Chapter 94
On the second day, because of the night watch, Gu Ran slept for two hours in the cave. He woke up late, so he did not go to explore the surrounding area. Instead, he just walked around the valley to look at the terrain outside the selected future orange grove.
After a day of hard work, the bushes at the front of the valley were cleared away, leaving an open meadow with only a few wild orange trees.
However, the tree stumps exposed on the ground have not been cleared away yet, because Pei Liu and Li Ji are now planning to cut down all the trees first, and intensive cultivation is the next step.
Gu Ran explored the north side of the valley. There was also a circle of thin bushes outside. Because it was winter, a tree with fruits was particularly conspicuous. When Gu Ran touched it over to take a look, hey, it turned out to be a wild pear tree.
It was the last season for harvesting pears. Gu Ran picked one and tasted it. It was very sweet, so he picked a few more and put them in a bamboo basket before continuing on his way.
After walking about twenty miles, we arrived at the shore of Dunzi Island.
Dunzi Island is surrounded by water on all sides and is considered a small island on the Wujiang River side. However, the northern half of the island is covered with reefs and waterways. A little further away, about twenty meters away, is another broken island in the river.
This waterway between Dunzi Island and another broken island is full of reefs. Once it gets deeper, the ships that usually carry passengers cannot pass through, and only small boats with one or two people can pass through.
Gu Ran walked around and identified the direction.
Since we want to plant orange trees on Dunzi Island, we naturally have to think about when the oranges will be ripe, or where to go to and from the island by boat, like a ferry.
The place where they came to the island now was the river channel from the Wujiang River to the county town. Although it was spacious and dozens of meters wide, there were many ships passing by on ordinary days, so it was not easy to get on and off there.
Whether it was to avoid suspicion or not to block the river, Gu Ran didn't want to go to the island under the watchful eyes of so many passengers coming and going, so he planned to find another sheltered place to go to the island.
And this direction is just right.
Small boats can avoid the ships coming in from the river to this side. If they are shipping, they can anchor here and receive all the oranges shipped before continuing forward. They can go up to the county pier or down to the seaport. It is very easy for the ship to turn around, and loading and unloading are very convenient.
Gu Ran immediately decided on this location and marked it on the map he had drawn yesterday. He planned to slowly build a ferry and repair the road when he had money in the future.
By the time she returned to the valley, the winter sun in the sky had begun to cool down again.
While there was still time, Gu Ran found a hoe and dug the tree stump for a while before crossing the valley to meet up with Pei Liu and Li Ji.
That day, Pei Liu and Li Ji cut down another acre of forest land.
The more than one acre of mixed woods at the back of the valley have all been turned into grassland, but the tree stumps still need to be dug out slowly. But after a piece of open space is opened up, the place immediately becomes fresh.
When the orange trees are transplanted, there will be no need to worry about other tree species competing with them for soil nutrients or blocking the sunlight.
Gu Ran expressed satisfaction with this progress.
Today's dinner was still barbecue and some leftover rice balls.
Gu Ran then took out the pears he had picked, washed them, and shared them.
We are leaving Dunzi Island tomorrow, so I will deal with the remaining one acre of land and the tree stumps in the land next time I come.
Since they didn't have to work so hard, the three of them felt much more relaxed that night.
Li Ji even asked Gu Ran when she would come to Dunzi Island next time, and planned to work for her for a few more days.
Gu Ran promised that if he came to Dunzi Island again, he would definitely hire him.
Needless to say, Pei Liu will definitely come along.
The three of them drank soup and roasted themselves by the campfire. Gu Ran couldn't help but take out a handful of chestnuts, threw them into the fire, and buried them with charcoal using branches, and threw in some dead leaves and twigs.
As Pei Liu grabbed a branch and tried to stir the fire, he couldn't help but ask, "We've decided on a plot of land for the orange trees. Where can we buy some?"
"You can't buy from people in Donglin Township. You have to go to a place farther away."
Gu Ran had no intention of buying any orange trees grown in the villages of Donglin Township or even in the villages of Yongchang County.
The yellow tip disease has just occurred. If you are afraid of infection, you must choose a healthy orange tree without any hidden dangers.
