◎Happy 81st Day: The bait tries to turn over◎
They wanted to grow mushrooms, and the first problem they encountered was not what else to do but to identify the species of mushrooms.
Last night, everyone ate all kinds of edible fungi without any precautions. The result was obvious. They are indeed not poisonous, but they have side effects.
And because they eat so many varieties, they don't even know which mushrooms are causing the side effects.
It's enough to go crazy once in a while. You can't go crazy every time you eat mushrooms in the future.
So they decided... to have another mushroom banquet tonight.
This time everyone picked out the varieties to eat, made a dish for each variety, and tested the side effects one by one.
Those without side effects will pass the test smoothly and become their future breeding targets.
If there are side effects, decide whether to keep it or not depending on the specific circumstances of the side effects.
In the end, the winners included oyster and straw mushrooms, which, despite their mediocre flavor, were highly productive and easy to grow. There was also an unidentified species, similar in appearance and flavor to shiitake mushrooms, though the numbers were limited and it didn't seem to be thriving. Laughing mushrooms have side effects, but their flavor outweighs their popularity, so they decided to plant some anyway.
"What if there's someone who's not ticklish?" Qin Shiwen advised, "The survival base has been built, and there's a trading post over there. We can use it to exchange things with others later."
Jiang Muyun knew that laughing mushrooms were profitable, but she had never seen anyone successfully cultivate them in her past life. Jiang Muyun didn't know why they couldn't be cultivated artificially, but it wouldn't hurt to give it a try.
The same goes for wine mushrooms.
After the apocalypse, information is difficult to circulate, and many things have different names in different places. If an item can have a universal name, it at least proves that it has a wide market and can be circulated among the survivors.
Before the apocalypse, grain wine had become a rare luxury item due to the cessation of grain production. Mushroom wine varieties, like the wine mushroom, are affordable alternatives after the apocalypse. The profits of the wine mushroom industry were as high as those of the tobacco and alcohol industry.
Of course, Jiang Muyun had heard that some people were growing and selling highly addictive plants, which was a truly profitable business. But even in the tenth year of the apocalypse, Jiang Muyun couldn't accept such immoral behavior.
To grow mushrooms, you must first collect spores.
Remove the stem from a mushroom whose gills have already opened, place it gill-side down on a piece of paper or a smooth surface, and then cover it with a container to prevent the spores from being blown away by the wind. Wait about a day and you will be able to collect the spores that have emerged from the gills.
Jiang Muyun and his team used thicker black plastic bags, which were dark in color. The spores of the main target of their cultivation were light-colored, so they would be more noticeable if they fell on them.
While waiting to collect spores, they also have to prepare some materials for growing mushrooms, as well as select a site for cultivating mycelium and growing mushrooms.
Among them, cultivating and preserving mycelium is the key.
If mushrooms are grown well, they will produce mushrooms in about a week.
But the sun never comes out, so even if they grow fresh mushrooms, they can't keep them for long.
You can't use the kang to dry things every day.
Even if they didn't feel bad, there wouldn't be enough charcoal and firewood.
So before the sun came out, or before they found a stable source of dry firewood, they grew mushrooms more to accumulate experience. There was no need for large-scale cultivation, and they could eat them as soon as they were grown.
The key is to cultivate and preserve the mycelium to facilitate their subsequent planting.
The simplest and most classic method is regular transplantation and low-temperature preservation, which is applicable to most strains of bacteria.
Find a slant culture medium, and after the mycelium has grown fully, plug the culture medium with a sponge. Store it in a low temperature environment below ten degrees. Transplant it every 3-6 months. As long as the temperature does not deviate, it can be stored for two years without any problem.
As for the growing conditions of mushrooms, they are all similar, heat preservation and moisture retention, light-free and ventilated, just find a small cave, or if that doesn't work, you can just dig a hole on the spot.
Spray disinfection with potassium permanganate solution in advance, then place the culture material, wait quietly for the mycelium to grow, and then spray water and ventilate step by step to grow mushrooms.
"Why not just dig the soil directly from the woods?" Jiang Muyun asked. "Those mushrooms grew in the woods anyway, so the contaminated soil shouldn't affect them."
If it had an impact, mushrooms would no longer be a staple food.
Wang Qingqing sighed: "We still have to go into the woods."
Zhou Ying rubbed her head and said, "Think about it, you'll have mushrooms to eat in the future. What's the big deal about going into the woods and suffering a little now?"
