Mao time (five o'clock).
Everyone had already eaten breakfast. All 68 of them ate in the Liu family compound, each person having a large bowl of white rice porridge with salted fish and vegetables, as many steamed buns as they could get, and two boiled eggs.
A water bag filled with brewed chrysanthemum tea was prepared for each person.
He set off driving an ox cart, carrying tools and a backpack.
By the time we had dinner, the division of labor had already been decided. The 58 people were divided into two teams, one responsible for digging sweet potatoes and the other for digging potatoes.
Several women were responsible for cutting the sweet potato vines, leaving a small section of the old vines close to the soil so that it would be convenient to pull them out later, or they could pull them out and then cut them.
The nimble men were responsible for digging sweet potatoes and potatoes, while Liu Yuhan and Baizhi Banxia's younger sister were responsible for picking potatoes.
Liu Yang, along with Liu Guang, Liu Lu, Xiao Si and Xiao Wu, were responsible for picking sweet potatoes.
The rest of the people were responsible for transporting the potatoes to the ox cart, which then pulled the sweet potatoes back to the yard.
Liu Daling dug the first hoe with trembling hands.
He was digging sweet potatoes. Liu Yuhan had already told them the techniques for digging sweet potatoes and potatoes. Never dig in the middle, only dig to the left and right. If the soil is loose, you can pull them up directly.
"Wow, these sweet potatoes are so big! One, two, three, four," Xiao Si exclaimed.
Liu Yuhan pulled a few of them. Each vine contained about 4 to 6 sweet potatoes, some large and some small, with red skins covered in fine sand and some with tiny whiskers. If you accidentally scraped the skin, you would find white flesh underneath.
Everyone was stunned by the sheer volume! The largest one must have weighed at least a pound.
Liu Yuhan was quite satisfied with the yield, after all, it was their first time to open up new land for planting.
Liu Daling asked them to pile up all the sweet potatoes from the latest acre of land, take them home and spread them out separately, so that they could check the yield per acre later.
Liu Yuhan asked his elder brother to keep an eye on Xiao Si and the others, and to be careful when stacking them so as not to scratch the skin. Only by keeping them intact can they be stored for a longer time.
Liu Daling went to the potato field with his granddaughter and started to hoe the potatoes.
Potatoes with yellow skin and various oval shapes of different sizes came out.
Potatoes are similar to sweet potatoes. One potato can have as few as four or five, or as many as seven or eight. Potatoes are smaller in size, but there are slightly more of them.
Everyone started digging, and just like sweet potatoes, they separated the potatoes from one acre and counted the potato yield.
Everyone got busy.
With so many people and easy sand to dig, everyone worked very hard. By the time the county magistrate, the chief clerk, the village head, and others arrived, they had already dug several acres.
When County Magistrate Zhu saw the astonishing crop yield, he was so excited that he started pulling up the crops out of envy.
Before noon, Liu Yuhan asked everyone to take back the dug sweet potatoes and potatoes.
They come to work early and go back to rest early. They sweat a lot while working, so they try to avoid heatstroke.
Liu Daling, along with the county magistrate and the village head, was measuring the yield per mu in a yard piled high with potatoes and sweet potatoes. The first mu of potatoes and sweet potatoes had been set aside as required.
The meal was ready. Liu Yuhan asked her master to take the county magistrate and others into the main hall for lunch, while the women ate in the kitchen compartment.
The rest of the workers all ate in the boys' dormitory. The girls from the pharmaceutical industry and the people from the pig farm also came to eat together.
The dishes we ate in the big pot were pretty much the same: pork and vermicelli stewed with Chinese cabbage, scrambled eggs with loofah, and tofu soup with bone. The staple food was steamed buns with white flour and white rice.
There were a few more dishes cooked at County Magistrate Zhu's table.
After eating, you have to rest for an hour before going back to work. Those who have straw hats are required to wear them, or cover their faces and heads with cloth.
The helping woman washed the dishes, boiled tea on the big stove, and when the tea had cooled, she helped put it into a water bag and began to prepare dinner.
The county magistrate finished his meal in a hurry and took people to weigh the goods.
"The sweet potato yield per mu is 3,200 kilograms! The potato yield per mu is 3,500 kilograms! This is really... too amazing!" County Magistrate Zhu's voice trembled a little.
You have to know that the yield of rice, peanuts and soybeans per mu is only three or four hundred kilograms. Such a comparison is simply shocking!
County Magistrate Zhu greeted the Liu family.
"Leave me all the sweet potato and potato seeds you have. I'll give some to the prefect. They'll be widely planted in the sand fields this year. Your Liu family has made a great contribution, and I'll speak well of you. As for any reward you get, we'll discuss it later."
"My Lord, the decision is yours."
County Magistrate Zhu happily packed a basket of potatoes and sweet potatoes and went back.
Liu Yuhan was very calm. This was the outcome she had anticipated when she first started planting. They had planted too hastily, without better conditions for fertilizing the crops, and even without pesticides to kill the minor pests.
So it's normal for the yield per mu to be slightly lower. It can't be compared with modern yields of 10,000 catties and 7,000 to 8,000 kilograms per mu, but she already feels very satisfied and hopes that next time, everyone will plant more carefully and the yield per mu will be higher.
They have over 30 mu of sweet potatoes and 20 mu of potatoes, for a total of 60 mu. If the yield is similar per mu, that's about 200,000 jin (approximately 100,000 kg)! That's enough to grow a lot of seeds.
We continued to work in the afternoon, and even those who were not busy in the village came forward to help.
In one day, I dug half of the sweet potatoes and half of the potatoes. If I keep working hard tomorrow, I should be able to finish the job in one day.
Liu Yuhan privately told his grandfather and father to keep an eye on which families would come to help, and give them more seeds when selling them. Since they wouldn't eat or take wages for their help, he'd give them more seeds.
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