"It's also the time when oranges are picked in villages in other counties, right? Have you ever been to other places where people grow oranges before?" Gu Ran asked.
Pei Liu nodded.
"Then we can go and ask each family one by one which ones grow delicious oranges and ask if they sell them. If so, how much is the price? How many trees can they sell to us?" Gu Ran said, "Once we confirm, we can buy the orange trees after the New Year when the weather warms up and spring arrives, and transplant them to this mountain."
It usually takes four to five years for an orange tree to grow from cuttings and grow into a fruit-bearing plant. If you grow an orange tree from seeds, it will take even longer.
Gu Ran had never thought of starting from scratch. His hope was to take care of the orange tree for a year so that it would bear fruit by the end of next year. Naturally, he had to buy a mature tree planted by someone else.
But orange trees have to be nurtured to grow up to bear fruit. If the family has some money, they are generally reluctant to sell them. And if they buy from large-scale orange tree growers, it will be even more difficult.
Because she bought hundreds of trees at a time, and since they all made a living in the orange business, others would be wary of selling so many orange trees, fearing that they would create a competitor. They would either be unwilling to sell or raise the price of mature trees, which would scare people away and make them retreat.
"If that doesn't work, then ask someone about orange orchards or farmers in other states. Maybe even from Guangzhou, where we can buy some mature trees."
The environment in Guangdong is similar to that in Fujian, and the orange trees in Guangdong can also survive in Fujian.
It is also close to go to Guangzhou in Guangdong by water.
"I just have to spend time finding out which farmers in Guangzhou can sell orange trees." It's a bit troublesome.
After the orange trees are transplanted, people have to be hired to take care of them.
The money he had on hand was running out, so he had to think of another way.
There is no way to save money, so we can only work on open source.
But we'll have to wait until we get back tomorrow to talk about it.
The next day, they packed up their belongings and prepared to go to the shore to take a boat back.
The mats in the cave were naturally not collected. They were rolled up and put aside to be used next time. There was not much dry firewood that was brought back, so it was also piled aside. There were also some mugwort, pots and bowls, etc. All the useful things were kept.
Seeing that it was still early in the afternoon, Gu Ran took the two of them to the pear tree and picked all the remaining wild pears.
"By the way, Liu Niang, didn't you say that there was a madman on this island?" How come they have been here for three or four days and haven't seen anyone? Is he no longer on this island?
"Maybe, he left." Pei Liu was not sure.
"What lunatic?" After these days of hard work, Li Ji completely let go of himself and gradually became familiar with the two people.
"It was the madman who injured Liu Niang when she came to Dunzi Island last year."
Gu Ran told Li Ji what happened before the New Year. "I was afraid of that madman, so I thought of Li Jie... Uncle, you are good at martial arts, so I hired you to be on the safe side."
Gu Ran said this and glanced at Pei Liu.
In Li Ji's eyes, Liu Niang was probably a delicate young lady. It was not known whether hiring her to do the job was a good thing or a bad thing!
Pei Liu also understood what Gu Ran meant. He glanced at Li Ji and said nothing.
After picking the pears, the three men caught a hare and two pheasants along the way, and then walked towards the shore they had come to three days ago.
In the valley they left, an old man with messy white hair and wearing animal skins stumbled out, leaning on a crutch made of branches, squinting his pale and turbid eyes, looking at the open space in front of him, and pointing randomly with the crutch in his hand, moving slowly step by step among the reclaimed woodland.
Gu Ran was completely unaware. He, Pei Liu and Li Ji boarded Liu the boat of the boatman, drifted downstream, gradually approached the Donglin Township ferry, and then went straight back to Xiaxi Village.
After staying on the island for three days, my body became smelly and my clothes were very dirty.
The first thing I did when I got back to the house was to get some hot water, light a fire, boil water, and wash up.
As the owner of the house, the first pot of boiled water was of course given to Gu Ran.
After Gu Ran moved the bathtub into the side room, he added hot water, closed the door and washed himself thoroughly, scrubbing his long black hair clean. After changing into clean clothes, he went out and found that Pei Liu had also gone into his side room to wash up. So he quickly moved a bucket and a basin, one large and one small, into the workshop, then went outside to pour out the water, and returned to the patio with the empty buckets and basins and put them away.
