Chapter 94: Collecting bees, peaceful days, encounter in the forest
“Buzz buzz buzz!!”
Smelling the taste of honey, the honey on the outer layer quickly climbed up.
Lin Heng was overjoyed, thinking that it was so easy to succeed, but he never expected that after a few bees flew over, there would be no movement.
After hesitating for a few seconds, he gritted his teeth and poked the beehive with the tip of a bamboo pole. Suddenly, a large number of bees flew up, some of them landed in the bamboo basket, and some flew back.
“There’s hope!”
Lin Heng's eyes lit up, thinking that this method could work. He leaned the bamboo pole against the tree branch and went to the side to cut another branch.
I poked the swarm of bees with a cut branch, and some of them flew into the bamboo basket.
After operating for more than ten times, the queen bee finally appeared. Lin Heng saw it from afar. It was much larger than an ordinary bee.
The queen bee hovered in the air for a while, and was finally attracted by the honey on the bamboo basket and landed on it.
“Done!!”
Lin Heng couldn't help but smile. Once the queen bee passed, everything would be basically settled.
Sure enough, the queen bee moved, and most of the other bees followed. Within a few minutes, the entire bee colony fell into the bamboo basket.
"Did it succeed?" Xiulan asked from a distance, holding her daughter.
Lin Heng grinned: "It's done!"
He succeeded in collecting bees for the first time and felt a great sense of accomplishment.
Carefully putting the bamboo pole down, Lin Heng looked at the bee swarm in the bamboo basket and felt a little excited, as if he had caught a big grass carp.
But what comes next is the most thrilling part. Transferring the bees to the beehive requires close-up operation.
Open the beehive and shake the bees continuously with a bamboo basket.
“Buzz buzz buzz!!”
Soon many bees flew out. Lin Heng was a little scared and used a little force. Most of the bees were shaken back in at once, and many bees flew out buzzing.
Fortunately, there was a lot of honey in the beehive, and the queen bee had gone in, so all the bees that flew out circled around and fell back in.
"Huh, I succeeded. It wasn't that difficult."
Lin Heng took a deep breath. He found that as long as he overcame his fear of bees, collecting bees was not that difficult.
Taking the bamboo basket away, Lin Heng used the lid to cover the beehive. Xiulan also came over from a distance with her daughter.
"hiss!"
Lin Heng suddenly took a breath of cold air, endured the pain, covered the beehive tightly, and tied it up with a rope.
"Were you stung by a bee?" Xiulan asked quickly, looking at his expression.
"Well, one escaped when I closed the lid and I pressed it."
Lin Heng stretched out his right hand in front of Xiulan, with a bee's sting still on his little finger.
"Bear with the pain." Xiulan first pulled out the bee's stinger, then squeezed hard on the stung area, and a little transparent liquid was squeezed out, and then she smeared a little honey on it.
"This is the only way." Xiulan said as she let go of Lin Heng's hand.
"It's just a minor injury, nothing serious."
Lin Heng waved his hand, packed up his things, and walked back with the backpack and the beehive in his arms. Xiulan walked behind him, carrying the backpack and holding her daughter.
"Lin Heng, is this a beehive you're holding?"
As we walked into the village, people started asking questions.
Lin Heng grinned: "Yes, I just collected it on the mountain."
"You are so lucky. You have a box of bees and honey, so you don't have to worry about anything."
"Yes, bees coming to cast their bees is a sign of great fortune and prosperity."
When passing by, many people looked at him with envy, and were shocked that Lin Heng could actually collect bees. This was really a very capable person.
Walking past Wang Jin's house, Wang Jin looked at Lin Heng holding the beehive with a big smile on his face and was stunned: "Did you harvest the bees successfully by yourself? Didn't you get stung by the bees?"
Lin Heng shrugged and said loudly: "Of course, collecting bees is not a difficult task. I am not hurt at all."
Wang Jin looked at Lin Heng's body and found that there were really no signs of stings. He felt a little bit unbelievable that this kid was not injured on his first time collecting bees. He was stung with several big bumps the first time.
