Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

When Li Long drove to Team 4, there was already water in the reed ditch. The traces of the flood were still there, with water marks on the banks of the ditch and places where the flood washed away mud and sand.

There are bags of sand and gravel piled up on both sides of the Weigou Bridge and the dirt road, probably to prevent water from overflowing from the bridge deck and washing away the road.

It seems that the flood this time is quite large, and the team should have mobilized a lot of labor to prevent the flood.

At this time, this is the only road leading to the outside world for Team 4. If the Weigou Road is washed away, it will be difficult to solve the problem of students going to school.

Two years ago, such things happened frequently. After all, there was no bridge or road in the middle of the reed ditch at that time. Students could walk across when there was no water, but when there was a flood, they could only go to the small lake and wade across from the source of the reed ditch - the team had to send militiamen to escort them there.

Unlike later generations, the four teams had at least three roads to the outside world, all of which were asphalt roads, so they didn't have to worry about being blocked - of course, at that time the small lake had been silted up and floods no longer passed through here, the reed ditch had been silted up and trees were planted, and there were no reeds.

That's just how the world changes.

While sighing, he drove to the Lao Ma Hao. When he arrived, Li Long was surprised to find that the saline-alkali land next to the Lao Ma Hao had been sown.

Before sowing in spring, you need to plow the land, then level, harrow and cut it. After the whole process, you can sow the seeds, and the seeds in the ground will grow well.

This should be done by my eldest brother Li Jianguo. I occasionally go back to the team, and the interval between each visit is not fixed. Every time I come back, I can make new discoveries.

The jeep stopped at the door of the old horse house, and Li Long found that the door of the sheepfold of the new horse house was open.

He got out of the car and looked, and found that there were no sheep in the sheepfold - had they been let out?
probably.

He got in the car and drove into the yard. Uncle Luo was feeding red deer and roe deer. He was very happy to see Li Long coming.

Li Long got out of the car, holding the bag of bear meat and said:

"Uncle Luo, have the sheep been released?"

"They've let them out. It was Yang Laoliu who let them out. He couldn't sit still, so he said he was going out to herd the sheep and see if there was any alfalfa. He was going to pick some and steam it. Are you in a hurry? If not, wait until he comes back at noon to check. If he's ready to pick some, you can take some back."

"I killed a bear yesterday and brought some bear meat here today," Li Long took a bag from the car, "I'll have lunch at my eldest brother's place and then go back to the county."

"Then come over after lunch, and take some if you see any." Uncle Luo took the bag of bear meat from Li Long. The two pieces of bear meat must have weighed more than ten kilograms. He sighed as he walked into the house, "Hey, it's only because of you that I can eat bear meat. If I let it go, I wouldn't have dared to think about it."

Li Long smiled and listened to Uncle Luo chattering about the big and small things that happened during this period, such as who had a grandson born in whose family; the flood happened at night and the militia gathered quickly, but some people didn't show up and were scolded by their father the next day; for example, after the flood receded, the reed leaves in the reed ditch were floated up by the remaining water, and many large crucian carps were stranded on them, and the students rolled up their trousers after school to pick them up.

For example, when Yang Laoliu was herding sheep, he met Ma Jinbao. Ma Jinbao didn't take good care of the lambs he gave birth to this year, so one third of them died. Now the sheep are still very thin, which made Yang Laoliu laugh at him for several days.

These things were all very new to Li Long. He still remembered some of them, but he didn't know about some of them at all, and he didn't know much about them in his previous life. But now that he heard them, he felt very familiar.

These are all things happening in the village, but they are no longer happening around me.

"There are seven deer and five roe deer growing antlers in the pen now." Uncle Luo started talking about business. "In a few months, we can harvest the antlers. This year, we can sell the antlers for a lot of money. I've also saved some deer placentas, dried them, and packed them for you later."

Li Long didn't expect that Uncle Luo still remembered this incident. He walked out of the house and walked towards the circle.

When I come back, I have other things to do and rarely see these red deer and roe deer.

When he first started raising them, he was just raising them for fun. After all, he had heard that sika deer were very prone to getting sick, and once they got sick, they were difficult to treat and the losses would be huge.

So when I first got the sika deer baby, I thought about selling it for money.