Qin Shiwen also brought a fire axe: "I vaguely remember where I picked up the mushrooms before. To be on the safe side, we can use wood chips from trees near their native place to grow the mushrooms."
The main materials for growing mushrooms will vary depending on the variety of mushrooms. Among them, wood chips are the most universal, and other materials can only be used as needed.
They were incapable of mixing chemical fertilizers, much less accurately proportioning culture materials. At this point, the mushrooms were already quite carefree, and if they treated them too meticulously, they might even be more vulnerable to death.
Qin Shiwen was responsible for cutting branches, and the others were responsible for digging the soil.
Not only do you need to accurately locate the mushrooms' home, but you also need to remove various other plant roots mixed in the soil.
They don’t have plans to grow mushrooms on a large scale now, but they have to prepare the soil first, otherwise when the sun really comes out, they may not remember where the mushrooms’ hometown is.
Moreover, these soils must be stored separately. Soil that grows the same kind of mushrooms can be put together to prevent the spores of other mushrooms from being mixed in the soil. If everyone squats together and fights, both sides will be injured and no one will survive.
At first, the progress was quite smooth. Apart from startling a bunch of flying insects from time to time, everything was fine. The small insects that occasionally came out of the soil were harmless and could be driven away.
The socks and gloves they wear now are all sprinkled with Tripterygium wilfordii water, which has a certain insect repellent effect. When encountering these insects, the most they will suffer is their eyes, but it will be fine once they get used to it.
But as Jiang Muyun dug, he felt something was wrong.
When she dug the soil in with a shovel, she didn't rush to shovel it into the bag next to her. Instead, she spread the soil out and looked at it carefully.
Sure enough, when I turned it over, I found some inconspicuous brown strips inside.
This thing looked very familiar to her.
After the end of the world, they are collectively called vegetable worms, and are another dominant player on people’s dining tables.
This insect can accurately locate the roots of various edible plants and will chew on them if it catches them.
In fact, it is not accurate to say that they eat plant roots. Their diet is highly similar to that of humans. It’s just that the insects themselves live in the soil, so most of what they gnaw on are plant roots.
If any fruit, stems or leaves fall to the ground, they don't mind enjoying them.
The biggest victims are not vegetables, but mushrooms, which belong to the fungus family but are also on the diet of vegetable worms.
Firstly, most people planted it after the end of the world. Secondly, mushrooms are fungi and technically do not have roots. Their "roots" are called mycelium, which are not as developed as those of plants and are not very edible. Vegetable worms often chew on them and swallow the mushrooms themselves.
When other crops are attacked by vegetable insects, people can at least rescue some of them in time when they find abnormalities in the stems, leaves, and fruits of the plants.
When mushrooms are attacked by cabbage worms, none of their branches or leaves show any signs of abnormality. By the time people notice anything is wrong, the worms may have already eaten the entire stem.
This kind of insect is a bit hard to guard against, but fortunately it eats a lot and dies quickly when it starves. It basically dies after starving for one night.
What Jiang Muyun dug out from the soil now were the dead bodies of vegetable worms.
Live cabbage worms are small, white and tender strips. Only when they are completely dead will they turn into this dark brown color that blends seamlessly with the soil.
Jiang Muyun dug twice more and found no white spots in the soil, so he shoveled the soil into the bag with confidence.
Jiang Muyun thought about it and decided not to remind everyone now.
The vegetable worms they dug out at this moment must be dead. If there are living ones mixed in the soil, it is impossible not to see them. Jiang Muyun did not dig up any living worms.
She couldn't just hold up a shrunken corpse, point at it, and tell everyone, "This thing is a new species from the post-apocalyptic era. It looked like this in life. Imagine it. Be careful if you see it."
As for the vegetable worm eggs mixed in the soil, they are easier to identify.
The eggs of cabbage worms are all white, and they form a large nest throughout their lifetime. It is impossible to confuse them with light-colored spores and mycelium. Just check them when you go back and spread the soil.
But unlike adult insects, the eggs are still very tenacious. As long as the eggs are still buried in the soil, they may not starve to death even if they are starved for ten days or half a month.
Considering that they had not encountered any mushrooms eaten by vegetable worms while picking them these past two days, it seemed that these vegetable worms had just entered society and had starved to death before they had time to eat.
If some early-maturing advanced individuals have already started laying eggs, the final harvest of their mushroom cultivation plan may be a bunch of cabbage worms.