"Would you like to sell the bees to me? I'll take one dollar. It's hard for you to feed them anyway, and it requires some skills." Wang Jin said again.
"Then will you sell your bees to me for one dollar?" Lin Heng glanced at the man. Did he really want to take advantage of him?
He thought about it carefully and realized that it was no wonder that the Wang family had never become wealthy in his previous life. They were a household with an income of 1,000 yuan in the 1980s and still were in the 1990s.
Shaking his head, he went home with his bees.
"Let's put it higher for now. If we put it lower, Xiaoxia might be stung." Xiulan said after returning home.
"good."
Lin Heng looked around the front and back yards, and finally came to the backyard carrying the beehive. He built a wooden ladder and climbed up, then put a board on the pillow extending from the wall of the second floor of the house and placed the beehive on it.
"Is this place okay? It's more than five meters above the ground." Lin Heng asked Xiulan.
Xiulan nodded: "This place is fine. When the grapes are planted, they can also pollinate the grapes."
Lin Heng put the beehive away and walked down. He couldn't open the small hole to let the bees in and out for the time being. He had to wait for half a day to make sure they wouldn't fly away again.
"Daddy, sugar!"
Seeing Lin Heng coming down, Xiaoxia pointed at the honey in the basket and whispered that she didn't dare to look at her mother because her mother didn't let her eat honey.
"Eat, you can eat today, dear!" Lin Heng kissed his lucky star. If it wasn't for Xiaoxia, he would not have been able to find this nest of bees.
Speaking of which, the timing of my discovery of the bees was good. It was a rainy morning and the bees were not very active, so there was less danger in collecting them.
"Let's make white flour buns in the morning. I'll make her some with honey filling. Don't feed her too much." Xiulan said quickly.
"Okay." Lin Heng dipped a little with chopsticks and fed it to his daughter. Her happy eyes immediately turned into two crescent moons.
Xiulan let Lin Heng feed her another mouthful, then left with the honey. Xiaoxia opened her mouth but did not dare to object.
It wasn't until Xiulan disappeared that she dared to whisper, "Spank Mommy!"
Lin Heng found it funny, so he took her to play on the swing chair, while he sat beside it and picked honeysuckle. When the swing chair stopped moving, he pushed it with his hand.
Xiongba was lying in the pavilion dozing off. When the sunlight came out and shone on his body, his ears moved, proving that he was still alive.
Time passed slowly. Xiulan made some white flour steamed buns and brought them, soup, and bowls and chopsticks to the pavilion in the backyard. The family of three sat around the table, and there was a silly dog rolling around under the table, begging for food.
"It's delicious. The oil residue steamed bun is so delicious."
Lin Heng took a bite and couldn't help but be intoxicated by the aroma of the oil residue. The wonderful taste made him unable to help but open his mouth and eat.
Because there is no baking powder, sweet wine is used to leaven the dough. There is a faint aroma of rice wine in the steamed bun, which adds a unique flavor.
Lin Heng, who often eats steamed corn bread, feels that this oil-dregs steamed bread is delicious.
"If it tastes good, eat more. We made a lot." Xiulan said with a smile, and she also took a steamed bun and started eating it in big mouthfuls.
Xiaoxia lowered her head and ate her honey bun, her eyes curved into crescent shapes.
After breakfast, Lin Heng, Xiulan and their daughter went up the mountain without stopping. Sometimes they were leisurely and sometimes they were very busy.
In the summer, right after it rains, it is the golden time to go up the mountain to pick mushrooms. During this period, there are a lot of porcini and chanterelles on the mountain, and other inedible mushrooms are also in great abundance.
"Honey, does your hand still hurt?" Xiulan asked again when they were on the mountain.
Lin Heng shook his head: "It doesn't hurt anymore, it just itches a lot."
Xiulan walked over and took a look. Her little finger was a little swollen and there was a red spot where the bee stung her, but it was nothing serious.
"I can only bear it and let you not notice it." Xiulan looked at him sarcastically.
"It's okay. Compared to collecting a bucket of bees, it's nothing." Lin Heng smiled.
