Chapter 223: Mountains and Waters
At six o'clock in the morning, the sky was already bright and the workers who were cutting down trees had already gone to Xiaofushan on their own.
Gao Mingcheng did not have a supervisor, but no one would be lazy. Because the weather was hot, everyone came to work in the morning and evening, and the lunch break was longer.
After breakfast, Gao Mingcheng prepared to process the first batch of Poria cocos he had picked.
These Poria cocos are covered to sweat, dried, covered again to sweat, and dried again. This process is repeated several times until the skin shrinks and turns brown.
There were a total of twenty or so Poria cocos in this batch, some as big as footballs and some as small as sweet potatoes. Gao Mingcheng called Xuan Duomei over, and the two of them held knives and began to cut off the skin of the Poria cocos, revealing the white pieces inside. Some of them showed a light red color, and this part was called red Poria cocos.
If Poria cocos is subdivided, it can be divided into four types, and each type has different medicinal properties. For example, the function of Poria cocos peel is to relieve edema.
The function of red Poria cocos is to drain dampness and heat, while the most common white Poria cocos has the function of draining dampness and strengthening the spleen. As for Poria cocos, it is the part with fine pine roots in the center of white Poria cocos. Cutting it into square slices has the effect of calming the mind and soothing the nerves.
While Gao Mingcheng was processing the Poria cocos, he explained to Xuanyuemei that he still had half a room full of Poria cocos and that he needed Xuanyuemei's help to process it.
Xuanyuemei also listened carefully. She was a clever person and had some knowledge of medicinal herbs, so she learned it easily.
First, remove the skin of the Poria cocos, and then start cutting it into pieces. This is not a problem for Xuanyue Mei. In her opinion, it is no different from cutting vegetables.
First cut into large slices, then overlap and cut into strips, finally align the strips and cut horizontally into squares.
The length, width and thickness of this block are about 4 cm. It will shrink a little after drying.
The two men raised their knives and chopped the white pieces of Poria cocos, which rolled off the chopping board and into the bamboo sieve.
After processing all the Poria cocos, Gao Mingcheng said to Xuanyuemei: "Separate the leftovers and put them in another bamboo sieve to dry. Keep this for your own consumption."
Poria cocos has many uses and many ways to eat it. The simplest way is to cook it into porridge. A more complicated way is to combine it with different Chinese medicines to have different effects in treating diseases.
But for women, Poria cocos has another great benefit, which is that it can be combined with white peony root and white atractylodes to form the Sanbai Decoction.
You should know that Sanbai Decoction was recorded in the book "Introduction to Medicine" in the Ming Dynasty. After that, it became popular among the people and was deeply loved by women.
The recipe is very simple, use 5 grams each of white peony root, white atractylodes, and white poria, and 2.5 grams of licorice, decoct in water, and take it warm. After taking it, it can improve problems such as rough skin, chlorosis, chloasma, and heavy pigmentation.
However, this prescription is not suitable for people with damp heat and excessive liver fire.
Leaving the follow-up matters to Xuanmei to deal with, Gao Mingcheng took his tools and bags and went into the mountains again.
He had already walked through the mountains and forests near Gaojia Village, and today he planned to walk further. The mountains were vast and contained many treasures, waiting for the arrival of treasure hunters.
He ran all the way into the mountains, disturbing many birds and beasts, but Gao Mingcheng didn't take it seriously. After he left, the small animals in the mountains would naturally return to peace.
As the altitude increased, the plants in the mountains also changed somewhat. In the moist humus soil under the forest, Gao Mingcheng saw a large patch of Asarum.
Asarum is also a medicinal material. It is a perennial herb and the whole plant can be used as medicine. It has many functions, but the most widely known one is that it can remove bad breath.
The roots of Asarum can be collected and dried in the shade in February and August. Now is also the season for this. Since Gao Mingcheng came across it, he showed no mercy and just went forward to pluck it up.
The root system of Asarum is very developed, and its roots are mainly used, so you have to loosen the soil with a hoe, and then carefully pull out all the roots.
