Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

First of all, the melon seeds are what some people call black melon seeds, the kind with thick skin, which is different from sunflower seeds. There are many kinds of sunflower seeds, such as the black ones used for oil extraction are called oil sunflowers, and the ones usually fried are called flower sunflowers, which have less oil yield and are suitable for frying.

There are also white, long and thin ones, which are now the horse-tooth melon seeds. The ones that are about the same size as sunflower seeds are generally used to cook five-spice melon seeds.

This is off topic, so I won’t discuss it anymore.

The one who came to see Liang Dacheng was Xu Jianjun. He didn't get promoted to a leader this year and was a little resentful towards Li Long, but there was nothing he could do. Who made him cause so much trouble last year?

Of course, Xu Jianjun didn't think it was his fault, he just felt that Li Long didn't like him. After the gang was over, those people got more than 300 yuan each, which made him envious.

It was more than three hundred yuan. At that time, the team added several bicycles. I was really envious!
But no matter how envious he is, he can't do anything if the other person doesn't want him.

Later, when he was making a big broom, Zhang Qiang caused trouble, so Xu Jianjun sent the big broom he made to Zhang Qiang. He was earning the same money anyway, and sending it here could also disgust Li Long, so why not do it?

Unfortunately, Zhang Qiang didn't make it, and finally had to get up early and go to Shicheng to set up a stall with a big broom. He was exhausted, but he still didn't dare to complain to his father-in-law Wang Tiansheng.

Also a coward.

He made more than a hundred yuan from making a big broom, and his wallet was bulging, so he thought about whether he could borrow some money to buy a bicycle.

There are more and more people riding bicycles in the village, and he is jealous.

As a result, I heard that the three Liang brothers followed Li Long to play with melons.

Although Xu Jianjun had some opinions about Li Long, he knew that Li Long was a man who would pay people for work. Tao Daqiang was definitely going to do this job, but now everyone in the village knew that Tao Daqiang was accompanying his wife to prepare for the birth of a baby, so they excluded him.

Li Long saved Liang Shuangcheng's life, so it was normal for him to have a good relationship with the three Liang brothers. Xu Jianjun came here to ask how much Li Long paid them.

"Jianjun is here." Although Liang Dacheng didn't like this guy, since he was here, he had to say hello since he was not his mortal enemy.

Fortunately, most people in the village didn't eat that night, so they didn't need to invite anyone. Their families were a little better off than in previous years, so they probably just drank some sweet soup and ate some steamed cakes.

"I heard that you went to Li's melon field to work today?" Xu Jianjun was standing in the yard, chatting with Liang Dacheng.

"Well, let's go and squeeze out the melon seeds." Liang Dacheng said casually, "Why, you want to go too?"

"No, I can't go even if I want to. Besides, I just finished making the big broom, so I don't have the leisure to work anymore. Aren't you uncomfortable staying at home?" Xu Jianjun said this deliberately.

"That's true." Liang Dacheng did not refute. If he talked about this kind of thing with such a person, the word would be distorted if he couldn't get it out.

"How much does Li Long pay you for a day's work?" Seeing that Liang Dacheng did not respond, Xu Jianjun asked directly.

"Ten dollars."

"Ten yuan? So little?" Xu Jianjun pretended to be surprised. "A day of making a broom costs more than ten or twenty yuan. It must be tiring to beat the melons all day, right?"

"Little?" Liang Dacheng was happy. "Jianjun, find me a job that can pay ten yuan a day. Don't even mention ten yuan, eight yuan is fine. As long as you can find one, I will do it every day, even in winter!"

Xu Jianjun stopped talking, he couldn’t say anything!
Why would they think ten yuan was too little? It was because Li Long did three big jobs for the team every year: weaving handles, tying big brooms, and making reed handles.

Let’s not talk about the fact that only a few people can make money from making broom handles. However, the whole village can participate in making big brooms and reed handles, and these jobs can earn each family in the village a few hundred yuan on average.

Now that they are rich, some people no longer care about ten dollars a day.

Of course, Li Long was able to offer ten yuan because he had considered this point. He didn't lack the money, and he was thinking of finding someone in the village. Otherwise, he could find someone from another village for five yuan a day, or even three yuan a day.

But there is no need for that. I spend most of my time in the county, but my eldest brother, including my parents and their family, are still in the team, so I have to leave some incense and favors.

