Chapter 364 Postpartum Care for Sows

They will definitely hold a grudge, but Zhao Yeqing didn't really hurt the baby elephant, so he shouldn't be in trouble.

Zhao Yeqing stayed at home obediently for a few days and did not go out, for fear that the herd of elephants would smell the scent and come to his house.

Fortunately, the weather was calm for several days in a row, so Zhao Yeqing climbed up a small hill near his home to look into the distance, wanting to see if there were any elephants on the meadow.

The meadow near my home was still the same as before. From afar I could see the soft grass being blown into surging waves by the wind. There were deer and rabbits on the meadow, but not a single elephant.

It was as if the elephant she saw a few days ago was just an illusion.

Could it be possible that they really caught up with the main force?

Soon, there were so many things to do at home that Zhao Yeqing had no extra time to think about the elephant herd.

It has rained several times recently, and I don't know where the mushroom spores came from and landed in my yard. When I woke up one morning, I saw small mushrooms everywhere in the corners and crevices of the front yard, the backyard, the grass, the greenhouse in the yard, the vegetable garden outside, and the grain field.

When Zhao Yeqing got up and looked at the densely packed little mushrooms, he felt dizzy. After washing up and having breakfast, they started picking mushrooms in full swing.

These mushrooms are not just one kind, they are colorful and everywhere. You can tell from their appearance that each one is not a good thing.

Both of them wore gloves and masks, fearing that they would be infected by accident.

After a whole morning of work, the mushrooms at my feet have piled up small tips. These cannot be thrown away casually. If they are thrown nearby and crushed into the soil, if there are spores on them, they will continue to grow.

It cannot be burned, so it can only be taken to a distant forest and thrown away.

Mu Xi put all the small mushrooms on the ground in a plastic basin, filling up half the basin, and said to Zhao Yeqing: "Don't do it yet. Take a break after lunch. Get as many as you can in the afternoon. Anyway, new ones will grow tomorrow morning."

This mushroom has grown so much, and the number of spores blown over must be quite a lot. Not all of the spores will grow out within one day. Some of the spores in the soil may not emerge until tomorrow or the day after tomorrow.

But we can't wait until the day after tomorrow to pull them all out. If we encounter a fast-growing species, if we don't pull out the mushrooms today, they may mature and spray new spores by the day after tomorrow, which will be even more troublesome.

Zhao Yeqing stood up, took off his gloves and rubbed his sore neck. "Don't throw away the ones in the basin yet. Wait until you finish pulling out the ones in the afternoon and then throw them away together."

It took three days to pick most of the mushrooms. The most were near home. After all, the two of them walked around here all the time, and the surrounding grass grew sparsely, so the exposed land was just right for the mushroom spores to grow.

The mushroom house where we grew oyster mushrooms was made of wood. The spores floated onto the wooden walls of the house, and small mushrooms sprouted on the walls.

Mu Xi took the pulled small mushrooms to the slope where he had burned charcoal and threw them away.

When the polar night ended, the first place the two went to was the small hill over there. The shrubs and small trees that had been withered and dry and dead have now grown branches and leaves again, and are so lush and green that there is no trace of their previous desolation.

However, the shrubs that originally dominated the area have been suppressed by ferns, and various vines are climbing on the trees, hanging down from the branches, blocking the view of the small slope that was originally not blocked by tall trees, and only a corner of sunlight can be seen through the gaps.

This corner of sunlight shines through the leaves, bringing with it the soft green color of the leaves, illuminating the small slope and making even the exposed soil look lush and green.

The mushrooms were just thrown at the bottom of the slope, and Mu Xi was not worried that they would grow and become rampant here.

It is definitely out-competed by these vines and ferns.

-

Thanks to the current weather, the most important watering work in summer has been saved, but many of the crops that have grown have yellow leaves and are wilting.

"This is rotten roots."

Zhao Yeqing pulled out the tall corn seedlings with a distressed look, shook off the dirt on the roots, and observed the condition of the roots. Those that were completely rotten had to be thrown away, while those that were only partially rotten at the beginning of the symptoms had to be rescued.

It has been a while since the seeds were sown and Zhao Yeqing was too lazy to replant. Fortunately, the loss was not particularly large.

She sometimes thought that her good attitude might be due to the fact that when she first planted wheat on the meadow, she encountered temperatures of dozens of degrees below zero, which resulted in a total loss of her winter wheat harvest. With that experience, she did not feel very bad even though the high temperature reduced the yield by half the year before last.

Now I don't care about this loss anymore.

It can be seen that as long as expectations are low enough, whether you get more or less will not affect your mentality.

In addition to crops, the animals at home are also due to give birth.

The pigs were the first to react. The gestation period of wild boars is generally four months. The couple had never delivered a pig before, and there were no books on postpartum care for sows at home. They had only attended sow births in the village when they were young, and it seemed to be similar to the way they delivered cattle and sheep.

The two men stood behind the first sow's buttocks when the sow lay down and started giving birth.

To prevent other pigs from causing trouble, the other pregnant sow and the remaining boars were separated by logs.

After the sow's belly heaved, the first piglet appeared.

The newborn piglet was wet and sticky all over. Its umbilical cord would automatically separate from the mother's body as soon as it was born. Mu Xi hurriedly wrapped the piglet's body with a bath towel and wiped off the mucus from its mouth and nose so that it could breathe normally.

Zhao Yeqing saw that the pigs at home were not fat and thought that they would not be able to give birth to many piglets. But when Mu Xi took the pigs out one by one, she panicked.

There was a piglet that looked dead as soon as it was born. Mu Xi picked it up and slapped it on the chest several times. He didn't let go until the piglet recovered its breathing.

Six piglets were born in one litter. Mu Xi looked at Zhao Yeqing's dazed face, as if he was asking her how she could afford to raise them. He could only comfort her by saying, "Actually, according to normal values, six piglets are considered few. Domestic pigs can give birth to 20 piglets in one litter, and normally they will have more than 10."

Zhao Yeqing: ...Thank you, I feel comforted.

But these are just the piglets of one pig. There is still a sow that has not given birth yet. According to Mu Xi, if that sow performs normally, it will give birth to more than a dozen pigs in its lifetime. So don't blame her for being cruel. Starting from next month, she will roast one suckling pig every week.

It is very important to keep the piglets warm and clean after they are born, so the two of them focused on cleaning the area where the newly born sow and the piglets live, and laid the area with newly harvested straw this year.

The temperature is getting high this day, and we have to prevent the piglets from getting heatstroke, so we put an ice basin in the pigpen that hasn't been used for a long time to help cool them down.

"Go to the tourist area someday and see if there is a ceiling fan like those that fall from the ceiling. Bring one back and put it in the pig pen to cool them down."