Then she sat down at the tea table in the courtyard, basking in the winter sun while carefully drying her hair with a handkerchief. She measured the length of her hair and found that it had grown a lot longer. So, while it was still wet and easy to trim, she went to the side room, took out a pair of scissors, parted her hair in two, leaving a length that could be tied up, and then cut off most of it with one snip.
In winter, the weather will get colder and colder. Cutting your hair short will make it easier to manage. It will save water, save nutrients, and be easier to dry!
Gu Ran put two strands of black hair aside and continued to dry her hair.
Just at this time, Pei Liu had also finished washing, and also came out with a head of dark black hair. He saw Gu Ran sitting in the patio and was about to say hello, but he saw her black hair that was cut shorter than her waist, and then saw the broken hair placed on the wooden chair next to her, and was stunned for a long time.
"Sixth Lady, what do you want to eat tonight?" Gu Ran saw Pei Liu coming out of the door, looked at him several times to admire his eyes, and then asked.
"What do you want to eat?"
"So, how about a barbecue?"
After three days of work, I am tired, and barbecue is the easiest thing to do.
Just light a stove, put a wire rack on it, and slice the meat.
We also grilled meat on Dunzi Island, but we ate it in large chunks by sticking it on branches. We didn’t eat enough. Now that we are at home, we can marinate the meat to make it more flavorful. After grilling, it will be even more fragrant if we dip it in konjac sauce and sesame.
"good."
So after his hair was dry, Gu Ran went to the small warehouse and selected some fresh meat: beef, mutton, eel, sea bass, etc. If there was not enough, he took it from the space compartment and then moved it to the kitchen. He removed the scales, gutted it, and cleaned it. The meat was cut into thin slices and sprinkled with some salt. He also washed some mushrooms, leeks, white cabbage and other side dishes, and the prelude to barbecue was completed.
When you have no money, you can only rely on the mountains to eat the food, go into the mountains to catch bamboo rats, wild rabbits, pheasants, etc. In fact, if you eat too much of these meats, you will get tired of them. Another reason is that artificially raised beef, mutton, etc. are actually cultivated in a way that suits human tastes. They are healthy and taste good.
However, these wild game that are naturally grown are grown for the survival and health of the mountain species themselves, so they look the way they should. Therefore, these mountain animals eat a variety of foods, and this is often the source of the fishy smell that is difficult to remove, not to mention the additional unsettling factors they carry.
Now that he has money and is free to eat meat, Gu Ran tends to eat the healthier and safer meat from domesticated animals.
As for game, just keep it as a backup and eat it every now and then.
"Sixth Mother, clean up the tea table. I'm going to move the stove over." Gu Ran stood in the kitchen and shouted outside.
"good."
Pei Liu tied up his half-dried black hair, walked out of the wing room, and moved the teapots and teacups on the tea table in the patio to the main hall. When he came back to clean up, his eyes fell on the hair on the wooden chair beside him. After hesitating for a moment, he picked it up and looked around, not knowing where to put it. Finally, he put it in the drawer in his wing room.
After taking out the barbecue stove and putting the charcoal fire in, you can move it to the tea table in the patio, then put the barbecue rack on it, put the processed meat, side dishes and condiments aside, and you can barbecue by yourself.
The meat slices are cut thinly. If the charcoal fire in the stove is strong, you can basically put it on and turn it over and eat it.
Gu Ran and Pei Liu each sat on one side and also brewed some white tea, enjoying themselves very much.
When I came back today, the cat was gone from the house. I guess Big Orange and the three little ones had gone crazy outside. This was perfect because they didn't have to eat by themselves and feed the cats from time to time, so they could eat more happily.
While grilling and eating, Gu Ran also told Pei Liu about his future plans for Dunzi Island.
The cleared forest land still needs to be maintained, and people will have to be brought there to work in two days. As long as the land for planting oranges is cleared before the New Year, the calculation of this job is simple.