Fortunately, it likes to grow in the moist humus soil under the forest, so it is easy to pull out the roots.
Gao Mingcheng removed its leaves, leaving only the roots and threw them into the bag. After digging out the piece of asarum, he continued walking forward.
He didn't pick and choose. Whenever he came across any medicinal herbs, he would just pick them up directly. Various herbs would accumulate over time, and he would be able to sell them all at once after going to the medicine fair.
Although the weather was dry this year, it was only localized, so the impact on the mountains and forests was not great. There were just fewer streams on the surface, and looking around, there were not many ditches or puddles to be seen.
He passed by the place where he had caught bullfrogs before and found that there was much less water here. Most of the bullfrogs lived on the ground, and the remaining water was also crowded with bullfrogs.
Seeing this, Gao Mingcheng felt that he needed to make some living space for the bullfrogs, so he put down the bag full of medicinal herbs, picked up an empty bag, and prepared to have a close contact with the bullfrogs.
He specifically picked out the big ones to catch, and his hands were amazingly fast. Before the bullfrogs could react, he had already moved them to another place.
He stopped after grabbing half the bag.
The water is about to dry up. Although bullfrogs are amphibians, they cannot survive without water. A large number of them will definitely die then.
Not only bullfrogs, but even some fruit trees will see reduced production. He has discovered that the wild fruit trees in the mountains this year do not bear as many fruits as in previous years.
There is no way around it. When encountering natural disasters, humans can still seek help from their own kind, but plants and animals are much more passive.
After some investigation, Gao Mingcheng found that there were still several ponds in the mountains whose water levels had not dropped. These ponds were not affected by the weather. Either there were springs underneath, or they were directly connected to underground rivers.
No matter which one it is, as long as there is water, some aquatic animals will not die in large numbers, and animals in the mountains and forests can also have water to drink.
When he discovered the water source, he also found that many animals had made their homes nearby, the most conspicuous of which was a group of wild boars.
This group of wild boars is powerful, with a total of twelve, including eight adult wild boars and four piglets. They occupied a small area of water where they played and drank water.
Gao Mingcheng left quietly, without any intention of attacking the wild boars. Now is the time for them to grow fat in autumn, so let them eat and drink well!
He walked and collected medicinal herbs along the way, and was quite far away from the village. When he was ready to go back, it took him a long time even if he ran all the way.
When I ran to the halfway point of the mountain near the village, I saw people crowding in the forest and occasionally hearing voices. It was the villagers who had gone into the mountains to collect medicinal herbs.
When he appeared carrying several sacks, he instantly aroused everyone's envy.
Most of the people who come here to collect medicinal herbs are women. They dare not go into the mountains, so when they see Gao Mingcheng walking out of the mountains with so many things, they feel envious.
But there are some things that we can only envy. Not everyone has the ability to go into the mountains, and not everyone has free time.
For these women, their day is very busy. They have to get up early in the morning to light the fire and cook porridge, then go to work in the fields, do housework at home, and then have lunch and dinner.
If you have children, it will be even busier. Even if raising a child is very rough now, it still takes a lot of effort from the mother to bring the child up.
Gao Mingcheng greeted people from a distance and then went back home.
Just as I put down the things I brought back, I saw Xuanmei coming out of the kitchen. She said, "Mingcheng, Shufang came here before and said that grandma has been feeling unwell these past two days, and your dad asked you to go back and see her. I prepared ten eggs. Do you think they are not enough? If not, I'll go to my second sister's house to buy some."
Other people would keep the eggs to sell, but he couldn't keep the eggs. He would eat them as soon as they were available. These ten eggs were just a few that Duomei picked up from the chicken coop to make up the number.
Gao Mingcheng saw this and said, "No need, just take ten. I got some bullfrogs in the mountains, and I'll just take some more with me."
So he went to the utility room and got a bag, and picked out ten big bullfrogs from the bag.
Although this bullfrog is big, there is not much meat left after skinning and removing the internal organs.
(End of this chapter)
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