Chapter 743 759: I think so much
Zhou Huaian and Zhou Yiding carried the beehive and honey and went straight to the forest. They put the beehive into the beehive. "If we put this nest in, there will be four nests of wild bees here."
Zhou Yiding looked at him in surprise. "One nest last time, one nest this time. Did you find the other two nests yourself?"
"That's right!" Zhou Huaian nodded proudly, "When my brothers were making beehives, I gave them the beeswax I had saved at home and asked them to smear it inside the beehives. When the wild bees passing by here during migration and nesting, they would smell the beeswax and come in to build nests."
"You are very thoughtful. I didn't think so much."
Zhou Yiding happily held him in his arms and walked back, “In another two months, there will be more large bee colonies migrating and setting up nests, and by then there should be more wild bees coming to build nests.
At this rate, our plan to plant honeysuckle trees and collect honey nectar will be halfway successful.”
Zhou Huaian thought for a moment and said, "The forest has been cleared now. We will dig up the saplings and plant them next month. It will be considered a success if the trees survive.
Even if the collection of pure honey nectar is unsuccessful, with such a large forest, once the herbs are grown, the income will not be bad over time."
Zhou Yiding: "You are so good! Even if you can't collect pure honey nectar, you can still collect wild honey and winter honey. These honeys also make money, and winter honey is not cheaper than honey nectar."
Zhou Huaian: "You are right, but after all the hard work and efforts, I still feel a little uncomfortable that I didn't collect pure nectar in the end!"
"The little bees have wings. We can't raise chickens and ducks by putting up a fence to enclose them and let them eat whatever we want." Zhou Yiding patted him, "We just plant the honey flower trees. Whether the little bees are willing to collect honey is their business."
"That's right. No matter what kind of honey it is, as long as it can be sold for money, it's good honey!" Zhou Huaian waved his hands excitedly after figuring it out. "Ding Ding Cat, in two years, we brothers won't have to go out and wander around the mountains anymore. We can collect wild honey from our own forest!"
"That's right!" Zhou Yiding laughed and punched him. "That's the right way to think! I was worried that you would get stuck in a dead end in order to collect pure honey nectar!"
"Tsk! I'm not Ha'er, why would I be so stubborn over a little honey?" The two brothers have been brothers for so many years, and Zhou Huaian knows in his heart that he is truly doing this for his own good.
The two came out of the forest and walked to the medicinal field. They saw the old man leaning against a big tree, sitting on a rock and smoking a leaf cigarette. "Grandpa (Second Grandpa) has come down the mountain to eat."
The old man looked up and asked, "Are you two going to dig out wild beehives again?"
"Yeah!" Zhou Huaian stepped forward and pulled him, "Third uncle said there was a nest of wild bees on his vegetable garden, so we moved the nest here and cut a few honey combs. There is more than a pound of honey. I will filter it out later and give half to Third uncle."
Zhou Yiding picked up the hoe leaning against the side and said, "Second Grandpa, you are the same. You are busy before the New Year is over. Go to the brigade's sunbathing area to play chess and cards with a few old men. How relaxing!"
The old man smiled and said, "I'm too lazy to play with them. Where's your husband? Is he going to the forest farm again?"
"No, he said he would help me clean up the medicinal fields before leaving." Zhou Yiding smiled awkwardly, "You know that the youngest and I are not good at farming."
The old man smiled and glanced at the two of them, "You two just like to go out and have fun. Now it's good, you have found a way out. Work hard and save more money while you are young. When you get older, you won't be able to do it even if you want to."
Zhou Huaian looked at the old man and said, "Don't worry, Grandpa. We will go up the mountain for another day tomorrow and work hard when the market opens the day after tomorrow."
The old man said: "Be careful when you go up the mountain. You don't make money by looking for mountain products to support your family. Don't do anything you are not sure of. Nothing is more valuable than life."
"I understand. We are not reckless people who dare to do anything stupidly."
Zhou Huaian felt that the old man was worried about something, so he thought about asking him after he got down the mountain if someone had made him unhappy.
While the grandparents and grandchildren were talking, they arrived at the backyard door. The dog saw them coming back and came to greet them, wagging its tail.
Zhou Yiding called Lai Fu and looked at his wound. "Dogs recover faster. If it were a human, it would take at least half a month for the wound to scab over."
Zhou Huaian smiled and said, "Chunyan changes the dressing every day, for fear that the wound will become inflamed and swollen."
"No, the dog can find herbs to eat by himself." Zhou Yiding went over and pushed his bicycle in the yard. "Second Grandpa, I'm home! Youngest, I'll call you tomorrow morning."
"That's fine." Zhou Huaian suddenly remembered buying rubber shoes. "I'm going to Ning'an this afternoon. Are you coming?"
"Go, get a few more doses of the prescription that Doctor Wang wrote for me. My old man will take them with him when he goes to the forest farm." After saying this, Zhou Yiding got on his bicycle and left.
The old man scooped some water to wash his face, then took out his pipe and sat on a chair to smoke.
Zhou Huaian took out the honey bucket and thought about the things in the basket. He would need them tomorrow when he went up the mountain, so he hung the basket on the wall and nailed it. "Yan'er, give me the gauze to filter the honey."
