Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

Chapter 1008 Self-reliance is the right path: Others are just external forces

Li Xiangqian submitted his suggestion and also contacted the supply and marketing cooperative and the pastoral team to share his ideas.

The livestock team's response was also ambiguous, and Li Xiangqian didn't say much; in this kind of matter, it was enough to convey the meaning.

The snow disaster has already happened. I've given you some advice and even found someone to cover for you. Whether you agree or not, whether you're willing to do it or not, is your business.

At that time, the supply and marketing cooperative was a large and influential organization, and it wouldn't go out of its way to curry favor with someone who wouldn't listen.

In contrast, the notice posted by the acquisition station received an immediate response.

In this freezing weather, the only things middlemen can buy are hides. Any other supplies left over from summer and autumn are just a bonus; they'll try to get whatever they can.

But hides aren't something you can just get whenever you want. You have to hunt prey within your own territory, then skin it and sell it.

Moreover, making money is not easy these days. Some part-time hunters, after hunting gazelles or red deer, skin them and sell them in the county themselves. It's just a matter of walking a dozen or so kilometers more. A middleman buys the hides from them, paying them thirty or forty yuan per hide. They then take them to the purchasing station to sell, where they can get fifty or sixty yuan per hide.

Why should someone else profit from a price difference of nearly twenty yuan?

Therefore, it is quite hard work for middlemen who collect hides.

Now that Li Long has given them a new way to make money, they are naturally happy to accept it.

Compared to large-scale sheep farmers or herders with vast pastures, small-scale farmers are less vulnerable to snow disasters.

The size of pastures is sometimes inherited, and sometimes determined by later generations. Less pasture means fewer cattle and sheep can be raised, and less hay can be harvested in the fall. During winter, with less grass, cattle and sheep are more likely to freeze to death if they don't have enough to eat.

According to incomplete statistics, in just one and a half months of winter, more than a dozen herders' winter huts have collapsed or their cattle and sheep pens have been crushed by snow.

In winter, cattle and sheep need to spend the night in heated pens. If the pens collapse, the cattle and sheep will have to spend the winter outdoors. Winter is also the season when ewes give birth, and without heated pens, the lambs will most likely freeze to death after birth.

So these middlemen were quite popular when they went to small-scale farmers to buy cattle and sheep.

After all, cattle and sheep can be sold for money if they are alive and slaughtered, but if they freeze to death, all you get is the skin.

"Boss Gu, what do you think of these three young sheep I brought over this time? They're in good condition, bigger than the last ones. Would you like to buy them?"

"Let me see... The sheep is whole, and the skinning is done well. It's not dirty either. You washed it, right? Judging from the meat, it doesn't look like an old sheep. Okay, the market price is two yuan per kilogram. Come on, let me weigh it."

Gu Boyuan had spent a couple of days researching the quality of beef and mutton, and his comments were quite professional. The main reason was that Li Long had already set the price, which also meant he could adjust it by a few cents. After all, the quality of meat can't be exactly the same.

Therefore, Gu Boyuan set the price entirely based on his own judgment.

Most of them are slaughtered on the same day and taken to the purchasing station on the same day, or slaughtered on the same day but the journey is relatively long and they are taken to the purchasing station the next day.

The meat is very fresh, so the price is mostly average. Occasionally, if the meat is of better quality, the price can be raised.

The three sheep weighed less than 60 kilograms in total, and the seller was overjoyed to receive 117.6 yuan. He calculated that he had made over 11 yuan profit from the three sheep – a worthwhile deal.

"Come on, it's my turn!" The next person came over carrying a bag. "I'll only buy one sheep, but this one is quite big, over 20 kilograms!"

"So big? How could the herdsmen bear to slaughter it?"

"Sigh, there's nothing we can do. The sheepfold collapsed and broke this sheep's leg. It can't survive, so we have to slaughter it."

"Come on, let's weigh it." Gu Boyuan was quite surprised to see the sheep in the bag; it was the biggest sheep he had received recently.

Don't assume that the sheep in the herders' homes will be very big at this time of year. It's normal for an ordinary sheep to weigh over ten kilograms, and twenty or thirty kilograms is rare.