Besides, the three Liang brothers have a good relationship with Li Long, so Li Long is willing to let them make money.

Xu Jianjun also came to his senses. Yes, when did he start to feel that a job that paid ten yuan a day was not worth doing? Ten yuan! Two years ago, when the land was not distributed, some people had less than ten yuan left after a year!

Of course, he came here with the intention of provoking others, but Liang Dacheng was very clear-headed.

Xu Jianjun understood the situation and saw that Liang Daben was determined, so he wanted to leave, but in the end he said:
"Ten yuan is enough for us. But it's nothing for Li Long, right? Forget ten yuan. You three brothers have a good relationship with him, so twenty yuan should be enough, right? He has so much money..."

"He earned so much money, what does it have to do with us?" Liang Dacheng shook his head. "If someone is capable, that's their business. I envy them, but I don't have the ability to earn that kind of money, and I don't want to share their money. I earn what I can, and as for the rest, that's not what I want."

Seeing that his attempt to instigate others failed, Xu Jianjun just chuckled a few times and left.

There is no loss. If I can't provoke Liang Dacheng, can I not provoke others?
We all came from that era, so isn’t it difficult for us to do something?
The next day, Li Long drove a tractor back to his eldest brother's house from the county, pulled his eldest brother up, put the pot away, and then drove to the melon field.

My two sisters-in-law and my father and mother have already started working in the yard.

When Li Long and his team arrived at the field, the three Liang brothers had already arrived and were piling the melons together. Other people from the village were watching and talking nearby.

Hearing the sound of the tractor, some people left, some stayed. It was a cold morning, no one was eating melons, but everyone was curious.

As the story spread, everyone already knew that the seeds should be kept when the melon is threshed, but how to get the seeds out was still a problem. The Li family came up with such a folk method that everyone was curious and wanted to see it, and of course, they also wanted to learn it.

After all, growing food can provide enough food, but getting rich is a bit difficult.

The Li family's planting of melons is a pioneering effort. Cash crops are usually more valuable than food crops. If the Li family can really make money from this, many people in the village will follow suit.

This has been the case for the past forty years. When it comes to farming in rural areas, it is difficult to be scientific, but it is too easy to just follow the trend.

So it is not easy to get rich. Farmers are at the very end of the information chain. Usually, they only know about this information when others become rich. By the time they follow up, they have become leeks, while others have already made enough money and left.

For example, garlic is cruel to you, beans are playful to you, ginger is your army and so on.

There are also the snow chrysanthemum and black wolfberry that have happened here. The game of capital has never been played with farmers.

Of course, the Li family’s is different. It started from the village, so this can be followed.

The Liang brothers watched the tractor drive into the field, and quickly came over to help unload the pot and position it. Li Long found that Boss Liang and his men had already dug a pit in front, so that the pot would be more stable after it was placed.

After putting up the board, Liang Lao Da and Liang Lao Er immediately started to beat the melons.

Li Long and Li Jianguo were also pressing, and someone next to them asked.

Such as whether it can be crushed cleanly, how many kilograms can be harvested per acre, where to sell it, etc.

Li Jianguo occasionally said a few words, but it was basically Li Long who answered. Anyway, he was young, but he knew how to make money, so everyone believed in him.

But if you really say something wrong, no one can find fault with it. After all, "a man without hair on the tongue cannot do things well." You, a person in your forties or fifties, cannot criticize a person in his twenties for being rigorous and capable.

"One acre of land can produce more than 100 to 200 kilograms. Now the only ones who can harvest it are the roasted nuts factories and seed companies." Li Long did not hide anything and said everything he should say. As for where the roasted nuts factories and seed companies are, that is another matter.

In fact, these people thought that since Li Long had planted the melons, the seeds should be easy to get. But in fact, if they planted them again next year, it was very likely that other people would go to the seed company to buy seeds, and they would buy the melon seeds grown by the Li family.

After all, there are people who grow melons these days, but they are few.

"How much can this kilogram be sold for?" This is the question that everyone is most concerned about.

"A little over one dollar?" Li Long gave a vague answer. He didn't want to say it was more than three dollars. After all, that number was a bit scary.

Think about it, right now the yield of wheat from an acre of good land is 200 kilograms, and the yield from an acre of inferior land is more than 100 kilograms.