"Yes." Yang Chunyan opened the cupboard and handed out the folded gauze. "How much honey?"
"There's not much honey in a new beehive." Zhou Huaian spread gauze on the colander on the honey bucket, smashed the honey combs in the bucket with a knife, and poured them on the gauze.
The honey filtered by this primitive method will contain pollen, royal jelly and beeswax contained in the honeycomb mixed in it. When the honey settles down, impurities will be visible at the bottom.
After Zhou Huaian crushed all the honeycombs and poured them onto the gauze, he pulled a chair and sat next to the old man who was smoking leaf tobacco on the recliner, "Grandpa, what's wrong with you? Who made you unhappy?"
The old man took two puffs of his leaf cigarette before saying, "Your father came to me today and said that he heard from a friend of Huaixing that... they wanted to lend money to Huaixing to buy one. Do you think what his friend said is reliable?"
Zhou Huaian said honestly, "There has been a lot of work on tractors in the past two years. As long as you are willing to work hard and endure hardships, you should be able to earn this much in a year."
The youngest and a few others were just running back and forth pulling truffles, and after a season they all became darker and thinner... When the old man thought about this and about Zhou Huaixing's character, he felt more and more that he could not endure the hardship of pulling goods.
Seeing that he was silent with a gloomy face, Zhou Huaian said, "Grandpa, did Daddy talk about this because he wanted you to help him borrow money?"
The old man nodded. "Yes! If Huaixing is willing to work hard, I would lend him money to buy a tractor. But he is not a man who can get things done. I am worried that buying a tractor will make it easier for him to spend money."
The gambling den in Fangtian Brigade was busted by the police, but there are still other places. Even if there is no gambling den, those addicted gamblers will gamble in any mountain den once they get addicted to gambling.
Seeing the old man in a dilemma, Zhou Huaian advised, "Grandpa, look at these days, the hardworking people in our brigade, in addition to farming to make money, also open up wasteland to grow herbs, raise fat pigs, chickens, ducks and geese to sell.
Then, with red mushrooms in the first half of the year and truffles in the second half, if we work hard for two years at most, we can buy a tractor. I think there will be more work in repairing houses and hauling goods in the future, so there is no need for Dad to rush."
After hearing this, the old man thought about it in his mind and said, "You are right. Erchun works alone and earns more than the money for a tractor in a year. How come there are four of them, two of them are strong laborers, and they don't even have the money to buy a tractor?"
"..." Zhou Huaian wanted to say, forget it all after losing it all playing cards. Zhou Huaixing had been gambling in Fangtian for a long time. Gambling is a bottomless pit, and mountains of gold and silver are not enough to fill it.
"I'll go to your grandfather's house." The old man stood up and said, "Let them finish the work this year and see how much they still need by the end of the year. If it's not enough, I'll lend him the money I've saved to buy it."
"That's fine." Zhou Huaian looked at him worriedly, "Don't be angry when you go. If it doesn't work out, I'll ask someone to help buy you a second-hand one? Even if it fails, it'll be a little less of a loss."
"No need!" The old man looked at him with relief, "Grandpa knows that you are worried about me, so I am willing to help them, but Huaixing has been spoiled by your aunt, he doesn't care about small money, and he can't make big money, otherwise he wouldn't be deceived into selling the quota.
You were kind enough to help them and save some money to buy a second-hand tractor, but your aunt thought you were trying to suppress them and didn't want to lend them money, so you used a second-hand tractor to humiliate them!"
"This, they think too much." Zhou Huaian really didn't expect all these twists and turns, but he just couldn't bear to see the old man in trouble, and was afraid that he would get angry and something bad would happen.
Just as the grandparents and grandchildren reached the door, Zhou's mother came back with Xiao Jiuer and Xiao Lin, "It's almost time for dinner, what else are you going to do?"
"I'll be back soon." The old man said and walked away with his hands behind his back.
Mother Zhou pulled Zhou Huaian and handed the child to him, "Did your grandfather lend all the money to the eldest wife?"
Zhou Huaian took the child and asked, "You also know about the loan?"
Zhou's mother recounted what happened, "How much did your grandfather take? Did he borrow from you?"
"Mom, you are such a fool!" Zhou Huaian squinted at her, "Do you think grandpa is old and confused? You clearly know that Zhou Huaixing is a bottomless pit, but you are still stupid enough to spend money to fill it."
Zhou's mother glared at him and asked, "If he wasn't going to lend them money, then why did he go to the big house?"
Zhou Huaian repeated to her what he and the old man had said, "Don't worry! Whatever you want, Grandpa wants too."
Zhou's mother said thankfully, "Fortunately, I didn't tell your Third Aunt about this just now, otherwise, if the old man knew about it, he would be very upset."
Zhou Huaian curled his lips, "You women are like this, you can't hide anything, you just like to make a lot of noise everywhere."
"Pa!" Zhou's mother slapped him on the back. "When did I start to make such a fuss? Who are you talking to? Do you still have any rules?"
"You didn't make any noise, why did you go to Third Aunt's house?" Zhou Huaian looked at her dissatisfiedly, "You hit me again when I was fine. You almost beat my heart out."
"Beat him, beat him..." Xiao Jiuer hugged Zhou Huaian's neck and shouted.
(End of this chapter)
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