While chatting, the two walked towards the back mountain, and soon they arrived at the ridge where they first picked pine milk mushrooms.
"Xiongba, today I have to rely on you to find mushrooms." Lin Heng rubbed Xiongba's dog's head and said while looking at it.
“Ouch~”
Xiongba was spinning in circles happily.
Xiulan took her daughter to pick up porcini mushrooms that were everywhere at the edge of the woods, while Lin Heng took Xiongba to the depths of the woods to look for better tricholoma, egg mushrooms and the like.
Recently, when he went to places near his home, Lin Heng didn't bring any bow and arrows, but only carried a slingshot.
Sometimes I don’t even want to bring a slingshot because I really can’t find any prey.
He planned to take a break and then go to Sanchagou Gorge. He was still obsessed with the musk deer he saw there. If he killed a musk deer, he could sell it for 1,500 yuan, which was too tempting.
It is easy to find mushrooms in the forest. Each type of mushroom has a mushroom nest, and you will get a reward if you find it.
It is difficult to say the least. I can't find the mushroom nest and I can't choose the right forest, so I can only pick a few mushrooms in a day.
However, Lin Heng has the Xiongba four-legged beast plug-in, so it is easy to find items no matter they are rare or not.
After walking a few steps, he saw a lot of chanterelles, but when he opened them, they were full of small insects.
In the summer, chanterelles get infested with insects very quickly, especially after continuous rain. Lin Heng shook his head, picked them up and threw them into the bag, then took them back to feed the chickens and badger cubs, which would be a good choice.
"I wonder how delicious this badger will be during the Chinese New Year." Lin Heng was a little greedy. Badger meat is much more delicious than wild boar meat. When fed with mushrooms, the taste is unimaginable.
“Woof woof!!”
He was savoring the badger meat when Xiongba called him from a distance.
Upon hearing the sound, Lin Heng quickly picked the remaining chanterelles, walked over, and saw a graceful orange-yellow egg mushroom.
"As expected of you, Xiongba, you are so awesome." Lin Heng carefully picked off the egg mushroom. This was definitely a good mushroom and it didn't have many insects.
With Xiongba's guidance, Lin Heng harvested the mushrooms much faster than a normal person who searched for them one by one, and found several blue-headed mushrooms and egg mushrooms in a row.
"Oh, I just regret that I'm not in Yunnan, otherwise I would become rich with such a dog." Lin Heng shook his head. Due to climatic restrictions in Qinling Mountains, the mushroom resources are still far behind those in Yunnan.
"Woof!"
At this time, Xiongba shouted again.
Lin Heng came over and saw it with his eyes lit up: "It's actually a tree of fungus."
Black fungus is one of the dishes that he and Xiulan both like to eat, and fried black fungus with bacon is very delicious when eaten with rice.
This fungus has absorbed too much water due to the rain, so it is tender and weighs more than one pound, but when dried it may weigh less than one ounce.
"Hey, why is there such a big wild grape vine here?"
Just as Lin Heng was about to leave, he discovered a vine wrapped around a tree.
This is a wild grape vine with a diameter slightly thicker than a thumb, but it does not bear wild grapes.
After looking at the root system first, Lin Heng discovered that the wild grapes did not have deep roots, so he decisively cut the vines with one knife.
He cut another wooden stick to dig out the grape roots. After digging out some side roots, Lin Heng took the initiative to cut off the main root.
The grape vines were naturally taken back and planted. Wild grape vines have strong vitality and are easy to grow.
We don’t have any grapes at home now, so it’s okay to plant some wild grapes first.
Wild grapes grow fast. Once you buy the grape seedlings, you can directly graft a scion on them. With the roots of wild grapes, they will grow very fast after grafting.
Throwing the grape vines into the backpack, Lin Heng continued picking mushrooms.
The forest is fresh and quiet after the rain. Walking in it looking for mushrooms is definitely a pleasure.
You don't have to think about anything. The only things in your mind are mushrooms. Sometimes you can't find even two in a forest, and sometimes you can pick a whole bunch in a small area.
It is full of unknowns and challenges, just like fishing. If you don’t lift the boat out of the water, you won’t know what fish you are fishing for.