In addition, a ferry crossing for boarding and disembarking in the east direction of Dunzi Island needs to be built, and a place for landing and mooring ships needs to be built, but this is not urgent.
Next is the section of forest from the ferry to the orange grove. A road must be opened to facilitate their entry and exit, and to facilitate the transportation of orange trees and oranges.
"If we can really buy all the orange trees and plant them, based on conservative estimates of normal yields, one orange tree will produce 200 to 500 kilograms of fruit. One acre of orange trees will produce 1,200 to 3,000 kilograms. How much can three acres of land produce?" Gu Ran said. "If we want to sell the oranges, we'll definitely have to load them onto ships first. So many oranges will definitely need to be transported by cart, so we'll have to build a road from the valley to the ferry. It'll have to be at least wide enough for a carriage."
Gu Ran walked on solid ground. It took more than an hour, or more than 30 miles, to walk from the outer circle of the orange orchard in the valley to the ferry. If the road was built, he could reach the orange orchard in half an hour by donkey cart or horse carriage, which would be convenient and fast.
Of course, it will take another year before the orange harvest, which will happen in September or October next year, so there is no rush to build the road.
What is more urgent is the need to build a place for people to live on the other side of the valley.
They will have to go to Dunzi Island to work in the future, so they can't always live in caves or grottoes, right?
The weather wasn't too cold now, so we could just barely get by with a campfire. But what about November or December, when it got colder? Even if it got hot, the forest would be full of mosquitoes, snakes, and flies, and living outside would be dangerous, not to mention the dangers of miasma.
Speaking of miasma, because the weather is cold now and there is not much rain, the forest is very refreshing. However, Dunzi Island is not as large as the island forest. There are more open woodlands, and the trees are sparse. It is not like the towering old trees in the miasma forest that cast shade. It is estimated that the miasma is not as serious as the island forest.
Whether it was for his own use or for the men he would hire to look after the orange grove, the house had to be built.
Even if it means building a small house the same size as the one she lives in.
Bricks and stones had to be shipped over by boat, which was too troublesome. Gu Ran planned to use local materials and build the house with the wood and rocks on Dunzi Island.
So we have to hire people for this.
When hiring people, one has to consider the wages and food expenses, as well as the boat fare to take them to Dunzi Island, which is a much-needed expense.
It’s winter now and the miasma on Dunzi Island has dissipated. We have to quickly hire someone to rebuild the house.
"I plan to hire Uncle Wu to build the house first."
The several windmill towers in the village were all built by Wu Sanbo and his men. They are solid and stable, which shows that Wu Sanbo's craftsmanship is excellent. Now the winter harvest is almost over. After paying the winter tax, the villagers don't have much farm work to do, so they naturally have more time to take on work and earn more money for the New Year.
After discussing the matters on Dunzi Island, there are still other matters left.
First of all, we have to consider the early spring of next year, from February to March, which is the best time for transplanting and planting. Before that, we have to purchase the orange trees.
It is now the end of October, and there are about three months to make arrangements. If we really want to find someone to go to Guangdong, we have to send them there early.
Gu Ran had never been to Guangdong during the Great Sheng Dynasty and had no connections, so he was very worried. He could only go to the county town to inquire about farmers in other states in Fujian who grew oranges.
"All of the above are things that must be done, one by one."
Next, it’s time to make your own work more convenient.
For example, should I order a small boat myself? After all, if I want to go to Dunzi Island to do work, I'll definitely need to carry people frequently.
Just like before, when going in and out of the county town, I had my own donkey cart, which made it convenient to move goods or carry people.
But if we order a small boat, we need a place to moor it. There is no ferry in Xiaxi Village, so we can only go to Donglin Township. I wonder how much it costs to store the small boat at the ferry in Donglin Township?
"Of course we need a boat, but before the oranges grow, we can make an agreement with Liu the boatman to rent his boat for long-term transportation." Gu Ran said, "But we must prepare the money to build our own boat. If we have a boat, it will be convenient to bring our own staff to the island, and it will also be convenient to transport the oranges to the dock or the harbor." As the owner, he can also take the initiative in sales.
Each of these land purchases requires money.
