When Gao Mingcheng saw Aunt Liu shelling peas, Aunt Liu offered to give Gao Mingcheng some pea pods.
However, Gao Mingcheng remembered that Zhang Chengyuan also planted a small field of peas for him, and it should be possible to pick pea pods by now, so he declined.
Zhang Chengyuan was in charge of cultivating the land in his family. His only requirement was that there should be a wide variety of vegetables to meet his family's needs.
When the sun was not so hot, Gao Mingcheng and the three members of the Chen family walked towards Xiaofushan.
Chen Duofu is mainly responsible for taking care of the beehives. This job is not very tiring, but it is more tiring to chase the flowering season, move the beehives, and shake the honey. However, at this time, Chen Dasong and Chen Duoxi will also help out.
Chen Duofu also takes care of the chicken coop and the fruit trees in the mountains.
This time, Chen Duofu went to Xiaofushan with them to move the beehives in the orange grove.
From April to May, orange flowers will bloom, and orange flowers are also a source of nectar. The citrus honey brewed from them is sweet and slightly sour, with a citrus scent, and is of very good quality.
Therefore, when the orange flowers bloomed, Chen Duofu moved ten boxes of bees over and placed them in scattered patterns on the hillside.
Now the orange blossoms were fading, so he was getting ready to move the beehives away.
Gao Mingcheng saw that the orange flowers were indeed about to wither, but the pomelo flowers next to them had just bloomed, so he asked Chen Duofu to move half of the beehives first, and leave the remaining half here until the pomelo flowers withered before moving them away.
"Okay." Chen Duofu agreed, but he was not in a hurry to move now because he had to wait until the evening when the bees that went out to collect honey returned to the hive before he could move the beehives.
Otherwise, when the bees flying back from collecting honey, they will find that their home is gone!
Xiaofushan is quite large, and until now, all the fruit trees have not been fully fertilized.
Gao Mingcheng looked around and said to Chen Dasong, "How many places are left that haven't been fertilized? If you can't handle it, call a few people from the village to help."
Fertilization during the flowering and fruiting period is very important and will directly affect the fruit setting rate.
Chen Dasong calculated and said, "There's not much left. I'll call two people to help tomorrow. If we work together, we can finish it in one day."
"Okay." Gao Mingcheng nodded in agreement, and told him to hire a few temporary workers to do the work when he was too busy in the future.
After talking about Xiaofushan, Gao Mingcheng said, "I'll give you the tractor now. I may not come back for a long time in the future. I have a lot of eggs saved at home. You can send someone to drive them to the county for me."
The last time when Xiao Xuxu celebrated his first birthday, Gao Mingcheng took Chen Dasong to drink, so he knew the address of the clothing store.
Chen Dasong nodded to show that he understood.
Spring and autumn are the time when chickens love to lay eggs. There are about 130 chickens in the chicken coop now, 40 of which were hatched this spring.
Gao Mingcheng does not plan to raise too many chickens. If there are too many chickens, they will need to be fed more food to keep them full, and the people responsible for feeding the chickens will be busier and more tired.
He opened the barbed wire fence and walked into the chicken coop.
There is a row of nests against the wall of the chicken coop. They are all bamboo baskets woven with bamboo strips with some straw piled inside. When the chickens want to lay eggs, they will lie here to lay eggs.
Now, there are several eggs in each of these bamboo baskets, some have three or four, and some have one or two.
Chen Dasong and Chen Duofu were fertilizing the fruit trees. Chen Duoxi, who was less strong, followed behind Gao Mingcheng, ready to help pick up the eggs.
Chen Duoxi said: "Usually I pick up eggs once in the morning and once in the evening. When there are more eggs every day, there can be 100, and when there are fewer, there are 80 to 90. Now there are 700 to 800 eggs at home."
Eggs go bad easily in the summer, so Gao Mingcheng said, "When you have 500 eggs, you can send them to the county. Also, take any edible vegetables from my field."
Chen Duoxi smiled and said, "Okay!"
He saw that there was a lot of chicken manure in the chicken coop, so he asked Gao Mingcheng to pick up the eggs, and he picked up a broom and prepared to clean up the chicken manure.
After sweeping up the chicken manure, Chen Duoxi brought another bag over. He tipped the bag over and poured out some of the rice husks.
He spread the rice husks in a corner for the chickens to rest.
When rice is pounded, three products are produced. One is the outermost rice husk, which cannot be eaten and can only be used for burning or as bedding.
After removing the rice husk, continuing to pound the rice will produce rice bran. After the rice bran is separated, it becomes white rice.