The difference is that you may come back empty-handed when fishing, but it is very difficult to come back empty-handed when picking mushrooms.
Even if you can’t pick anything edible, you can pick some inedible ones to satisfy your craving.
"It looks like the tea tree mushroom season is almost here."
As he walked, Lin Heng saw a clump of tea tree mushrooms on an acorn tree stump not far away.
The cap of the Agrocybe agrocybe is gray-brown, the stem is white, the flesh is dirty white, and there is no ring.
The most notable feature is that this type of mushroom grows in clusters, and does not grow on the ground, but on rotten wood. Generally, there are at least a dozen mushrooms in a cluster after they have grown.
One bunch weighs more than one kilogram, and a large one may weigh two or three kilograms. It is easy and quick to pick, and there is no dirt on it.
Lin Heng came over and picked them. This bunch weighed more than one pound.
I looked around and picked two more clumps. Tea tree mushrooms are most abundant here at the end of July.
Although the dried goods are only two or three cents per pound, like honeysuckle, there are a lot of them and they are easy to pick, so many people go up to pick them every day.
After drying, it tastes pretty good, and is best when stir-fried or made into soup. Fresh ones are not very tasty, and Lin Heng thinks they are not as good as red mushrooms.
“Woof woof!!”
As soon as he threw a few tea tree mushrooms into the backpack, Xiongba let out a loud cry.
"What did you find?"
Lin Heng was a little curious. Such a loud cry usually meant good things.
"It's really a good thing. I finally encountered two today. I thought I couldn't find them."
Lin Heng couldn't help but smile, Xiongba found two red Ganoderma lucidum.
Moreover, there is not only red Ganoderma lucidum in this place, but also several Gastrodia elata growing nearby, with long flower swords growing out.
After picking the Ganoderma lucidum, Lin Heng looked at the Gastrodia elata again. The flowers had been removed. He used a hatchet to mark an X-shaped mark on the tree. He walked over to pull out the Gastrodia elata flowers and dug up some Gastrodia elata to take back.
Of course, they were not intended to be sold, but to be dried and stewed as pig heads. The pig heads sent by Tian Baishun had not been eaten yet.
The therapeutic effect of Gastrodia elata is quite good. It has the effects of calming wind and stopping convulsions, calming liver yang, and removing wind and unblocking meridians. It is often used to stew chicken in rural areas.
After picking mushrooms for a while, Lin Heng looked at the sky and estimated that it was already four or five o'clock, so he took Xiongba back to find Xiulan.
Not far down, I heard the sound of people talking.
After walking a few more steps, we saw people: Liu Lan, Jin Yan and Li Yan were picking mushrooms in the woods.
There were two other young men next to him, one was Liu Chengzhang from the Liu family, who was his classmate, and the other was Lin Hai, the second son of his third father, who was also his cousin.
"I was wondering who it was. Turns out it was you, Lin Heng." Liu Lan was the first to take the initiative to say hello.
"Lin Heng, you still think highly of the money you make from picking mushrooms. I'm afraid you can't earn as much from hunting a rabbit as you do from picking mushrooms for a whole morning." Jin Yan said with a smile, looking at Lin Heng with some resentment in her eyes.
Lin Heng glanced at the others and said casually, "You can sell mushrooms for money. Even a dime is money. Why not pick them up?"
Lin Heng looked at his cousin Lin Hai again: "Lin Hai, have you seen your sister-in-law?"
As soon as he saw his cousins Lin Hai and Liu Chengzhang, he understood that both of them liked Jin Yan and were trying to find ways to get close to her.
Jin Yan is indeed beautiful and attractive, with a nice figure with breasts and a nice butt, and is deeply loved by rural men.
"I didn't see it, cousin. Maybe he went in the wrong direction and lost his way."
Lin Hai shook his head.
"Then come with me and help find it." Lin Heng looked at him and said.
His third father was good to him, and he didn't want Jin Yan to marry into his family.
Although Lin Heng felt that people like Jin Yan would look down on ordinary families like Lin Hai.
