Chapter 445 Sparrow
The dogs at home heard the sound of the car from a long distance away, and were jumping and waiting at the door of the wooden fence. When Zhao Yeqing got out of the car and opened the door of the wooden fence to let Mu Xi drive the car in, three dogs were instantly hanging on his body.
So heavy...
She pulled a few off: "Why are they so heavy? What did you steal when I was not home?"
She was just joking. She had only been away for two days and couldn't gain weight no matter how much she ate. But she just loved to rub the dogs' bellies and say they were fat while rubbing.
Mu Xi said, "You are just bullying them because they can't talk. If I were to say that to you, you would get angry with me."
"Then why don't you say something?"
"...I won't tell you."
"snort."
Once home, he was destined to be even more busy. Zhao Yeqing couldn't sit still and immediately ran to the rice field to see how the rice was growing.
It’s almost harvest time. The rice fields are starting to fill with grain and there are more birds in the fields.
Among them, the sparrows, which were the largest in number and grew in groups, were the worst hit. They were fearless because of their large numbers and the scarecrow was nothing to them. When they saw Zhao Yeqing rushing into the rice field to drive him away, they scattered, but did not go far. They stopped on the wall not far away, waiting to come back to eat after the man left.
This thing was a protected animal before the ground cracked. When I was a child, I saw many people taking it to the market to sell it, but later on they didn't dare to do that. In the past, many families had shotguns at home, but now they can't find any. Otherwise, you could shoot down these little creatures that harm crops and feed them to the dogs as snacks.
She also thought it was delicious.
When I first arrived at the meadow and was planting crops in the wheat fields and barley fields on the meadow, there were not as many sparrows as there are now. After I shot down a few with a slingshot, they were so scared that they didn't dare to come near for a long time.
Now that their biggest natural enemies have become fewer and their reproduction numbers have increased, it is really a bit of a headache for the time being.
"If only we could find a fowling gun."
The bullets for the shotgun are not difficult to come by, but they are not genuine military ammunition. They are made of iron sand and cannot hit other things, but are extremely useful for shooting birds.
Mu Xi recalled that he didn't seem to see any shotguns in the village, "If all else fails, then we can just get a bird net?"
In the past, those who did not have shotguns in the village or were too lazy to shoot would put up bird nets in the woods. They were somewhat similar to fishing nets, with the two ends of the net tied to two trees in the woods. Any bird that flew by would be trapped in the net, and the more it struggled, the tighter it would be entangled.
He did have the impression of having seen fishing nets. Mu Xi recalled that on the first floor of the family closest to the foot of the mountain, that is, the family where the walk-behind tractor was seen, there seemed to be a fishing net hanging on the wall. He just wondered if it had become brittle and would break if squeezed after so many years.
Since ancient times, humans have chosen places with water sources when living. Most of the rich cities are built near water. There are very few people living in arid and barren places unless they are forced to do so.
Even they settled in this place with abundant grass and water in search of water sources.
If nothing unexpected had happened, there would have been a river flowing around the mountain at the foot of the village, but the water had been cut off by the cracks in the ground and flowed into the cracks. Most of the fishing nets on the mountain were used to catch fish by the river.
"Next time, go check it out. If it's not bad, bring it back. I've been busy lately, so I'll catch as many as I can."
After Mu Xi packed up the necessities and left the meadow to go to the village to continue making looms and spinning wheels, Zhao Yeqing would let the cattle and sheep out early every morning at home, and then sit by the field to watch the sparrows.
At first, the sparrows were reluctant to approach, but after a while, seeing that Zhao Yeqing didn't leave, they boldly flew into the field openly.
She was waiting for this moment, pulling the slingshot and shooting.
But this thing had not been used for a long time and had indeed lost its accuracy. The bird was not hit, and the stone it threw out only served to bluff and scare the bird.
After hunting for an entire afternoon, I caught two sparrows, enough for my dog to eat.
The long row of sparrows that still stood on the wooden wall, refusing to leave, seemed to be laughing at her helplessness.
Zhao Yeqing learned from his mistakes and planned to set up some other traps.
When I was a child, when sparrows were not yet a protected animal, adults would shoot birds with shotguns and catch them with nets. Children would sometimes shoot birds with slingshots, but more often they would set traps.
Sprinkle some rice on the ground, support the basket with a wooden stick, tie the stick with a thin rope, and when the sparrows go to peck at the rice, pull off the stick and let the basket fall down to cover the sparrows. This was their favorite way to catch sparrows when they were young.
The weeds on the grassland were lush and it was not suitable to spread rice to lure the fish. So Zhao Yeqing set the trap beside the ridge near the edge of the field. The weeds here had been cleared cleanly and it was close to the rice field. All he had to do was squat behind the fence beside the rice field and pull the rope.
This method was very effective. Apparently, these sparrows had never seen the 'evil hearts of people' and had no defense against this kind of trap. Zhao Yeqing caught a bunch of sparrows in just one morning, tying their feet with ropes and dropping them on the edge of the fence.
It's useless to scare them by people, but the shrill squeaking of the sparrows has a great effect. In the afternoon, the number of sparrows on the wall dropped sharply, and the traps didn't catch anything.
When Zhao Yeqing returned home in the evening, the string of sparrows had been cleaned and hung on the eaves to dry and then frozen. When Mu Xi came back, she planned to tell him that she had shot them with a slingshot.
Mu Xi took Xiaohua with her this time. Xiaohua was the greediest, so she planned to share the string of sparrows with the dogs when Xiaohua came back, without favoring one over the other.
In the evening, the dogs came back with the cattle and sheep. Zhao Yeqing counted them and locked them in the barn.
This year, the sheep mated before the beginning of spring, and it is almost time for them to give birth. Since the last time the sheep encountered wolves, the two have not killed any sheep. If the sheep give birth this year, the sheep pen will be too small to accommodate them.
The cows that were supposed to be slaughtered were not slaughtered. There is too much work to do every day. Fortunately, there are many machines that can be used. Otherwise, it would take more time and energy to do farm work in the fields, and people would be exhausted.
Zhao Yeqing thought about it carefully and felt that he was really getting too arrogant. Killing cattle and sheep had become a burden now. Even in the past peacetime, the people in the village were never so generous.
After the cattle and sheep are slaughtered, the life of not being able to finish eating meat will begin again.
After counting the livestock, Zhao Yeqing isolated the sheep that were about to give birth and added extra feed.
When he came out of the sheep pen, he saw Xiaohong kicking the front door with the horse's hoof. Zhao Yeqing walked over, opened the door and led Xiaohong in.
Now that the family has sufficient means of transportation and farming equipment, there is almost nothing that requires Xiaohong to work for. Every day we just need to let it out to eat grass on its own, and there is no need to waste any feed.
Just as he brought Xiaohong in, Zhao Yeqing noticed that Xiaohong's hooves had grown a lot, and he couldn't help but touch his nose guiltily.
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