It was the Tree Planting Day on March 12. We journalists went to Lidian village in Ruzhou and visited to Peng Zhangsuo, an 80 year-old forest ranger of Jiufeng Mountain in Ruzhou. During his 38 years of hard work, Peng Zhangsuo has planted more than 200,000 trees on the barren mountain, covering an area of 33.33 hectares. He has won a hundred of awards in his life, including National Excellent Forest Ranger, Provincial Advanced Green Worker, and more.

Peng was as strong as a young man

At the road crossing, an old man in a brown nylon hat, dressed in a black cotton-padded jacket with a pair of green canvas shoes, waited for us. He was Peng Zhangsuo.

On our way to Peng's forest farm, a government official made a joke to him, "Peng is in charge of more than 33.33 hectares of forest and now he is a big suzerain and millionaire!" Peng replied, "That's only joke, I am just an ordinary farmer."

We had to go through a long mountain road and soon felt tired. Even though Peng is 80 years old, he walked much faster than us. "The air in the mountain is fresh and the tree planting work keeps me very healthy," Peng said.

When we arrived at Peng's stone house, he stepped on a ladder to the roof. We were worried about the 80 years old man, however, he soon returned with a dozen persimmons. "The persimmons grow up in the mountain without any pollution and taste great," Peng told us.

The unforgettable experience as a forest ranger

"It's time to work," Peng said. He took his scissors and other tools, called for some workers and began to work in his mountain orchard. "We must prune useless branches. So far, we've merely done half of the work and there are still more than 1,000 trees waiting to be pruned."

At break time, Peng told us his experiences as a forest ranger.

The story began in 1964. At that time, most of the trees in the mountain were cut down illegally. After the Spring Festival, the village leader found Peng Zhangsuo and asked him to be a forest ranger. Despite the disagreement from his wife, Peng accepted the difficult job. Peng was 42 years old at the time.

In the spring of 1964, Peng and his wife put up a shelter in the mountain and began to take care of the trees. It was always rainy in the spring so he and his wife had to work in the rain. During the day they planted trees and in the evening, they drew water from the pool that was located about two kilometers away.

Where there's a will, there's a way. The survival rate of his trees reached 95% and Peng was highly praised by the village leader. Peng worked in the forest farm for 16 years, planting more than 60,000 trees and winning a hundred awards.

Since the Chinese economic reform, every household has shared the work in forest farm and Peng has retired. In the beginning of 1989, he heard of the outsource project for barren mountains in the neighboring village, so he undertook 33.33 hectares of a forest project, with the contracting piece of 100 yuan per year. After 22 years of hard work, Peng has planted more than 100,000 trees, including 2,000 fruit trees in a four-hectare of orchard. He invested 50,000 yuan to build 13 impounding reservoirs which can hold more than 500 cubic meters of water.

The orchard can produce more than 10,000 kilos of fruits every year with a very good reputation in the Ruzhou fruit market. The sales revenue in the last year was over 40,000 yuan and the economic value of his orchard is over 500,000 yuan.

A warm hearted old man

During our conversation, Wang Laifa, an orchard farmer from Xiaotun town of Ruzhou, called on Peng's home for help. He wanted to cut off some branches for grafting. With the assistance of Peng, Wang soon cut off about 800 branches. When Wang tried to pay him, Peng politely declined.

The government official told us that Peng has a good reputation in Ruyang, Lushan and many other neighboring villages. When other orchard famers asked for help, Peng always went to their orchard and helped to treat their trees without hesitation.

Zhang Jingui, a villager who got a skin disease, asked Peng for help. Peng gave him a kind of herb medicine and Zhang soon recovered within three days. We curiously asked what magical medicine it was, and Peng laughed and said, "It is not magical! The herb medicine is Xiangchuan." Peng has been living in the mountain for more than 40 years and has a good knowledge of herbal medicine. He is very warm hearted to all the people.

Peng is also a tree-disease forecaster for the Ruzhou Forestry Bureau. He told us an interesting story: in the spring of 2006, the City Forestry Center sent a forecast report about a budworm disease. He scanned the contents and laughed, "It was like the umbrella after the rain, too late!" People doubtfully looked over the contents and found that the report content was the same as Peng's forecast two weeks earlier. Peng has been the volunteer tree-disease forecaster for more than 20 years. When there's going to be a tree-disease, he tells the villagers to prepare for prevention.

Peng has been planted trees for 38 years, and he spent most of his life in the mountains. "I am glad to make contributions to our country's green project," He said.