How much does a kilogram of wheat sell for?

The public grain is 1.2 yuan, and the special price grain is 1.8 yuan, and the average price is about 1.5 yuan. I don't know if it will increase this year, so let's take the highest one, 200 kilograms per mu, so the gross income per mu is 30 yuan.

One acre of land can yield more than 100 kilograms of melon seeds. Even if the lowest yield is 100 kilograms, if calculated at one yuan, the gross income is also 100 yuan.

It’s three times as much as growing wheat!
Of course, the investment will be higher, after all, the seeds are expensive, and the labor investment is high. For example, it is a hassle to crush the melon seeds now. If you dare to say that you can sell one kilogram of crushed melon seeds for three yuan, then the gross income per mu of land is three hundred yuan. Even if you deduct the cost of one hundred yuan, it is still a net income of two hundred yuan.

If everyone knew this, they would go crazy!

This is much better than growing crops!
Why doesn't anyone plant it on a large scale?
Because no one collects it on a large scale.

Otherwise, do you think there would be few people who know how to plant?
Once it is planted on a large scale, it will become worthless. It may even be unsaleable and become a backlog.

Unlike grain, grain itself is a consumable. Not to mention that there is not enough grain now, even if there was enough, it can be used to make other things, such as side dishes, feed, and even in industry.

But there isn't much use for beating the melon seeds.

Except eating.

So Li Long tried to say as little as possible.

But he believes that as long as he sells the melon seeds this year and the price is announced, there will definitely be a large group of people growing this tomorrow. After all, it makes more money than growing grain!
Fortunately, we live in the same village, so no matter how much we grow, the impact will not be too big. After all, paying public grain is a must, there is no doubt about that, so even if everyone grows, it is tentative.

Some people ask from time to time, and some people leave after asking.

The two big pots kept pressing down. An hour later, Li Long called Liang Dacheng:
"Dacheng, take a break and move around. It's hot. Eat some melon to quench your thirst."

They didn't bring any water - just imagine how they would be laughed at if they needed to bring any water while working in a ripe melon field.

The only uncomfortable thing is that after digging out the melon pulp with your hands, it feels sticky and uncomfortable.

Five days later, all the melons in the field had been harvested, and the three Liang brothers earned a total of 140 yuan from Li Long.

The original pay was 150 yuan, but the work was only half a day on the last day, so Liang Dacheng and his team only collected half of the money, and Li Long just made it up to an integer.

There are more than 1,000 kilograms of squash seeds that have been flattened and dried, and some have not been dried yet, and the work of flattening is still going on. The trouble is to pick out the ones that are warped, and they need to be picked out one by one.

It is relatively simple after picking them out. Use two very flat boards to clamp the warped melon seeds, and press them with iron plates, stones or something like that. They have to be pressed evenly, otherwise some of the warped ones can be flattened, but some cannot be completely flattened.

The Li family used a sieve to sift out about 50 kilograms of large melon seeds to prepare for seed. In those days, melon seeds were not patented, so no one would sue them for growing second-generation seeds - a similar thing happened forty years later.

At present, some villagers have come to inquire about the price of melon seeds, probably wanting to buy them for seeds, but Li Long said that the seeds they bought from Wucheng are more expensive, six yuan.

If villagers buy it, they will give a discount and charge it three yuan.

Of course, this was said in jest.

No one in the village bought them, so Li Jianguo left some alive, saying that he didn't know the selling price this year, so after the first batch of melon seeds were sold, he would sell them to the villagers at the same price as he sold them to others.

When doing business like this, Li Jianguo did not ask for favors from the villagers, and everyone understood if he offered a lower price.

After all, we don't know how many people will buy it right now. If there are really more people, is it cheaper to give this one and that one a discount? If it is cheaper, more people will buy it, and the Li family will suffer the loss.

Why should they sell it cheaply? They can sell it at a higher price to buyers like food speculation factories, and then lose money to earn favors?

No need.

Two years later, someone in the village had a bumper wheat harvest with an extremely high yield of 300 kilograms per mu, and it was reported in the newspaper.

Farmers from other places come to buy wheat as seeds, and people from our village also buy it, so the price is the same. We treat everyone equally.

At most, the villagers can pick a few.