Of course, today's rice pounding technology is just average, unlike the rice sold in stores in later generations, which are white and crystal clear, as if they have been polished. They look good, but have no nutritional value.
But to be honest, the taste of that rice grain is indeed quite good.
Gao Mingcheng watched Chen Duoxi work and felt that although the young man was young, he was quite efficient in doing things.
Just now, he picked up more than fifty eggs in total, and placed these eggs in the utility room next to the chicken coop, which was mainly used to store straw, rice husks and feed.
Gao Mingcheng walked out of the chicken coop, went up the slope, and then walked towards the valley near Niuweiling. In the shadier place was the bayberry forest.
The bayberry trees nowadays are not big, but the distance between them is quite wide, because Gao Mingcheng knows that the older the bayberry trees are, the bigger they will grow, so he widens the distance between them in advance. In twenty or thirty years, these bayberry trees will grow into towering trees.
These Dongkui bayberries are growing well. Their green leaves are like shade. The small green bayberries are hidden among the lush leaves and can easily be overlooked if you don’t look carefully.
It is only mid-May now. It will take until the end of June to the beginning of July for the Dongkui bayberry to mature.
Gao Mingcheng took a look at the fruit-bearing rate this year and picked off some of the fruits that grew too densely.
He spent the entire afternoon patrolling Xiaofushan, either thinning out the fruits or checking if there were any diseased branches to see whether he should buy medicine to treat them or just cut them down.
In their place, the weather is generally good in the first half of the year, but if they are unlucky in the second half of the year, they will encounter drought.
Seeing that most of the fruit trees were fine, Gao Mingcheng felt much more relieved.
Seeing that there was still a large barren area in the northeast corner of Xiaofushan, he planned to use the land to grow oranges.
It is now mid-May, so it is naturally impossible to grow oranges. Therefore, he decided to buy a batch of orange seedlings in September.
By then, the entire Xiaofu Mountain will be planted with fruit trees.
There are not too many types of fruit trees, but there are quite a few, and they are all suitable for their local climate and soil.
At five o'clock in the afternoon, although it was still bright, Gao Mingcheng was ready to return to the county town.
He loaded the eggs, fish and other things into the car, and went to the fields to pick some vegetables. He picked a basket of pea pods and another basket of cucumbers.
As for vegetables such as cowpea, loofah, eggplant, and pepper, they have just bloomed now, and it will take another ten days or half a month before they bear fruit. They should be ready for harvest when Gao Mingcheng comes back next time.
"I'm back to the county. If you have any urgent matters, either go to Xing'anling and call me, or drive to the county to find me." Gao Mingcheng said to Chen Duoxi beside him, and then prepared to get in the car.
Chen Duoxi stood beside the car, looking at the brand new car with envy. He waved to Gao Mingcheng and said obediently, "Okay!"
As soon as Gao Mingcheng's car left, Zhang Chengyuan came back from the reservoir leading a group of goats.
The grass and water on the other side of the reservoir are more abundant, and Zhang Chengyuan often goes there to graze sheep. Speaking of which, there were people who raised sheep behind Gaojia Village, but they didn't raise many, and they couldn't keep them for long, because they found goats difficult to manage.
Goats are omnivores. Not only will they eat the vegetables grown in the fields, they will even eat leaves!
If you don't spend enough time taking care of your goats, the naughty goats will soon give you a surprise - from time to time someone will come to your door and say that your goats have eaten their vegetables and gnawed their trees!
Such trivial matters often happen in small mountain villages.
The tired birds have returned to their nests, but the noise of the passing cars scares them away again, and they will not return to their nests until the area becomes quiet again.
The car stopped by the pond in the old village.
It's quite lively here, with many people gossiping. Some are women squatting by the pond washing vegetables, some are strong men returning from the fields carrying hoes, and there are also many elderly people.
They were either sitting on stone blocks or tree stumps, and there were naughty children running around in the crowd.
Gao Shufang and Lou Xinyu were also in the crowd, chatting and laughing with others.
Gao Mingcheng looked carefully and found that Grandma Xi was also here with Xiao Xuxu and Xiao Yuanyuan, and Grandma Gao was also sitting on a tree stump, listening to others talking with a smile on her face.
The arrival of the car instantly attracted everyone's attention.
Gao Mingcheng got out of the car, greeted people in a generous manner, and called Grandma Gao, Grandma Xi and others.
"Dad!" Xiao Xuxu was originally playing well with Xiao Yuanyuan, but after seeing Gao Mingcheng, he immediately abandoned the other children he was playing with and ran towards Gao Mingcheng.
"Hey! My dear son!" Gao Mingcheng smiled, bent down, and picked up little Xuxu.
