Chapter 250 Taro

It's still possible to make strawberry jam, and the small movements won't hurt your chest.

Zhao Yeqing first drank the medicine under Mu Xi's gaze, then stuffed the largest strawberry in his mouth to alleviate the bitterness before starting to make strawberry jam.

The jam is easy to make. Just chop it up and put it in a pot and cook until it becomes thick, then add sugar.

Being able to return to Meishan, she was able to take over the things from her home in Meishan, including the condiments she had stockpiled before. Salt and sugar became more abundant, especially salt.

She had bought a lot of salt in order to pickle kimchi. Later, when the accident happened, there were a lot of seasonings in the trunk of the pickup truck, and salt accounted for the majority of them.

There are homestays and restaurants in tourist areas, and there are quite a few stockpiles of condiments. After removing those that are improperly stored, the remaining stocks of salt, sauce and vinegar are also gratifying.

Sugar has the least amount of all the condiments, which may be because the people who survived in the tourist area before had no other food supplies and could not eat other condiments. Sugar can be eaten without any food and can replenish energy very well.

They haven't had time to move most of the things back yet, and now there is too much to do.

While Zhao Yeqing was cooking strawberry jam at home, Mu Xi planned to go out and check on the situation in the citrus orchard.

As expected, just as Zhao Yeqing had speculated, the citrus trees in the areas most exposed to the sun were not so affected by the red spider mites. Instead, the citrus trees that were half exposed to the sun and partly shaded by the trees were the worst affected.

In addition, neither of them had time to take care of the orchard, and there was no water source passing through the orchard, so it was already in a state of severe water shortage.

Mu Xi didn't care whether the sun was still too strong and it was not suitable for watering. He planned to find a way to bring water from the ditch and stream not far away. This way, when they were unable to water the trees, the fruit trees would not die of thirst.

There was a part of the citrus orchard that had no shade from the trees, and the naked sunlight shone down from above, like an extra-high-wattage light bulb, making him a little dazed.

I started to feel a stinging pain in my eyes soon after I opened them, and could only walk forward with my eyes half closed.

When he walked to the stream that he had dug last time, the sight of it made him feel disappointed.

The water source was almost cut off, and only the thickness of my wrist was left.

Not to mention being able to divert it, I'm afraid this small stream won't be able to survive in a few days.

Yes, the groundwater reserves near the meadow are already abundant. During the last high temperature period, the water source in Meishan had already dried up when the temperature was just over 40 degrees.

Mu Xi suddenly remembered that Zhao Yeqing had said before that they wanted to wait for the taro to mature, so he hurried behind the thatch to check.

Sure enough, the taro that had big green leaves before has now turned yellow and wilted.

The temperature is just too high.

Taro likes warmth and humidity, and the most suitable growth temperature does not exceed 30°. Now the humidity is almost gone and the weather is too hot, so it naturally can't withstand it.

Mu Xi took out a small hoe from the basket on his back and dug out the taro seeds from the soil.

The temperature underground is much lower than the temperature on the ground, and the taro underground looks to be in good condition.

The taro they have here is not the small kind of taro, but the big kind similar to the one from Li County, Guangxi Province. It has a high starch content and is very large in size. Any one of them is at least the size of a dragon fruit.

Mu Xi dug out the grown taro seeds and put them in a basket to take back to see if he could plant them in the basement.

The taro problem has been solved, but what should we do with the water source?

Mu Xi couldn't think of a solution at the moment and could only water the orchard with bottled water.

The water flows down the fruit trees, washing away some of the red spider mites, and then flows into the soil to nourish the fruit trees.

After processing a large orchard, I went to look for some tobacco on the way home.

Walking to the location of last year's tobacco field, Mu Xi saw a small piece of tobacco still growing. He breathed a sigh of relief. Although it was not as much as last year, it could solve some urgent problems.

He remembered what Zhao Yeqing said, not to pick all the leaves, but to dig up those that were growing well and plant them first. After all, there was only so much of this stuff, and even if he picked all the leaves it wouldn't be enough.

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Zhao Yeqing's jam has been made. Jam is not difficult to make, but the difficulty lies in its preservation. If it is not handled properly, the jam will become moldy in a few days.

All glass jars used for storage must be sterilized and dried before use.

A basket of strawberries only made two small jars of jam. She put the jam in the refrigerator for storage and went down to the basement.

It has been nearly half a month since the last time I fertilized strawberries, watermelons, fruits and vegetables.

She took the fertilizer and applied it to the strawberries and watermelons first, and then dealt with vegetables like tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants.

It is more appropriate to use chemical fertilizers for fruits. Fruits grown with targeted application of elemental fertilizers are much more delicious than those grown with only organic fertilizers.

There are not so many requirements for fruits and vegetables. Of course they will grow better with chemical fertilizers and they will be easier to take care of, but after all, the current conditions do not allow it, and she also prefers to use organic fertilizers to grow fruits and vegetables, which will be healthier to eat.

Organic fertilizer easily breeds small insects, so she squatted in the basement and manually removed the insects, thinking that next time she saw small ladybugs or something outside, she would catch them and put them in the basement, thus creating an ecological cycle that would help eat pests such as aphids.

When Zhao Yeqing came up from the basement, Mu Xi just walked into the yard.

He took off the backpack and said, "The stream beside the orchard is almost dry, and I dug up all the taro growing by the water. There are also a few tobacco plants. There are not many of them this year, so I dug up all the good ones."

Zhao Yeqing leaned over to take a look and saw some large taro roots still covered in dirt. He counted them and found there were about seventeen or eighteen of them.

Taro prefers moist and warm conditions, but is also very shade-tolerant, so planting it in the basement should not be a problem.

Mu Xi carried the backpack directly to the door of the basement. Now the sun was about to set, so he pushed away the soil covering the basement and opened the PC board to allow the plants inside to ventilate and receive the last bit of sunlight of the day.

When the boards were lifted, some dirt was bound to fall down. Zhao Yeqing waited until no more dirt had fallen before he walked into the basement.

The vegetables that were previously planted between fruit and vegetable crops were also planted according to their characteristics. In addition to seasoning vegetables such as garlic and onions that repel insects, there were also mint, lettuce, celery, etc.

Mint can also help kill insects. Maybe it’s because we grow these crops with special aromas that there are no red spider mites on tomatoes and peppers.

She didn't have much experience growing strawberries, and wasn't sure if they could be inter-planted with these, but looking at the current situation, the need for deworming was more urgent, so she took a small hoe, dug up a mint plant, and planted it among the strawberries.

I also inserted a few garlic cloves into the gap, hoping that it would work.

Zhao Yeqing plans to plant taro near tomatoes. Tomatoes are now in the fruit-bearing period and have a relatively high demand for water. Celery, lettuce, and mint planted near tomatoes are all vegetables that consume a lot of water.

Planting fruits and vegetables with the same characteristics together with taro will not cause problems due to watering the taro and causing the surrounding soil to become moist.

As for tobacco, Zhao Yeqing is now having a headache. Before, he only thought about digging it up and planting it, without considering where to plant it.