After all, there was no concentrated feed at that time, and cattle and sheep mainly ate grass. Feeding them sugar residue, like Li Long did, was already an excellent fattening method.

Let alone now, even in twenty years, many ordinary non-fattening sheep will only weigh ten or twenty kilograms when slaughtered. Sheep weighing thirty or forty kilograms will ultimately be a minority.

Of course, things changed later on. Most of the sheep on the market were fattened with feed. Grass-fed sheep could only be found in the livestock market when they moved down from the mountains in October each year. After that, a large number of people who were in the fattening sheep business would buy these grass-fed cattle and sheep, fatten them up with feed, and then slaughter and sell them in the winter.

Back then, even the ribs of mutton were covered with thick layers of fat, and because the mutton was fed with feed, it had a unique muttony smell.

The sheep were much heavier back then, easily reaching 20 or 30 kilograms. 40 kilograms wasn't unusual either.

But people still prefer to eat lamb meat; it's so tender.

So it's quite rare for this 20-plus kilogram ram to appear at this time.

The meat is of good quality, not from broiler rams, and doesn't smell gamey or foul. Gu Boyuan unusually offered a high price of 2.1 yuan per kilogram.

Although there was only one sheep, this person earned seven or eight yuan from it, and he couldn't hide his smile.

The next few dealers brought in hides and sheep pelts.

When Li Long came over in the afternoon, he also encountered a cowherd who had been brought in on a large flatbed cart. The cowherd weighed more than 200 kilograms, which was quite astonishing.

After Li Long helped weigh the animals and deliver them to the warehouse, he found that there were already more than a hundred cattle and sheep on the shelves. There were fewer than ten cattle, but more sheep, and upon closer inspection, the mutton all looked quite fresh.

"Not bad," Li Long said happily, looking at the large amount of beef and mutton they had collected. "It seems the traders are quite capable. The livestock team hasn't received any news at all, and we've already made some progress here."

"What's so great about it? You've already collected so much in just a few days, several thousand yuan gone." Gu Boyuan expressed his concern, "What if you can't sell all this beef and mutton? Have you heard anything from your friend over there?"

“No.” Li Long shook his head. “Jia Tianlong isn’t really interested; he deals in medicinal herbs, which is a different matter. Zhao Hui is the same; he buys hides and runs a leather business, which has nothing to do with food.”

I was just wondering how things went with Huang Lei, since he's dealing with dried mushrooms, and even within the food industry, he should have some connections.

"Don't be so optimistic and pin all your hopes on others. You also need to think of a way. If all else fails, we can just pack up and sell the beef and mutton to a few profitable factories before the New Year. We shouldn't lose money on ourselves."

Gu Boyuan was telling the truth. There are no cold storage facilities here right now, so if we keep all this beef and mutton in our hands and can't sell it before the New Year, it will just go bad by the time spring comes.

"Don't worry, Uncle Gu, we'll be able to sell it eventually," Li Long smiled. "I think I'll have good news from Huang Lei. Of course, we can't just rely on him."

Last year, the sugar factory needed sheep, so we slaughtered cattle and sheep from the old horse farm. This year, we don't need any; the cattle and sheep in this warehouse are enough. I also transported some to the Kuitun agricultural machinery factory. They're doing well this year; they're even producing snowplows in three shifts. They'll definitely need sheep too, and then there's…”

Li Long thought for a moment and said:

"After New Year's Day, I'll look for other factories in Shicheng to see if they want to make some welfare sheep for the New Year. That should be about right."

"Shall we continue collecting?" Gu Boyuan felt relieved when he heard Li Long say that he could actually get rid of several hundred sheep.

"Let's buy them," Li Long said. "Our team might need to buy some more cattle and sheep later. If there are any left, we can break them up and take them to the market in the old street in December. I believe we can sell them in a day or two."

Gu Boyuan was finally completely relieved. Putting aside other places, selling sheep in the old street would definitely work. The purchasing power of Shicheng was far superior to that of Ma County, and besides, the old street was a place frequently visited by people from both Shicheng and Ma County, so consuming dozens of sheep would certainly not be a problem.

Then let's keep collecting them.