Xiao Yuanyuan was not shy either. She immediately followed Xiao Xuxu's example and ran towards Gao Mingcheng, calling him "Uncle" sweetly.
"Hey, hello, Xiao Yuanyuan." Gao Mingcheng bent down again and picked up Xiao Yuanyuan with one hand. In this way, he was holding a child in each hand, making the two children smile.
When Gao Shufang saw her second brother coming, she knew it was time to return to the county.
She walked to Grandma Gao and said gently, "Grandma, I'm leaving. Would you like to sit here for a while, or should I help you go home first?"
Grandma Gao has difficulty walking and her memory is getting worse, so Gao Shufang is worried about her going back alone.
Grandma Gao still remembered Gao Shufang. She looked at Gao Shufang reluctantly, but still said with a smile, "You go back. I will walk back by myself later."
Gao Shufang was still a little hesitant. At this time, a person who lived next to Gao Mingpeng said, "Shufang, don't worry and go. I will help your grandmother go back later."
After hearing this, Gao Shufang was completely relieved and thanked her again.
"Haha, you younger generations are filial, which is a blessing for the old people. Go to the county and earn more money. You don't have to worry about your family." An uncle from the eldest wife said so, and others echoed him.
In an age when everyone wants to make money, it is a great thing if children and younger generations can make money.
After saying hello to everyone, Gao Mingcheng took Xiao Xuxu, Gao Shufang and Lou Xinyu into the car and prepared to return to the county.
On the way here, Gao Mingcheng drove slowly to take into account the speed of the tractor. Now on the way back, he can drive faster. Therefore, it took him one hour to come here, but only forty minutes to go back.
Gao Shufang felt that this was very fast.
But Gao Mingcheng knew that after the national highway was completed in 1997, it would only take half an hour to drive back to the village!
When they got home, there was a table full of food waiting for them.
Xuanyuemei was counting money and settling accounts, but as soon as Xiaoxuxu got out of the car, he pounced on her, preventing Xuanyuemei from continuing to count money.
She was not angry. She put down the money and account book, hugged and kissed her baby son first, then asked some questions, inducing Xiao Xuxu to tell her what happened today.
Xiao Xuxu tried very hard to speak, but his voice was unclear and his words were incoherent, so Gao Shufang needed to supplement him in time.
For example, if Xiao Xuxu said he had eaten, Gao Shufang would supplement what he had eaten.
Xiao Xuxu said that he was a bad guy and stole my things. Gao Shufang then added that it was Gao Mingpeng’s eldest son who snatched a stick from Xiao Xuxu’s hand.
Children like to fight over things. When the wooden stick is placed on the ground and no one takes it, no one cares about it. But once someone takes it, others will want to snatch it away.
Little Xuxu squatted on the ground and picked up a stick to play with. When his cousin saw it, he took the stick away, making little Xuxu cry for a long time. Gao Shufang coaxed him for a long time and took little Xuxu to find another stick. Only then did little Xuxu become happy.
Later, seeing that little Xuxu and her older nephew couldn't play together, Gao Shufang sent little Xuxu to live with her grandmother.
Lou Xinyu returned to the village today and went to work to improve his favorability. Now his trouser legs and shoes were covered with mud.
After dinner, Lou Xinyu was ready to go back to rest, but he said, "Shufang, please walk with me."
At this time, it was already dark outside. Gao Mingcheng glanced at him and was about to refuse.
Lou Xinyu added: "I'll send Shufang back later."
Gao Mingcheng shut up. Well, you guys have been together for a whole day, and you don’t feel bored at all, right?
After they left the clothing store, they headed towards the police station's family compound. In front of their family, Gao Shufang was more reserved and did not hold hands with Lou Xinyu. But when they were out of their family's sight, facing the hand that Lou Xinyu extended to her, she thought again and again and finally reached out her hand.
The big hand held the small hand, and the fingers covered with calluses instantly became sensitive.
Gao Shufang's cheeks were flushed. Just as she was about to say something, Lou Xinyu suddenly said, "Shufang, don't your parents like your second brother?"
Gao Shufang's heart skipped a beat and she looked up at Lou Xinyu.
Lou Xinyu asked in a questioning tone at first, but after seeing Gao Shufang's eyes, he immediately confirmed that he was not wrong.
He said, "Your eldest brother's son is older, and he was the first to grab the stick from little Xuxu, but I found that your parents prefer their eldest grandson and treat little Xuxu indifferently."
These older grandsons and younger grandsons are all grandsons!
Since they are treated differently, it must be related to my grandson’s father!
But Lou Xinyu had been in the village before, and there were many people around, so he didn't have the chance to ask Gao Shufang. (End of this chapter)
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