Although both have the same effect in filling the stomach, but... who would want to eat insects when they can eat mushrooms, even if these insects are pure natural, pollution-free, and carefully bred and raised artificially.
It might eat better than ordinary survivors.
With this calculation, it seems that after the end of the world, when people put worms on the table, besides the need for survival, it also carries some personal emotions?
Jiang Muyun also heard that the mutant mushrooms cultivated at a base were all destroyed by cabbage worms, and then the batch of mushroom-flavored cabbage worms were sold at a high price. People who couldn't eat mushrooms used mushroom-flavored cabbage worms instead, which was considered as letting these cabbage worms pay for the mushrooms.
Jiang Muyun dug out the insect corpse here, and Chu Buwen could naturally recognize it.
He silently shoveled a piece of shriveled insect corpse into two pieces and mixed it into the soil, just as a way to fertilize the soil.
Just as Jiang Muyun thought, the soil they dug was where the mushrooms had lived the day before. Although new residents had not grown here immediately after one night, it was enough to starve to death the vegetable worms that were looking for food.
If Jiang Muyun and Chu Buwen had not been experienced and had not gone out of their way to search, these insect corpses mixed in the soil would have been difficult to find.
But there are always some lucky people in the world.
For example, Wang Qingqing.
Fortunately, she found a nest of newborn oyster mushroom cubs in the original habitat of the oyster mushrooms that had just been exterminated.
"I announce that this nest of lucky mushrooms will be grilled tonight!" Wang Qingqing, adhering to the principle that meeting is fate and the cubs are more tender, excitedly shoveled at the mushroom cubs.
Then he shoveled out a nest of white, wriggling cabbage worms.
To be fair, they'd killed countless disgusting insects swarming in mosquito nets during previous insect plagues, and encountering maggot-infested corpses in the city was nothing new. This was just a bunch of cute little cabbage worms, so unless someone with trypophobia was concerned, they probably wouldn't have much of a reaction.
But Wang Qingqing couldn't help but shovel out a dense nest of small white worms. She originally wanted to take home a bunch of cute little mushrooms, but she ended up shoveling out a dense nest of small white worms. This contrast gave her a great shock. Wang Qingqing's smile froze on her face and her hair almost exploded.
Jiang Muyun had just finished digging out a mushroom nest. As he passed by with his bag, he peeked in and exclaimed, "What a lively nest of lucky mushrooms."
Wang Qingqing silently tightened the shovel handle, and Jiang Muyun nimbly took a few steps back to prevent any possibility of being affected by the impulsive criminal behavior.
"What's wrong? Where's your lucky mushroom? Is the shovel broken?" Zhou Ying looked up and asked when she suddenly fell silent.
Wang Qingqing silently turned over the shovel, pushed the nest of vegetable worms to the ground, and then slapped it a few times. The vegetable worms and the mushroom cubs were beaten out of a pile of sticky strange liquid.
"There are bugs, and they seem to be eating mushrooms. Be careful." Wang Qingqing pretended to be calm.
Qin Shiwen came over with a bundle of branches and asked, "Insects? What do they look like?"
Jiang Muyun pointed to a puddle on the ground, and Qin Shiwen fell silent.
Only a ghost can tell what they looked like when they were alive.
Just then, several people gathered around, and Jiang Muyun simply gestured to them with this puddle: "This long, this thick, a bit like small baby maggots, white and plump. They will curl up in a ball and burrow into the mushrooms. When you scoop them out, they will scatter into a puddle and burrow on the shovel."
Zhao Jiahao retched slightly to make his point clear: "Even if you repeat yourself, it won't change the fact that they are disgusting."
Jiang Muyun followed his gaze and glanced at the things on the ground. They had now changed from white sticky to brown and white sticky. So he added, "It seems that after the juice is squeezed out, it will change color. Look, it's brown now. It didn't seem so disgusting just now."
"This kind of insect seems to change color after it dies." Chu Buwen continued, "I also found a similar insect corpse when I was digging the soil just now."
"They eat mushrooms." Qin Shiwen recalled, "We didn't see this kind of bug when we were picking mushrooms yesterday."
Jiang Muyun glanced at the puddle on the ground again. "Maybe it was because they hatched after we picked them up yesterday afternoon. So the places where the mushrooms were picked up are full of insect corpses because they starved to death because they had no food. And the mushrooms that were not picked up became their food."
"No way, are we so lucky? We just happened to catch up?" Wang Qingqing was shocked: "You secretly worshipped the gods?"
