The broker smiled nonchalantly. Judging from Qin San Niang's appearance, he figured this woman must not know anything about farming, so he had done a good deed!
Inside the grain store, Chunhua and her son had already selected their grains and were now sitting happily on stools waiting.
The waiter even poured them two bowls of water, which moved Wu Chunhua deeply, and she repeatedly expressed her gratitude!
When Qin San Niang arrived, she saw the three of them talking.
"Sister Chunhua, Fatty, have you made your choices?" As soon as she entered the shop, Qin Sanniang asked. On the way, she went back to the steamed bun shop and bought more than fifty large meat buns, as well as several packets of pastries and candies, which she threw into the shelves in her space so they would be warm when she took them out.
Fatty nodded quickly, indicating that they had made their choices. Wu Chunhua also opened the bag for Qin Sanniang to see.
Qin San Niang peeked out and grabbed another handful. The grains were all of excellent quality, each one uniform and plump. She nodded with satisfaction and praised, "Pang Ya is so capable! She can even help your mother choose grain seeds! From now on, we'll all have to rely on you to buy grain seeds for our fields!"
Upon receiving the praise, the chubby girl grinned, revealing two rows of teeth. Showing no shyness whatsoever, she replied crisply, "Auntie Third Aunt, I was very serious. I picked them out one by one. If you need to buy seeds in the future, I'm sure I can do it!"
Hearing them say that, he figured they could probably make a deal later, so the shop assistant chimed in, "Wow, you guys are so careful with your grain selection! You've picked out all the good grains from my farm!"
"How about it? Aren't all the grains in our family the same? These are top-quality grains that I personally selected, one grain at a time. Selling them to you at this price, you're not losing out, are you?" As she spoke, she even made a pained expression!
"Young man, don't be sad about it. Our family has a lot of land, and we might need to buy a lot more in the future. This is just a trial run. If the harvest is satisfactory, we'll buy all our seeds and other grains from you from now on!" Seeing Wu Chunhua's expression, Qin Sanniang knew that the young shopkeeper was telling the truth, so she went along with the conversation.
"That's great! There's definitely no problem with our seeds, Madam. Just wait for the granaries to be full! Don't forget to visit our shop again then!" the shop assistant said, half-seriously and half-jokingly. "Also, I heard from this lady that we're buying some wasteland to cultivate. Will we need manure then? If so, I can recommend a good place to get it."
The young man was quick-witted. During their casual conversation, he overheard Wu Chunhua mentioning that they had migrated from the north and had bought a lot of wasteland, which they planned to cultivate next spring.
How can you clear wasteland without manure?! It just so happens that his father is in the business of selling grain at this grain shop, so helping out his family is no big deal! Even if the shopkeeper finds out, he won't blame them!
In this era, there were no compound fertilizers! Moreover, I've heard Liu and others say that after wasteland is reclaimed, it does need some manure to nourish it before cultivation. I think I also read in some book that using organic fertilizer to nourish the soil in winter is better than using compound fertilizers from later generations!
"Sister-in-law, what do you think?" Instead of directly answering the shopkeeper's question, Qin San Niang turned to Wu Chunhua and asked her. Compared to Wu Chunhua, she trusted her own people more.
“What the young man said is certainly true, but the ground is still frozen. After the New Year, when the weather warms up a bit, the land should be tended to, and manure will be needed,” Wu Chunhua said earnestly. Sigh, it really costs money everywhere!
But could we try to find some fertilizer in the village? Then I thought again, that was definitely not an option! Not to mention that most farming families are struggling to get enough to eat these days, how much manure could they possibly have? Besides, we don't raise many chickens and ducks, so the amount of chicken and duck manure we have is limited. And with planting season approaching in the spring, how could we possibly sell our manure to others?
Fatty muttered to herself that she would make sure that when Xiaohu and the other kids relieved themselves, they would have to do it in their own outhouse. Otherwise, it would just be fertilizing someone else's land. She felt sorry for all the fertilizer they had used on their escape route!
Unaware of the many thoughts the mother and daughter had imagined, Qin San Niang pondered for a moment and understood the crux of the matter: fresh manure couldn't be used directly; it had to be composted first. She then turned to the young man and asked how much manure they had, and whether it was enough for twenty acres of land.
The young man rubbed his hands together, appearing somewhat more honest than before. He had only said it casually, never expecting it to actually work.
"Madam, the manure in our house was collected by my parents themselves. Business wasn't good before, so we stored up quite a bit!"
His father had spent his whole life dealing with manure and fertilizer. In previous years, his business was barely surviving. But in recent years, there have been fewer people and more land. Many people have fled, and the land has naturally been abandoned. Who would think about taking good care of the land anymore? As a result, the family has accumulated a lot of fertilizer in the past two years. Fortunately, it was in the backyard, and it happened to be winter, so it didn't overwhelm him with the fumes.
If it were the scorching summer sun, the feeling and smell would be incredibly unpleasant, and his parents would sigh every day looking at all this fertilizer! He was just trying to help them out of their distress!
So, when they first heard that they came from the north and that the land they had just bought had not yet been cultivated, they thought of this matter! Moreover, this lady looked like a wealthy person, so she shouldn't be bothered by such a small amount of money!
He wouldn't say anything about other farming families, as ordinary farmers usually collect their own manure and only spend a few copper coins to buy it when they are in a real hurry.
Seeing that Qin San Niang's expression softened, the young shop assistant felt he had a better chance of success, so he continued, "If Madam is interested, I can take you to have a look later. My father has been in this business for more than just a year or two! I guarantee you'll be satisfied. Besides, I can also give you a discount!"
"So how do you calculate the price of your manure?" Wu Chunhua asked, clearly wanting to split every penny in half!
"Hey, manure is cheap! We charge by the bucket, two buckets for only one coin! Since you need a lot, I'll talk to my father and we'll charge you three buckets for one coin, how about that?" the shopkeeper said eagerly.
Although they don't earn much money this way, it solves the problem of manure disposal at home, so it's not like they're just throwing it away for nothing!
"How about we come back to you after the New Year when we're preparing to fertilize the land? We'll stick to this price?" Qin San Niang agreed.
They had just arrived in Shiligou and didn't know the situation there. If they went to the villagers to buy manure, they probably wouldn't be able to buy so much at once. Moreover, according to the shopkeeper, the fresh manure needed to be composted. Were they going to argue with people over a bucket of manure? She didn't have the time or energy for that.
Besides, she knew she couldn't stand that intoxicating taste! It was a miracle she didn't succumb!
Seeing that Qin San Niang agreed, the shop assistant was overjoyed and bowed and smiled, "Of course, I've always worked at this grain store! My name is A Jin!"
"Alright, Brother Jin. Please give me another hundred catties of rice and wheat flour, fifty catties of cornmeal, and fifty catties of sorghum flour." Qin San Niang instructed. Liu Shi didn't have much rice and flour left. Now that several families were eating together, the food was being consumed quickly.
She still had some rice and flour in her storage space, but they were all in modern small packages, meant for use in emergencies.
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