1968: Started from breeding

Chapter 18 Designing a Chicken Coop
After the discussion at the brigade headquarters.

on the way back.

Father Su gave earnest instructions.

"Youngest, since you have decided to raise chickens, you should do it well and not be like before, fishing for three days and drying the net for two days."

"When Lao Gao said he wanted to pay for it himself, I was a little hesitant about whether to let you continue raising chickens. If you continue with your previous temper, I think the two hundred dollars will be wasted in no time!"

"Although you've been a little lazy these past few days, at least you're not as lazy as before!"

"It's you who are planning to build the chicken farm, so you have to pay for it yourself. I'll ask your mother to give you the 200 yuan you want to divide up tonight. But if you lose it, it will be hard for you to find a wife in this life!"

Su Wenchen's face was filled with black lines.

"Dad, don't worry! Don't you know my chicken-raising skills? Look how well I've taken care of our chickens these past few days. They lay eggs every day when we eat, and we continue to eat after they lay eggs. They are all so happy!"

"Besides, how can I be lazy? I feed the chickens and cut grass for the pigs early every morning. Most people can't catch up with me in diligence!"

Father Su looked dismayed.

"You are still not lazy like a teenager every day, then go and earn full work points like your elder and second brothers!"

"Uh~" Su Wenchen was speechless for a moment.

You can't earn a single cent with full work points. Now it's the spring ploughing season, and to get full work points you really have to use a hoe to plow the soil!

For someone like him who doesn't have a thick layer of calluses on his hands, after a day of work, his hands would definitely be covered with blisters!
Therefore, you can earn absolutely no work points from plowing the soil, and you can only make a living by collecting grass for pigs.

No, the chicken farm has now been approved by the brigade and he will soon be the farm manager. He won’t even have to cut grass for the pigs anymore!

Su Wenchen directly hugged his father's shoulders and said, "Dad, as the team leader, you have to learn how to use people. Your son is obviously a genius in raising chickens, but you insist on using him to plow the soil. Isn't this a waste of talent?"

"By the way, Dad, after my chicken farm is built, how many work points will I get per day?"

Father Su shook Su Wenchen's hand off his shoulder. He was a little uncomfortable with being so close to his son all of a sudden!

But he still said, "It's the same as Zhao Dabao's pigpen, full work points plus extra work points subsidy!"

Su Wenchen looked at his father with sparkling eyes, "How much is the subsidy? It can't be that working yourself to death or just idling away will get the same subsidy!"

Father Su glanced at Su Wenchen, thought about his youngest son's personality, and spoke in advance.

"For example, Zhao Dabao raised all ten pigs last year without any death. When he sold the pigs at the end of the year, he earned more than 1,700 yuan for the brigade. At the end of the year, he will be rewarded with 170 centimeters!"

Su Wenchen thought for a moment, "Isn't it a bit too little? I earned so much for the team, but only got a little over 170 centimeters as a reward?"

Father Su replied angrily, "What the hell, this is equivalent to a strong laborer working for seventeen consecutive days!"

"Besides spring ploughing and autumn harvest, there aren't that many full-point jobs for you to do at other times, so the full points per day alone are a lot of money!"

"Okay, I won't talk to you anymore. I have to go to work. You should figure out how to run your chicken farm first before we talk about other things!"

After saying this, Father Su turned around and walked towards the field.

After Su Wenchen returned home, he immediately began to prepare his own chicken farm construction plan. The sooner it was completed, the sooner he could enjoy the ten work points per day.

The first thing is the design of the chicken coop.

Since he fed the chickens with feed, he certainly wouldn't let the chickens run around on the ground to find food for themselves like the chicken farms of this era.

Moreover, this is an egg-laying hen, not a broiler chicken. It does not need firm meat. It just needs to be full and lay eggs in the nest.

Su Wenchen drew a rough outline of a chicken coop based on the appearance of a modern chicken coop, but when he came to drawing the chicken cage, he suddenly got stuck.

Because modern chicken coops are all made of iron, it would be difficult to deal with them in this era. However, Su Wenchen thought that the chicken coop in his yard now seemed to be made by his father himself. It seems that there is no need to pursue an iron chicken coop, right?
In this era, iron is a relatively difficult material to obtain, and ordinary people really don't have the channels to get this thing.

And the bamboo front should be able to be used as well!

At worst, each cage can be made smaller. It seems that two or three chickens in one cage will be fine!
Moreover, this way they can be isolated, so even if a sudden illness occurs, the entire army will not be wiped out.

Next is the sanitary condition of the chicken coop, which is of utmost importance. Once poultry such as chickens get sick, they are easily contagious.

Therefore, it is very important to prevent it in advance.

Most modern chicken farms pay attention to not letting chicken manure fall to the ground. Instead, they use machine-transmitted manure belts to deliver the chicken manure out of the factory where the hens are at any time to prevent the chicken manure from breeding bacteria!
It is definitely impossible to have this kind of automated high-tech in this era.

Su Wenchen thought about it and decided to install a pull-out wooden board under the chicken coop.

By manually replacing new wooden boards every day, the chicken coop should be able to maintain hygiene in time. It is impossible for a large number of bacteria to breed in just one day!

After drawing the basic structure of the chicken coop, Su Wenchen began to list the things needed for the chicken coop.

The first thing is a thermometer. He is not sure whether it exists in this era, so he plans to go to the supply and marketing cooperative to ask. With a thermometer, he can intuitively understand the temperature, and then control the temperature of the chicken coop. In this way, the chicken coop can always maintain a suitable temperature for the hens to lay a large number of eggs.

Then there is illumination.

This is also an important factor affecting the egg production of hens. In the absence of electricity, only natural light can be used.

In this case, wooden windows are obviously no longer suitable. Not only are they inconvenient for maintaining temperature, but they are also not conducive to sunlight exposure, so he also needs to get a batch of glass windows!
Finally, there is the hen.

Su Wenchen looked at the list he had made and felt a little sad.

Thermometers and glass are probably not easy things to deal with in this era. On the contrary, hens should be relatively easy to deal with compared to these two things.

It turns out that no matter what era it is, starting a business is never an easy thing!
After packing up the things he needed, Su Wenchen prepared to go to the county to ask around to see if he could get them.

However, just as he packed up and prepared to go out, Su Wenchen suddenly realized that he seemed to have no money left. He only had two cents left. Let alone buying glass, he probably couldn't even afford a piece of glass.

I looked at the sky outside. I had just started work, so it shouldn’t be too late! The morning market shouldn’t end so soon!

Su Wenchen returned to the house and took out a basket of eggs that he had saved up over the past few days. He had saved a total of thirty-five eggs over the past three days, plus seven more eggs he had picked up this morning. He put all of them in the basket, ready to take them to the morning market to sell.

After closing his door, Su Wenchen rushed to the county carrying the eggs.

(End of this chapter)