Now he found that Uncle Luo and his team raised the red deer very well. The red deer were divided into three separate pens, with several adult red deer in one pen, does that had given birth and their calves in another pen, and several half-grown red deer in another pen.

The roe deer were divided into two single circles, with adults and semi-adults in one circle, and mother roe deer and calves that had given birth to roe deer babies in another circle.

The number actually felt huge, which was beyond Li Long's expectations.

There are more than thirty of them in these two groups together!

"The red deer and roe deer babies are all alive." Uncle Luo saw Li Long's surprise and said with a smile, "Last year, a red deer was sold for 800 yuan, which scared us old guys. This thing is so precious, we can't let it get spoiled or die."

Li Long nodded. It seemed that it was the right decision to let Uncle Luo raise these things.

This has already developed into a large scale.

"The village official Jiang came over twice to interview you, but she didn't see you. She just took some photos and went back," said Old Uncle Luo. "She said if you have time, she would ask you to come to the village. She wants to interview you properly."

"I'm busy right now." Li Long shook his head and went to look at the little wild boars again. He felt that the wild boars' humming had become quieter.

"Two litters were born this year." Old Uncle Luo followed over, "The four pens were almost full, so we didn't breed that many."

Li Long knew what Uncle Luo meant. The piglets here were hybrids, which had the lean meat gene of wild boars but were not so noisy.

"There are seventeen pigs in the two litters, and they are growing very well. In addition to the two sows, there are twelve big ones. Should we sell some of them? They won't grow big anyway. Wild boars can never grow as big as domestic pigs." Uncle Luo felt a little regretful.

When these little wild boars grow up, they will basically weigh about 70 to 80 kilograms in one or two years, and no larger than 100 kilograms.

A little worse than he imagined.

"Wait for Professor Luo and his team to come over in a few days and slaughter one." Li Long thought for a moment and said, "Is there anyone in the team who wants to buy piglets? If there are any, then we can sell some to them."

He is now considered a special breeder, so of course he cannot just keep the fish, he can also sell them for money and get some of his investment back.

"There are people in the team who come to buy sheep. Do you want to sell them?" asked Uncle Luo.

"Sell it. Just make it cheaper than the market price." Li Long thought for a while and said, "The current market price of mutton is 1.5 yuan per kilogram, and 80 cents per kilogram when weighed live. We can just sell it at 70 cents."

After the Spring Festival, the price of mutton has dropped a bit. Now that spring has begun, sheep are losing a lot of weight, so usually not many people buy sheep, and not many sheep are slaughtered.

After all, there are almost no people who fatten the pigs like Li Long, and even fewer who fatten the pigs in the spring.

After explaining all these things, Uncle Luo put some dried deer placentas into a bag and put it in Li Long's car. Li Long said goodbye to him and drove away.

Gu Xiaoxia may not use these placentas, so she will probably keep them in the side room and wait for Jia Tianlong to come and see if she wants to keep them.

When Li Long drove back to Li Jianguo's yard, only Du Chunfang was there tidying up the vegetable patch. The tractor was not there, so she must have gone to work in the fields.

Several fishing nets were hung on wooden stakes beside the vegetable garden wall. When Li Long got out of the car, he could still faintly smell the fishy smell.

"Xiaolong is back?" Du Chunfang stood up and walked back from the vegetable field with a smile. "Your father and your eldest brother went to work in the fields. They are sowing seeds these days. They said they are sowing sunflowers and oil sunflowers. By the way, your brother sowed beets on the land over at your horse farm a few days ago. He said he was sowing beets as you said. These days your brother is still wondering whether the expert from the Agricultural College will come."

Du Chunfang really wanted to chat with Li Long, otherwise she wouldn't have been able to say so much in one breath.

"I killed a bear yesterday and brought back some bear meat and a bear paw." Li Long took a bag from the car and said, "Since they are not here, let's braise the bear meat and we'll see what to do with the bear paw when my dad comes back."

"Okay." Du Chunfang said with a smile, "Are the children and your wife all right?" "All right, all right." Li Long came over quickly to add fire to the stove and wash the pot. Du Chunfang went over to press water and then helped.

Li Long washed the bear meat, went to the kitchen to pick out the clean meat, cut it into pieces and put it in a basin, and brought it out. There were two stoves, so he could cook the meat and the bones at the same time, perfect.

