As mentioned earlier, I don't have fire. Therefore, I can't melt the rosin and return it to a fluid state.
But as I've said before, children in rural areas have no shortage of imagination. I plan to use a technique commonly used in pretend play to solve this problem.
I now have some sharp stones on hand, which can first make a horizontal cut in the bark of the pine tree, and then make a long vertical cut.
Then I embedded the clam shell in my hand into the horizontal bark of the tree, so that the smooth, concave inner wall could temporarily store the remaining white pine sap like a small butterfly.
To increase collection efficiency, I followed the same method again, cutting off a section of bark and using the remaining clam shells to collect the pine sap.
This method was not invented by me; this method of collecting resin dates back thousands of years.
However, what people collect is raw lacquer from a type of lacquer tree. In the past, some lacquer craftsmen from other places would come to our village to find lacquer trees and collect raw lacquer. However, as industrial paints became more widespread, this technique faded from people's view.
I stood aside watching the pine sap drip into the clam shell, occasionally making a few scratches on the cut surface to prevent the pine sap from completely solidifying.
After about an hour, I saw that the two clam shells had filled with enough pine resin, so I carefully removed the two shells and poured the pine resin into one of the shells.
I know that to obtain resin as transparent as acrylic, these fluid pine resins cannot be exposed to the sun, otherwise they will quickly react and turn into the amber color of rosin on the tree.
I found a pine needle and gently stirred the pine resin inside, while my other hand was also busy using a willow fan to fan the pine resin. This would speed up the loss of moisture, leaving only the purest pine resin.
As the white bubbles in the pine resin decreased, I could feel the resistance from the stirred pine needles increasing, which was a sign that the resin was becoming concentrated and thickened.
I switched to a hard, sharp thorn that I had knocked off a bush, and continued to slowly stir the pine sap while fanning myself.
The pine resin thickened considerably, now resembling maltose that hadn't cooled down, requiring considerable effort to stir. However, its color wasn't the yellowish-red of maltose, but rather a translucent, crystalline hue closer to acrylic.
I'm so glad that I haven't forgotten how to do these things since I was a kid. When we were little, we loved to make these shiny and translucent little toys by mixing pine sap with other materials.
I never imagined that nearly twenty years later, I would still think of this kind of thing that only young children would tinker with. This inevitably makes me nostalgic for the carefree days of lying in the shade of a tree when I was a child.
Once it was almost stirred, I turned the clam shell upside down, and the pine resin inside stuck firmly to it like maltose. The next step was to demold the pine resin.
I found a fairly flat stone slab and laid a water bucket leaf on it. Then I placed the upside-down clam shell on the leaf and left it to dry in the sun.
The sun heats the oyster shells, causing the resin to dry first at the bottom. Because the oyster shells contain a pearly layer, the seemingly tightly stuck resin will naturally detach after drying to a certain extent.
The midday sun is very strong, which is perfect for drying the resin. Because there is no direct exposure to the sun's ultraviolet rays, I don't have to worry about the resin turning amber.
It will take a while to dry this stuff. In the meantime, I went back to the stream. This time, I planned to catch some fish to improve my life.
I originally planned to use stones to form a funnel shape in the stream, and then lay some green branches on top to make a fish nest to attract the fish's attention.
I drove the fish upstream into the makeshift maze I had set up, and caught them one by one in their nests.
But just as I was about to put it into practice, I discovered that a lot of plants with red stems, like weeds in the field, were growing in a depression not far from the stream.
I recognize this too. This plant with small red spikes on its head is called Polygonum hydropiper. It's an important ingredient in traditional winemaking, and we also collect it to feed pigs along with other wild vegetables.
However, this stuff has another use: raw Polygonum hydropiper juice has a certain anesthetic effect, which can cause certain toxic side effects on fish and shrimp.
When we were kids, we often bundled these plants together, then went upstream to find a rock to place on top, and used sticks to beat the smartweed. While beating them, we would splash water on them to help the smartweed juice flow into the water.
The smartweed saved me a lot of energy. After I pounded the smartweed a few times upstream, a lot of white foam appeared on the surface of the water. I knew that this was a phenomenon that would occur when smartweed juice entered the water.
After a while, I tied a green vine to my wrist and swam downstream to collect my spoils. I wasn't worried about eating the fish and shrimp that had been poisoned; once heated, the toxicity of the Polygonum hydropiper would be negligible.
The first to suffer were those in the waters near the poisoned water. Even catfish weighing one or two ounces that usually hid in the crevices of the rocks and yellow catfish were forced to come out by the poison, turning over a few times on the surface of the water before revealing their snow-white bellies.
I know these fish not only have few bones, but are also a rare delicacy, very tasty. However, the medicinal effect of the Polygonum hydropiper is limited, so I need to collect it quickly, otherwise the upstream current will dilute the medicinal effect and the fish will recover.
I went downstream collecting fish. Since I found catfish and other fish, I didn't bother collecting the smaller bream and the like, since they would come back to life soon anyway.
I walked downstream for about twenty meters, and the fish I picked up were all scuttled into the gills and pulled out of the mouth.
In less than half an hour, the vine I was wearing was already laden with fish of all sizes. I weighed them in my hand; they were quite heavy, and I estimated it to be at least seven or eight pounds of fish.
This small stream has produced far more fish than I imagined. To be able to catch so many fish in just twenty meters is truly a wonderful place.
Just as I was about to finish up, a catfish about the length of my forearm and estimated to weigh over three pounds was bobbing up and down in the water, choking on the water as if it would drown at any moment.
I immediately threw the string of fish I was holding onto the shore; compared to that big fish, the fish in my hand suddenly didn't taste so good.
As I ran, water splashed everywhere. I grabbed a piece of dead wood from the stream with my right hand and picked up a stone with my left. Before I even got close to the fish, the stone in my hand started to pounce on it.
It tried to dive into the water, but by then it was already quite disoriented. It darted towards me instead, and I was overjoyed. I raised the stick and smashed it down hard!
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