engineering measures of building large and small dams and reservoirs. Until today, his opinion is still regarded as an important way of soil and water conservation.

(4) According to the investigation in the mountainous areas of North China and the plateau outside the mouth, Zhang Xiangwen

feels that the bad geographical environment really affects the economic life of human beings; But he believes that people can change a bad environment into a favorable environment through labor. That is to say, he initially realized the dialectical relationship between human activities and geographical environment. Therefore, in the third year of Xuantong, Wang, who loves learning, wrote to ask him: "Black Province is desolate and desert, and it has been regarded as abandoned land for hundreds of years. ..... Is there anyone who can expect it in the future? "He replied:" The current desolation of Heilongjiang Province is an unfinished business and an unnatural regret. "Then he pointed out that the plains of Black Province are fertile and vast, and there are abundant forest and mineral resources, and the future of" struggling to manage "is promising.

In the spring of p>1914, Zhang Jian, Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, entrusted him to investigate the northwest farmland water conservancy, which was exactly what Zhang Xiangwen wanted. He wanted to see if the bad environment there could be improved. In March of the following year, he set off for the northwest. It was hard along the way. On the way to the wilderness, I often feel that "the wind is flying and the dust is flying, and people are rushing." And in the wilderness, "there is no hotel or hotel", and often "every 2 or 3 miles, you will see a few huts", that is, "look at the door and stop". A line of several people, crowded on the pit where cattle and horses burned dry dung, felt "the stench was transpiration, and people wanted to vomit." If you walk for more than a month, you will reach the back cover. See its "terrain is lower than Hexi, all alluvial layers of the Yellow River, ... thousands of miles north and south, less than half of them have been cultivated". Because "the land is fertile and fertile", "if the Yellow River can be used for irrigation" and "the border is reasonable, it can be compared with the two provinces in the mainland". He will discuss with Tongchun Wang, president of Wuyuan County Agriculture, the intention of coming here for reclamation, and Wang deeply agrees, and is willing to donate tens of thousands of mu of land as a reclamation base. After Zhang Xiangwen returned to Beijing, he negotiated with Zhang Jian and donated 2, yuan each to organize the "Xitong Reclamation Company" and decided to reclaim the land in the back set. Zhang Xiangwen, who was full of enthusiasm, turned a blind eye to the hardships of his journey to Houtao, and immediately personally led 1 farmers recruited from his hometown to go to Houtao again to engage in the practice of farming reclamation. In the back cover, he not only instructed farmers how to dig irrigation ditches and how to divert water for irrigation, but also told farmers to harvest wild weeds and accumulate them in low-lying areas to rot them into fertilizer. At that time, there was no term "material cycle", and he certainly didn't know what "material cycle" was. However, he came from a peasant family, and knew that it was beneficial to the growth of crops to guide farmers in this way, but he didn't realize that it actually played the role of "small material cycle" in modern plant geography. Therefore, it can be seen that in the early 2th century, his understanding of the interaction between man and land did not stay in words or theories, but was applied to the practice of transforming the desert. Obviously, his behavior has written a glorious page in the history of geography in China. However, in the era when the army bandits were rampant, bureaucratic gentry not only confiscated the irrigation ditches they had worked so hard to dig, but also extorted irrigation water from farmers, and their livestock were sometimes robbed. As a result, the "Xitong Reclamation and Animal Husbandry Company" barely operated for six years and failed. Zhang Xiangwen went through all kinds of hardships to engage in the patriotic heart of transforming the desert, which was dealt a heavy blow.