After Gu Ran bought Dunzi Island, he only had a few taels of silver left on hand. It seemed that he had to use his real estate assets.
Her real estate assets are only one hundred taels. She can take out fifty taels and hire someone to build a small house. That should be enough, right?
But finding an orange tree is also a considerable expense. I guess I have to spend the other fifty taels, and then I will have nothing left.
Gu Ran threw a piece of barbecue into his mouth and finished eating. He glanced at Pei Liu who was listening silently and nodding. He coughed dryly and asked, "Sixth Lady, are you interested in joining me in this orange business?"
"Aren't I working with you now?"
"It's not just about following me. How about investing some money and becoming my partner?"
I remember that at the beginning of the year, Pei Liuniang easily took out twenty taels of silver. She went to various places outside to look for her elder sister, and she probably spent a lot of money, but I never heard her complain about lack of money, so I guess Pei Liuniang was also a person with some wealth.
Yes, yes, during her exile, she was still wearing fur coats and felt shoes!
She is also very generous when buying food, and I have never seen her in financial difficulty.
If I could convince her to join me in the orange grove and give me some money, then I wouldn't have to be so stingy.
When Pei Liu heard what Gu Ran said, his eyes lit up and he looked up at her, "Are you willing?" to let him get involved in her business?
"Of course I'm willing. To be honest, I'm running low on cash now that I bought the island. Everything I just mentioned requires money. Some things aren't urgent, but building a house and buying orange trees need to be done soon. These two sums of money can't be skimped on." Gu Ran said, "I estimate that I have enough money for the house, but not for the orange trees. If you could contribute some money and buy the trees with me, then the orange grove will be yours and mine in the future. How about we split the profits?"
Pei Liu nodded almost without hesitation.
"good."
"I knew you were interested, Liu Niang." Gu Ran chuckled and put a few slices of roasted meat into Pei Liu's bowl. He asked cautiously, "Then, Liu Niang, how much silver are you planning to pay?"
Pei Liu looked at the barbecue in the bowl, smiled, put down his chopsticks, and got up to go back to the room.
Are you going to get the silver? How much will it be?
Gu Ran's heart leaped with joy, and he looked at her expectantly as she came out of the room again, and then handed him a wooden box.
She smiled at Pei Liu and didn't bother to eat the meat. She rubbed her hands, took the wooden box, felt it, and found it was not too heavy, as if there were not many silver ingots. She opened the lid and took a look: there were ten silver ingots piled in a row on the box. Judging from their size, they were five taels each, which meant fifty taels.
There were still silver notes under the silver ingot.
Gu Ran moved the silver ingot away and picked up the silver notes, two of fifty taels and two of one hundred taels, totaling three hundred taels.
That's three hundred and fifty taels.
"Sixth Mother, with so much silver, you can buy a Dunzi Island." Gu Ran was shocked.
"But I'm not interested." Pei Liu shook his head. Seeing Gu Ran's surprised expression, he felt quite happy. "If you still want it, you can buy another one."
"No, no." Gu Ran waved her hands repeatedly. For her to grow oranges, one Dunzi Island was enough.
This one hasn’t even been planted yet, why would I need to buy another one?
"So, these three hundred and fifty taels are all earned from the orange business?"
Pei Liu nodded. "You can make a living selling oranges or doing anything else. It's up to you what you like."
Gu Ran smiled and looked at Pei Liu: "Well, I will spend all this money on the orange grove first. When our oranges are harvested in the future, we will split the profits 50-50. What do you say?"
Pei Liu continued to nod: "Okay, whatever you say."
Gu Ran smiled as she collected the money and placed it in a box. She then attentively poured Pei Liu a cup of hot tea. "Sixth Sister, from now on, we are family. I am your second elder sister. If you need any help in the future, just tell me!"
Pei Liu picked up the hot tea that Gu Ran poured for him. He felt that the words "one of us" from Gu Ran's mouth were particularly pleasant, and he smiled with his eyes narrowed and was particularly happy.
Gu Ran was also very happy.
The existing partner was so generous that he gave her a huge sum of three hundred and fifty taels of silver at once. Her fixed assets could remain untouched and be preserved.
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