The purchasing station always had ample cash flow, so there were no problems with buying sheep or hides. Gu Boyuan was only worried about the final disposal.

On December 20th, Zhao Hui returned to the purchasing station. This time, he took away more than 700 pelts collected from the station during this period, including a snow leopard pelt.

Zhao Hui initially only wanted to take the pelts. Although there was only one high-grade snow leopard pelt among so many pelts, the quantity was enough to make up for his dissatisfaction.

“Boss Zhao, you can take some mutton with you and try it.” Although Zhao Hui called back to say that his friend didn’t need beef or mutton from Northern Xinjiang, Li Long still tried his best to promote it. “Anyway, we’ll be hauling a whole truckload of stuff. If you take some beef or mutton back, even if you can’t sell it, you can give it to relatives and friends. After all, beef and mutton from Northern Xinjiang are different from what you have back home. You’ve eaten it before, so you should know.”

Zhao Hui was persuaded by Li Long, and he took away twenty sheep and a cow.

Li Long offered him a price that was two cents higher per kilogram than the purchase price, which wasn't much.

After all, this is just to earn some goodwill points and see if I can open up a market along the way.

It's okay if you can't open it, since we didn't lose money.

Jia Tianlong also called. He said he had plenty of mutton, but was short of beef. So he was thinking of coming over in a while to bring back a truckload of hides and see if he could earn some extra money during the winter.

This was an unexpected surprise.

Huang Lei's call came the latest.

"Mr. Li, I'm really sorry, but I really can't take those cattle and sheep this time."

Of all the people Li Long contacted, he actually placed the most hope in Huang Lei, since Huang Lei is in the food industry.

Huang Lei also hoped to close this deal. He collects wild mushrooms in the summer and has nothing to do in the winter. He thought that if he could collect beef and mutton from northern Xinjiang in the winter and sell them to markets and restaurants in his city, he would have two opportunities to make money each year.

So after receiving Li Long's call, he went door-to-door, hoping to reach an agreement with someone on this cooperation.

To Huang Lei's surprise, these butcher shops and restaurants all had established partnerships, and their beef and mutton came from Inner Mongolia and were of very high quality.

Huang Lei felt somewhat frustrated, but he was not one to give up easily, so he went to talk to each company one by one.

In the end, it still failed—Inner Mongolia is closer to my city, and the price of beef and mutton is very low, after all, the pastoral areas there are larger.

Therefore, if he buys beef and mutton from Li Long, he will basically make no profit, and may even lose money, including the transportation costs.

After he finished speaking, Li Long understood.

"Have you looked into the recent number of cattle and sheep being transported from Inner Mongolia?" Li Long asked, a thought suddenly occurring to him.

"What do you mean?" Huang Lei asked, somewhat puzzled.

“This year’s snow disaster in the north is nationwide,” Li Long said. “We don’t know the extent of the snow disaster in Inner Mongolia yet. If the disaster is severe enough, there may not be enough beef and mutton to meet the demand.”

Although this could be considered profiting from disaster, it was merely taking advantage of the situation, and Li Long felt no guilt whatsoever.

"Is that so? We haven't heard about it here... Let me inquire further!" Huang Lei's fighting spirit was immediately rekindled.

The wild mushroom incident dealt him several blows, but Huang Lei persevered, so this time was no exception.

Li Long felt that the saying "What doesn't kill me makes me stronger" was quite fitting for Huang Lei. This short man from the region has some talent in business and a tenacious character; he should be able to achieve something significant.

Reminded by Li Long, Huang Lei went to inquire about the amount of beef and mutton recently transported to the city.

There was a moderate snowfall recently, about 20 to 30 centimeters deep, which is actually the perfect depth for snowplows to operate.

When Li Long went out, he could see that some units in the county were already using snowplows to clear snow, and people were also using small four-wheeled tractors with snowplows attached to them to clear snow on the streets of the county.

Song Ming made a special trip to find Li Long, as the ten or so truckloads of sugar residue he had hauled to the mountains were enough. Halimu and the others told Li Long to come into the mountains when he had time, as they wanted him to haul down the things they had gathered.

