Chapter 231 Busy Inside and Outside
After returning from the county, it was time for Gardenia jasminoides and Hedyotis diffusa to mature.
Gao Mingcheng, like everyone else in the village, is devoted to picking medicinal herbs. It's about making money, and no one would complain about having too much.
Gardenia needs to be steamed and then dried. Gao Mingcheng and Xuanyuemei continued to divide the work and cooperate with each other. He picked the herbs in the mountains, and Xuanyuemei was responsible for processing the herbs at home.
The closer it gets to October, the more medicinal herbs piled up at home. Medicinal herbs are afraid of moisture, so most of them are piled on the wooden bed that Gao Yue gave them. If there is not enough space, a row of low shelves are temporarily made to prevent the herbs from directly contacting the ground.
There is no need to find a carpenter to make this shelf. Gao Mingcheng can make it himself with the wood. Although the workmanship is a bit rough, it is durable.
There are many yellow gardenia trees in the mountains. They are not actually planted specifically here, but it may be that the climate and terrain are very suitable for the growth of yellow gardenia. Whether at the foot of the mountain or on the mountain, they can be seen everywhere, and they are growing quite well.
At first, some people would run to the mountains to pick and eat gardenia flowers when they bloomed. Later, when they learned that yellow gardenias could be sold for money, they were reluctant to pick and eat the flowers. If any ignorant children picked the flowers to play with, they would be scolded.
Gardenia jasminoides has a wide range of uses. It can be used as medicine or as a dye. Therefore, it is one of the most traded medicinal herbs at medicine fairs and has never been a hassle to sell.
While Gao Mingcheng was picking medicinal herbs in the mountains, he also took a look at the condition of the beehives. Wow, he hadn't checked for a while, and the beehives were full of honey!
Judging from the color of the honey, it is almost ready.
Seeing this, Gao Mingcheng went home without saying a word, got a honey extractor and prepared to extract the honey.
He also planned to take this batch of honey to the medicine fair to sell. You know, honey is not only a tonic, but also an auxiliary medicine. Some pills need to be blended with honey.
It took Gao Mingcheng two days of hard work to shake the honey from all the beehives. From now on, the frequency of shaking the honey will increase from once a month to once every two months or even three months.
When winter comes, the number of flowers in the mountains decreases and the honey bees lack nectar sources, so they will consume the honey they brewed previously to sustain life.
In order to avoid wasting honey, some professional beekeepers choose to feed the bees sugar water.
This is because they shook all the honey away, and without food, the honey cannot survive the winter safely.
Gao Mingcheng had no plan to feed the bees with sugar water. Although he had forty boxes of honey, they were scattered throughout the mountains, so there was still some honey source. Besides, he would not shake the honey so diligently, so the honey in the hives was enough for the bees to eat.
As time goes by, the medicinal herbs at home increase day by day, but the cash in hand decreases day by day.
October 12th soon arrived, and Gao Mingcheng had already announced that he would no longer purchase the medicine.
The medicine fair in Zhangshu is on October 16th to 18th. Last year he had to catch a train and was afraid of delays, so he went there two days in advance. But now he is driving himself and has plenty of flexible time, so he can just leave on the 15th.
In the few days before departure, Gao Mingcheng had to check all the medicinal materials at home one by one to see if they were all qualified.
Most of these medicinal herbs were purchased by Xuanmei, but Gao Mingcheng would never feel at ease unless he took a look at them himself.
Check all the medicinal materials and make sure there are no imposters. Then continue drying those that need to be dried, and store those that need to be stored.
There have been some changes in the village over the past month. Some medicinal herbs that were once seen everywhere have now completely disappeared, and the entire village has become much cleaner.
Gao Mingcheng carried a bucket and strolled to Xiaofu Mountain. He first filled a bucket with water from the pond at the foot of Xiaofu Mountain, and then came to a shady place.
There is a piece of bare yellow land here, in which there is a deep pit about 30 centimeters deep, with some sand and seeds in it.
This seed is the seed of Polygonatum sibiricum.
When he first collected the Polygonatum sibiricum in the mountains, he also collected its seeds. If he planted it with seeds, he could not harvest it in the same year, but if he planted it with seeds, he could plant a large area at one time.
It’s just that the seeds of Polygonatum sibiricum need to be stored in sand.
What is Shazang?
After taking out the mature seeds, immediately mix one part of seeds with three parts of sand, store them in a pit 30 cm deep in a shady place, and keep them moist.
Although it is already October, the weather is still hot with mostly sunny days because there is almost no rain. Gao Mingcheng will soon go out to do some work, so it is necessary to water the sand pile before going out to keep the seeds inside moist.
After watering the plants, Gao Mingcheng continued walking towards Xiaofushan.
Today, the felling of Xiaofushan has been almost completed, and the workers hired at the beginning have changed from being tree cutters to diggers.
Under Gao Mingcheng's instructions, they cleared a sunny hillside first. If Xiao Jinfeng brought him tangerine seedlings from Guangdong, they could plant them here.
Cutting down trees is not easy, but digging the soil is also difficult. Before digging the soil, you need to clear out the tree trunks and then clear out the large stones. After this cleaning, the surface soil will be somewhat loose.
Finally, dig holes according to the spacing between the saplings and wait for the saplings to be planted.
Gao Mingcheng saw some stones piled on the ground. These stones were covered with yellow soil and were obviously dug out from the ground.
He went to find a shoulder pole and transported the piled stones to the foot of the mountain.
These stones were big and small, and he simply smashed the bigger ones because he planned to use them to pave the road. This would also make it easier for vehicles to pass through and the wheels would not easily sink into the deep pits.
Gao Mingcheng was in a good mood as he worked back and forth. Although there was a bare mountain in front of him, he had already begun to imagine the scene several years later.
By then, there will surely be fruit trees here, lush greenery, with fruit flowers in spring and fruits in summer and autumn.
On the ground, there are local chickens responsible for clearing pests from the orchard. After eating and drinking enough, the local chickens will lay eggs with green shells in the chicken coop.
This green eggshell is a variety they introduced from other places. Everyone thinks that eggs with green eggshells are more nutritious than eggs with yellow eggshells. In later generations, people here operated it into the brand of "Oriental Magic Eggs", and then produced gift boxes as a local specialty for tourists to buy.
It’s hard to say whether it’s just a waste of money, but it’s definitely better than foreign eggs.
Gao Mingcheng worked on this job until the evening. When he left, he saw that a small hill had been built with stones at the foot of the mountain.
It was already late, so Gao Mingcheng did not continue paving the road with stones. Instead, he took his tools and went out. When he reached the vegetable garden, he only needed to take a glance to know whether his wife had come to pick vegetables today.
If they were not picked, he would take some vegetables back with him, but if they were picked, then there was no need to do so.
(End of this chapter)
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