"It's Chu Buwen's fault," Jiang Muyun said in support of the hero. "If Dabai hadn't been here, we wouldn't even know which mushrooms are edible. It's not like you haven't heard from Captain Yu about the situation at the base."
Chu Buwen quickly took a few steps back: "That sounds unlucky. I thought I was already hanging on the wall."
Jiang Muyun considerately changed his suggestion: "How about we worship Dabai and put three dried fish in front of Dabai. He will definitely not mind."
"I can go out and find cat food, but where can I find dried fish? Do you still have some uneaten squid slices?" Wang Qingqing wondered.
Jiang Muyun pretended not to hear the rest of her sentence: "I've never heard of any cat food that has a shelf life of three or four years. You want to give expired cat food to our Dabai? Are you still human?"
Without giving Wang Qingqing a chance to refute, Jiang Muyun quickly started a new topic: "As for the dried fish, maybe we can actually find it."
Sure enough, everyone's attention was attracted.
Jiang Muyun swiped his hands down the mountain. "The thick snow here has all melted, and then it rained for so many days, but there's no water at the foot of the mountain. What does this mean?"
Qin Shiwen reacted quickly: "You mean there's water in the river?"
"But just because there's water doesn't mean there are fish." Zhao Jiahao was depressed. "Those rivers and lakes out there have been dry for so long, there must be no water monsters left."
Li Anxuan was very disappointed: "The river here has dried up, but it's not like the rivers of the entire continent or the entire Blue Planet have dried up."
Jiang Muyun spread his hands and said, "Anyway, we have to go down the mountain and continue searching for supplies. Besides, the water in the reservoir is reserved for the dry season. Now that there is water outside, we can't keep consuming the water in the reservoir. We must find a fixed water source for daily use. It's on the way, so why not go and take a look."
That's definitely something you have to go and see!
It has been several years since the temperature started to drop and no one has tasted fresh fish. The only time we saw fish was after the tsunami.
But who would dare to eat the fish at that time? They had barely survived. This was not the right way to challenge yourself.
"I didn't think much of it before when I could buy it whenever I wanted to eat it. As someone who doesn't like fish, I might not even remember it after not having eaten it for years. But now, whether I like it or not, I can't eat it. It's hard not to feel rebellious." The rebellious young man Qin Shiwudao.
Zheng Xiang, who loves eating fish, was even more eager to try. She wanted to arrange all the mushrooms immediately and then drag the cart down the mountain to catch fish.
Wang Qingqing's mind raced. "So we have to go to the river sooner or later, and when we get there we definitely won't forget to catch fish. Are you trying to change the subject?"
Jiang Muyun said confidently: "Why did I change the subject? I said I wanted to catch fish for our hero."
Jiang Muyun raised his wrist and said, "It's getting late, hurry up and dig. After digging, we have to check if there are any insect eggs in the soil. We will try to spread the spores today and go down the mountain to catch fish tomorrow."
On the way to dig the soil, Chu Buwen glanced at Jiang Muyun's wrist. In order to make it easier to work, they took off their watches and put them in their pockets before setting off.
Jiang Muyun noticed his gaze and said calmly, "You know I'm not wearing a watch, but why don't you hurry up? I'm afraid Wang Qingqing will come after me soon."
Wang Qingqing was ultimately unable to kill Jiang Muyun because they still had to grow spores and mycelium to grow mushrooms under Teacher Jiang's guidance.
For the sake of the overall situation, Wang Qingqing had to put aside personal grudges for the time being.
Strictly speaking, the temperament of mushrooms is comparable to that of rabbits, because they don't like to live with other mushrooms. If different species of mushrooms live in the same room, the mycelium will most likely fight to the death.
Jiang Muyun and others had no choice. All the existing caves on the mountain had been used up by them, so they could only use shovels and hammers to find a place that was not in the sun and start digging.
You don't need to dig a large area at one time. An area of one or two square meters is enough. After digging small squares, disinfect the inside to prevent other bacteria from interfering with the mycelium.
In the absence of professional mushroom bags, a group of people rummaged through boxes and drawers to find a bunch of PP plastic bags to serve as mushroom bags, then put the spores and mixed culture medium into the bags, and then put the bags back into the room they had specially prepared for these people.
Within seven to ten days after putting the things in, it is best not to turn it over unless the temperature of the culture medium is too high. In other words, they can let the mycelium grow freely during this period.