Li Long and Li Jianguo discussed taking a batch of melon seeds to the Shicheng Roasted Nuts Factory to inquire about the price. If the price was acceptable, they would sell a batch first.

"How much?" Li Jianguo asked.

"How about taking one ton? We'll sell them all if they're suitable." Li Long meant that the seeds had been set aside, and although the rest had not been weighed yet, it felt like there was almost one ton.

In other words, this year's melon harvest is quite good, with almost 200 kilograms per acre.

a lot!
"How much is appropriate?" Li Qingxia asked from the side.

"I think one dollar and fifty cents is about right." Li Jianguo didn't have any big ambitions to harvest 200 kilograms from one acre of land. Or rather, in his opinion, the weight of the harvest from one acre was about the same as that of wheat, but this land was not a good one for producing 200 kilograms.

If it can be sold for one dollar and fifty cents, one mu of land is three hundred yuan. Even if we deduct the cost of seeds, labor, machine farming and water (seeding also requires labor), and add all these together, it would be one hundred yuan. The net income of one mu of land is two hundred yuan, and ten mu of land is two thousand yuan. Who would dare to imagine this?
"No, it has to be two dollars and fifty cents at least." Li Long came from his previous life, so his mindset was different. Although there were few places to harvest melon seeds, there were also few places to grow melon seeds. Maybe his ten acres of land was unique.

Since there are so few plants planted, it is a rare commodity and worth a lot of money. Can we negotiate a higher price for it?

"Hey, if I can make two dollars and fifty cents, I need to be able to buy a tractor from these ten acres of land." Li Qingxia quickly calculated the income.

Li Jianguo also said:

"If they can really charge me 2.50, I'll buy a tractor after I sell it!"

Hey, Li Long was happy. Just for big brother's enthusiasm, he had to negotiate for more than two dollars and fifty cents, and three dollars would be best!
If you want three yuan, ten acres of land can bring in about six thousand yuan, which is enough to buy a tractor.

After all, my brother should have some savings, which is enough to deal with daily emergencies.

Besides, there is still myself.

He knew that his eldest brother had a strong sense of pride and didn't want to use his younger brother's money to buy a tractor, so he tried his best to use his eloquence and negotiate a higher price!

That night, Li Long did not go back to the county, mainly to load the dried melon seeds into the truck bed. Li Qingxia also wanted to go with him, but he did not go there to bargain, but because he had not caught fish in the past few days, he was addicted to fishing.

Tao Daqiang was unable to come, and Li Long did not dare to let his father go fishing alone, so he accompanied him. Li Qingxia brought two basins this time, and Li Long sat on a tire to go to the center of the lake to fish.

There are many people setting nets around, so the fish are no longer active nearby, and each net can only catch a few fish.

It is an easy job to ride a tire to the deep part of the lake to cast nets, but not many people can do that, and first of all, the tires are hard to find.

Li Long put down ten nets, rowed the tires and came back with his father. They had to get up early tomorrow to get the nets and fish.

Fortunately, we have a tractor, so distance is not a problem, and time is not a problem either.

Li Long was still a little uncomfortable living in the big courtyard at night, but he thought it would only happen in the next two days.

At dawn the next day, Li Long asked Li Qingxia to wake him up, and then they went together to get the net.

Now the number of pike that can be caught in the basin is also less, and the two basins combined can catch more than the original one.

But Li Long's nets, which were set deep in the lake, yielded more harvests.

At this time, other people had not arrived yet and the lake was very quiet. After Li Qingxia took the basin and went ashore, he listened to the crackling sounds from Li Long's side, which made him itchy.

There are so many fish and why is there such a big noise?

When he and Tao Daqiang were fishing together, Tao Daqiang rode a tire into the lake, but he didn't dare go too far. After all, he didn't have Li Long's skills, and it would be difficult to collect the fish if he went too far.

Li Long himself didn't care. He was skilled and bold, so he would just cast his bait where there were more fish.

He hasn't been online for quite a long time, and it's exciting to come online once in a while.

I was even more excited when I took out the net, and there were still a lot of fish!
There were quite a few big fish as well. With only two nets, we caught two large carps weighing more than three kilograms. They had red heads and tails, which looked really festive!
Hey, a great harvest, a good omen!

I don't care how much the fish sells for. Does this mean that selling melon seeds today will have a good result? (End of this chapter)