Du Chunfang was already sitting in front of the stove and starting to light the fire. Li Long poured the bear meat into the pot, and then went to prepare seasonings such as pepper and ginger.

In the past, the locals did not add any seasoning when stewing meat, just keeping the original flavor. Li Long was reborn from the future, and his decades of experience plus the knowledge he later learned from short videos and online platforms made him think that adding some seasoning to the stewed meat oil would make the dish more fragrant when stir-fried.

Of course, don’t put too much, just adjust the taste.

Du Chunfang saw the "rebellious" behavior of her youngest son, but she did not stop him at all. Her youngest son was very capable, and even if what he did was different from what everyone else did, it was still her son's innovation and he did it better.

As for whether it was wrong or not, she would never think about it that way. In her opinion, her son was right in everything he did.

Li Long was watching the fire where the meat was stewing, skimming the meat foam in the pot where the bones were boiling, and chatting with Du Chunfang.

From Li Juan and Li Qiang’s recent academic performance, to whether the team’s life was affected by the flood, as well as Du Chunfang’s recent appetite and physical condition.

"All right, all right. I can eat and sleep well, and I don't work every day. What else do you want?" When talking about her current life, Du Chunfang was full of praise. "I never thought I could live such a life back home.

Even if your eldest brother sends back things and money, we can't eat meat every day. Every market day, your father takes me to the market and I can buy a meat-filled pancake to eat. How can I eat it at other times? Not to mention meat, even the fish in the river can't be caught as much as we can catch every day. "

The river is nameless, and its banks support hundreds of thousands of people, most of whom are capable of diving into the water and catching fish. Unlike Team 4, which has abundant resources, not many of them can actually catch fish, or have the determination to do so.

Several decades later, the ice on Dahaizi started to melt in the spring and the fish started to show their heads. But among the entire production team, only ten people showed up to catch fish.

At that time, fish were really worthless, mainly because Ma County was too small and the purchasing power was weak. A dozen people each caught 70 or 80 kilograms of fish and sent them to the county, and the market was directly bursting.

Can't sell.

As we chatted, the pot for stewing meat started to boil. Oil slowly seeped out of the meat, more and more, and the aroma wafted out.

Mrs. Lu from the opposite side didn't go to the fields. When she saw the jeep, she came over with a hook in her hand and stood at the gate to greet Li Long:

"Xiaolong is back?"

"Well, I'm back." Li Long said with a smile, "Mrs. Lu, I got some meat and am cooking it. Can you come over later and take two pieces back for Tietou Ni'er?"

"No, no." Mrs. Lu waved her hands hastily, "How can I do that?"

"What's there to be embarrassed about?" Li Long smiled, "Bear meat, take it back and try it."

"Hey, then I won't be polite." When she heard that it was bear meat, Mrs. Lu was obviously interested and turned around to go back to get the thing.

"What can I do for her?" Du Chunfang was obviously dissatisfied with this woman who seemed to her to be a bit of a bargain hunter. "Can't we just eat at home?"

"It's okay. There's plenty of meat. You'll have to eat these bones for two or three meals. Bear meat isn't that tasty. The experts will be here in a couple of days, and the stable will slaughter a pig. Then we'll send some pork home."

Mrs. Lu hurried into the kitchen, took out an enamel basin, then changed it for a smaller one. She turned around and saw the big crucian carp that Tietou had caught from the canal in the morning. She hesitated for a moment, took out seven or eight crucian carps and put them in the basin, and took the rest and walked out.

She had prepared these crucian carps in the morning. The scales, gills and internal organs had been removed, and the seeds were still in the stomach. Don't say here that you should not catch crucian carps in spring. There are too many crucian carps. Once the water is released or there is a flood, these crucian carps will flow out from the reservoirs and lakes. They will either go to the large lakes downstream and survive, or they will split up and swim into various ditches, waiting for their fate, which is to die of dehydration after two or three days.

So if he was arrested, he was arrested.

The Lu family has been eating fish for two days. Tietou is much more interested in catching fish than working in the fields. He goes out every morning as soon as it is light, and comes back with several long strings of fish by the time of dinner. He does not sell the fish, but leaves them at home for Mrs. Lu to clean up. Mrs. Lu complains but still has to clean up the fish because it does not want to waste them.