The current temperature and humidity are very suitable for fungal growth, and the mold spots that appear from time to time in their homes are the best proof.
"I hope these big treasures can fight for their spirit and show the momentum of their wild mutant strains." Zhao Jiahao made a sincere wish.
Now that the mushrooms are in place, they can start preparing to go out.
Clear away any vegetation growing on the pulley track to prevent it from interfering with the operation of the pulley assembly.
The plants in the mountains have grown almost completely, and are no longer at that crazy rate of three emergencies a day, so the traps can be set up again. And this time with the cover of plants, there are even more traps that can be set up.
The method of pulling the bell with a rope is not feasible except for the pulley system. However, small targets can be hidden under bushes, and placing more of them can also serve as an early warning.
And since these fishing novices want to catch fish, they will definitely need the help of tools such as fishing nets, so they have to prepare them in advance.
After everything was ready, everyone decided that two people would stay behind while the other eight would go out.
The people who went out were divided into two groups. One group went to the city and continued to collect fuel in the buildings that had not collapsed. The other group went to the water source, transported water back and caught fish at the same time.
To be on the safe side, they also took Dabai and Xiaobai with them when they went out.
Dabai followed him to the water's edge, just in time to see if it could be eaten as his future food.
Xiaobai followed him to the city, and if he encountered a robber, he could practice his skills.
In order to prevent accidents, Jiang Muyun and Chu Buwen both took the initiative to ask to go to the waterside when they went out on the first day.
The poisonous rain may not have fallen simultaneously all over the world, but it must have toured the world.
This kind of patrol pattern gives the water source space to purify itself without directly destroying non-mutated organisms - mainly the source of human life.
However, the self-purification ability of river water is mostly obtained by relying on aquatic invertebrates and algae, which are usually on the diet of fish. As a result, the degree of variation of fish is no less than that of terrestrial organisms.
In any case, Jiang Muyun has seen many amphibious fish that have mutated and can briefly come ashore, as well as omnivorous fish whose teeth have evolved to the point where they can prey on large animals, such as humans.
Or to put it another way, the mutated teeth of most omnivorous fish allow them to easily share humans. After all, human skin is more tender than that of most animals.
Jiang Muyun was afraid that everyone would go fishing without any preparation. If they failed to catch any fish, it would be a small matter, but it would be terrible if they became bait.
Moreover, catching mutant fish is not an easy job. A novice who does not change the bait is a winner. Jiang Muyun, who can win the first battle, is willing to respectfully call the other party the Purple Star.
Only with her and Chu Buwen taking advantage of the situation can they really catch fish.
The mutated fish didn't taste very good, but Jiang Muyun said honestly that all the mutated fish she had eaten were better than more than 90% of the mutated animal meat.
The most that the mutated fish meat has is that its deliciousness drops from crucian carp to scavenger carp, while the mutated animal meat is simply inedible without seasoning.
Eating unprocessed mutant animal meat is not a question of whether it tastes good or not, but a question of whether one can physically withstand the stimulation.
In comparison, fish is more friendly to humans.
It's just difficult to catch and raise.
From time to time, severe droughts would dry up rivers and aquatic animals would disappear.
Now that there is water in the river, you have to be careful not to turn yourself into bait when catching fish.
Some people want to try artificial breeding, but Jiang Muyun heard that these fish only eat natural food. If you want to raise them, you have to go to the river to catch pure natural food for them, otherwise they will go on a hunger strike.
In other words, they can only survive when there is water and fish in the river.
When the dry season comes and there are no wild fish to catch, farmed fish will not survive either.
It's purely a case of whoever raises the child suffers injustice.
Jiang Muyun, dressed as a fisherman, threw his fishing net onto a small cart. He adjusted his sun hat, which was only used for fashion purposes because it had no sun protection. He also comforted Dabai, who was in high spirits and extremely excited. He raised his hand and shouted, "Let's go!"
After she catches fish today, she will learn from Chu Buwen up close.
With Master Chu teaching her on the spot, Jiang Muyun didn't believe that she couldn't learn how to cook fish.
Zhao Jiahao and Zhou Ying, who were pulling the cart in front, vaguely felt that something was wrong, but they couldn't think of what was unusual. They could only blame this feeling on the unusually gloomy weather today.
After they walked for a while, Jiang Muyun and Chu Buwen came over to take over, and Zhou Ying, who was walking behind, finally reacted.
Looking at it from this angle, and shouting a few times, doesn't it look like a mule pulling a cart?
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