Li Long didn't rush into the mountains; instead, he went back to the Fourth Team. After settling the transportation fees with Song Ming, he told him to continue hauling sugar residue to Old Ma's place, with the transportation fees remaining the same.

Li Long drove his jeep back to the fourth team and found that the snow on the roads leading to the various residential areas had not been cleared. However, the snow in the alleyways inside the residential areas had been cleared by each household.

Li Long felt a little guilty, so he simply turned the vehicle around and went straight back to the county town. Then he fiddled with the small four-wheeled vehicle, attached the snowplow, and drove back to the fourth team.

In the past two years, Li Long has focused his main attention on matters concerning Halimu and his tribe, while also paying attention to the purchasing station.

The team was doing relatively well, with several major tasks under his charge, and he had made money from planting cash crops, so Li Long didn't pay much attention to the production team.

On his way back in the jeep, he saw students walking in the snow on their way to and from school, a stark contrast to the environment in the city.

It's already quite an achievement for the villagers to clear the snow from the alleyways and roads. It's unlikely that they would bother to clear the snow from the roads leading to the residential areas. In the eyes of ordinary people, since it's snowing, the more they walk, the more compacted the snow becomes.

But in Li Long's view, he had already designed a snow removal machine and obtained it, and even cleared the road leading into the mountains, but he had not considered clearing the snow from the roads in the village.

Of course, these things should be considered by the team leader Xu Chengjun, but Li Long always believed that he was a member of the village and that he should do what he was supposed to do when he had the ability.

He drove his small four-wheeled tractor, and as soon as he entered the village, he put down the snowplow, started the winch function, and began to throw the snow mixed with stones, dried manure, and other debris from the road into the roadside ditch.

The road was still narrow at that time, and the small four-wheeled tractor chugged along, clearing away the snow from half the road at a speed slightly faster than a person could run.

Li Long ignored the snow in the residential areas. He drove his small four-wheeled tractor from the entrance of the village all the way to the new residential area, then turned a corner and cleared the snow on the other side of the road.

Some residents heard the commotion and came out to see what was happening. They saw a snowplow kicking up snow and flying towards the roadside.

Once you see the people on the tractor clearly, it doesn't seem surprising anymore.

Although many people in the village were jealous of Li Long, most of them were grateful to him.

Li Long's past actions have made people feel that it's not surprising for a young man to do such things.

After all, this isn't the first time.

Soon, Xu Chengjun rode his bicycle to Li Long's tractor.

"Xiaolong, your machine is amazing!" Xu Chengjun exclaimed. "It cleared the snow so quickly!"

"Captain, I'm wiping your ditch." Li Long didn't give Xu Chengjun any face at all. "We have so many strong men in our team. If we just leave the snow on the road like this, the kids will walk on it on their way to school, getting their shoes wet."

"What can we do?" Xu Chengjun said helplessly. "The team doesn't have much money in the account to begin with. After the household responsibility system was implemented, everyone has money and doesn't care about those few work points anymore. I've shouted on the loudspeaker several times, but no one has stepped forward to sweep them. What can I do?"

Li Long remained silent, but he knew Xu Chengjun didn't want to get involved. Otherwise, with his prestige, he could easily gather a few dozen people and clear the snow.

Meng Hai has that kind of prestige, how could he not?
Impossible. They just don't want to do it.

Li Long didn't expose him, but instead said:

"I couldn't stand seeing this snow fall, so I cleared it today. I've put the snowplow with my older brother. The team can use it, but only with his permission, and it can't be used for free. Today's snowplow job is my duty to the team, but we can't do this again in the future."

"Okay, okay, don't worry about that." Xu Chengjun laughed when he heard that Li Long wanted to put the snowplow in the team's possession. "I'll definitely let your brother know when he needs it, and he'll definitely get the work points too. I'll also mention this at the village meeting and embarrass the others!"

Li Long didn't care about anything else. After explaining the situation, he drove the tractor to continue clearing snow. In less than an hour, he had cleared almost all the roads leading to the various residential areas, which totaled a little over one kilometer but less than two kilometers.

By the time we drove the tractor to my older brother's yard, it was already lunchtime.

(End of this chapter)