"Xiaolong, this is the crucian carp that Tietou caught this morning. Take it back for Xiaoxia to eat, it will help her produce milk." Mrs. Lu came over with a basin. "It's all peeled and opened, take it home and cook it directly - don't fry it. This fish is big, two or three years old, and the bones are hard. It tastes better fried than stewed."

"Okay, okay." Li Long agreed with a smile. Having lived two lives, he knew the character of Sister Lu, who was gossipy and greedy, but she was close friends with his sister-in-law Liang Yuemei. After all, people with good relationships were actually good people. At that time, social resources were limited and not abundant, so it was normal to be greedy.

Li Long picked up a bone and a few ribs for Mrs. Lu, who said quickly, "That's enough, that's enough. There's a lot of meat on it. If we take it home and remove the meat, we can make two more dishes." If we save some food, we can make two more dishes.

"Not bad." After Mrs. Lu left, Du Chunfang looked at the fish and said, "Your father has been working in the fields these two days and has no time to catch fish. This fish is just right."

There were about ten crucian carps, all about the size of a palm, weighing 200 to 300 grams, well-proportioned, not skinny, probably because they can still eat reed roots in the water in winter. I took them home and stewed them, which was quite fragrant.

After the meat and bones were stewed and the oil was cooked, Li Long didn't wait for his elder brother and the others to come back. He took a bone, put it in a basin, and ate it with the steamed buns he had had in the morning together with his mother.

Du Chunfang actually didn't eat much. She took a small piece of meat and nibbled it slowly. Li Long ate two pieces of meat and two steamed buns. When he was full, he put the fish in a bag and put it in the car. Then he said goodbye to his mother and drove to Mahao.

At the Lao Ma Hao, Yang Laoliu was picking the alfalfa and said as he was picking:

"The Xiaolong Huihui people always send us all the good stuff, so the alfalfa we give them can't be bad. I was in such a hurry when I was pinching it that I didn't bother to pick up the grass inside - there isn't much grass, but if I really didn't pick it up, it would be troublesome to eat it when steaming it."

As they were talking, Li Long drove over. Yang Laoliu picked out more than a kilogram of alfalfa. When Li Long got out of the car, he was still saying:
"Xiaolong, take a break. I'll pick some more. You can take all the alfalfa away later..."

"No, no, Uncle Yang, these are enough. I can't eat so much..."

"How can they not eat that much?" Yang Laoliu said, "Old Gu can eat half of it by himself!"

Li Long wanted to laugh after hearing this. This guy really understands his father-in-law.

"No, no, just try it. I've already troubled you."

"What's the trouble? Don't be polite. We get your salary and eat the meat you send us every day. What's that?" Although Yang Laoliu has done a lot of bad things, he is not an ungrateful person. He knows that his life is much better than that of other people in the team. Shouldn't he be grateful to Li Long?

Li Long smiled, and together with Yang Laoliu, he packed up the picked alfalfa and put it in the car. Then he waved to Uncle Luo and the others and left.

"I was thinking of keeping him for dinner." Another old man said, "The dinner is almost ready."

"Xiaolong must have something to do." Old Uncle Luo said, "When he has time later, we will take care of such a big family business, so he will have to come often. The professor is coming over in a couple of days. Xiaolong said he will slaughter a pig. Then you can prepare some pickled cabbage and stir-fry some pickled cabbage and pork. See if he will come to eat."

"Hey, that's definitely no problem." Old Zhongtou smiled. When he received his salary, he always felt like showing off, otherwise he would feel a little guilty about taking it.

After all, not much work can be done in a day and everyone is working on it, so when the workload is shared, there isn't much work to do.

For them, it's a piece of cake.

Li Long drove the jeep back to the big yard first, put down the fish and alfalfa, and then hurried to the gate of the county party committee compound. After a while, Ma Xiaoyan appeared at the gate neatly dressed. It was obvious that she had already eaten and was waiting here.

After getting in the car, Li Long said, "Sit tight, I'm going to drive."

Ma Xiaoyan hummed, feeling a little excited—she can only ride in this level of car a few times a year! (End of this chapter)