"Okay." Although Lin Hai still wanted to talk to Jin Yan, he still agreed to his cousin Lin Heng.
Liu Chengzhang, who was standing next to him, saw this scene and thanked Lin Heng, his good classmate, hundreds of times in his heart. Once Lin Hai left, he could be alone with Jin Yan.
"Lin Hai, go and help look for it. It's raining right now and it would be bad if something happens."
Liu Chengzhang urged a little impatiently.
Lin Heng glanced at him and thought, "You don't even look at your own conditions. You are not good-looking and your family is not good. How dare you touch such a woman? You have been hooked and you don't even know it."
But he wouldn't remind them. As long as they weren't related to him, he was too lazy to help them change anything.
Just as Lin Heng and Lin Hai were about to leave, Jin Yan said with a smile: "Lin Heng, you seem to be very afraid of your wife. You don't even dare to talk to us when you see us."
When she said this, Li Yan couldn't help but smile and agreed: "You know what, I really haven't seen Lin Heng talk to any women."
Lin Heng glanced at the three of them, spread his hands and smiled, "I am indeed more afraid of my wife, and now that I have Xiulan, I don't want to talk much with other women."
When faced with provocation from others, the usual approach is to fight back strongly so that they dare not provoke again.
However, this is usually time-consuming and labor-intensive.
There is an even simpler way, which is to just give up. You say you are afraid of your wife, so I am afraid of my wife, I admit it.
Jin Yan and Li Yan were speechless now. What else could they do if they had already admitted it? "Lin Hai, let's go." He smiled and turned around to leave.
"Don't go. Liu Lan said you are very good at picking mushrooms. Let us see your mushrooms."
Jin Yan said again.
"She lied. I'm not very capable." Lin Heng said without even turning his head.
The more Lin Heng downplayed it, the more unhappy Jin Yan became. She immediately said, "Let's have a competition. If I lose, I'll give you all the mushrooms I picked. I don't believe that your mushroom picking skills are better than mine."
Hearing this, Lin Heng turned around and said, "Don't regret it."
As he said this, he put the backpack on the ground and said, "Look at it, all you can do."
Several people came over to check it out. The most common ones were porcini, followed by chanterelles. Although there were a little more of them, there was nothing surprising about them.
But what followed was so surprising that they couldn't close their mouths: "Why are there so many blue-headed mushrooms, seven or eight egg mushrooms, and two Ganoderma lucidum? How did you pick them?"
Jin Yan widened her eyes. These mushrooms from Lin Hengcai were so valuable.
In addition to porcini and chanterelles, she also picked three egg mushrooms and some wood ears. She felt that she was very lucky.
How come Lin Heng can pick so many good mushrooms? Did he worship the mountain god as his godfather? "Thank you very much. I will gladly accept these mushrooms."
Lin Heng smiled, took the egg mushrooms and wood ear mushrooms from her basket, and poured the other mushrooms into the backpack.
"Hey, couldn't you leave some for me? I was wrong." Jin Yan said aggrievedly as she looked at Lin Heng who was so cruel.
If Liu Chengzhang heard this, he would probably pour all his mushrooms back. Lin Heng put the empty basket on the ground expressionlessly: "Who asked you to gamble? Don't you know that nine out of ten times you lose? Remember this lesson next time."
Then he took Lin Hai, carried his things, turned around and left without looking back, leaving Jin Yan and the other four standing there stupidly.
"Is this luck or skill?" Liu Lan was confused again.
"It must be luck. There's no such thing as a bullshit technique in picking mushrooms." Li Yan shook her head.
"That's right, you don't have any skills. Next time we meet, I must win my mushrooms back." Jin Yan snorted coldly. She gritted her teeth. Not only did she not make Lin Heng angry, but she also lost a basket of mushrooms. It was really not worth it.
What they don’t know is that Lin Heng relies on a dog. No matter how good his luck is, can it be as sharp as Xiongba’s dog nose?
"It's okay, Jin Yan. I have some mushrooms here. I'll give them all to you."
Liu Chengzhang quickly showed his courtesy and took out his own mushrooms with a smile.
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(End of this chapter)
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