Chapter 342: Selling Prawns for Money
"What's the matter?" Lin Heng put his daughter down and asked while lying on the sofa.
"Yesterday, three wild boars came down from the mountain in broad daylight to eat soybeans and attacked villagers. Wang Kaidian and his group went to fight them. Wang Bing wanted to take credit for the victory but got bitten on the leg by a wild boar."
Xiulan said while eating grapes.
"Haha, this is really interesting. That kid is too ambitious and will get into trouble sooner or later." Lin Heng couldn't help but smile, then turned around and asked, "Did they finally kill the wild boar?"
Xiulan nodded and said, "It took more than a dozen people to kill one, which was said to be over 220 kilograms. The remaining two small ones ran away. Mom even went to watch when the wild boar was being killed."
Lin Heng nodded, turned to look at Xiulan and said, "It looks like there are a lot of wild boars this year. I'll go kill a few when I'm free. We've almost run out of meat at home."
There were only two strips of meat and a ham left in the house. After a summer, they not only ate them themselves, but also often gave them to their parents.
He is going to continue fermenting the ham. The flavor of ham stored for one year is still average, while ham stored for two to three years has a richer taste.
As a result, there are only two pieces of meat left at home, and the piglets at home are not big. If they don’t hunt the wild boars, the family will soon run out of meat, which is absolutely unacceptable.
"Don't worry, just take your time. The pork at home can last for a long time." Xiulan looked at him and said.
After that, she continued, "Let's eat first. I specially made chestnut rice, a large plate of stir-fried tea tree mushrooms, and egg yolk soup."
During this period, chestnuts were ripe, and every household went up the mountain to pick a lot of them. She peeled the chestnuts and mixed them with rice to make fragrant, glutinous and delicious chestnut rice.
"Wait a moment, I'll go tell my parents and be back in a few minutes." Lin Heng picked a small branch from her hair and said.
"Okay." Xiulan nodded in agreement.
"Dad, I want to go with you." Xiaoxia heard that Lin Heng was going out and ran over to stick to him.
"Okay, I'll carry you there." Lin Heng picked her up and took her out, but when they reached the door, he came back.
He ran to the small storage box in front of the sidecar and took out a bunch of flowers. He returned to the house and gave it to Xiulan: "I almost forgot. I picked this for you this afternoon."
As he spoke, he took out a flower and put it in Xiulan's hair near her ear. With her hair tied in a ponytail, she suddenly looked more elegant and beautiful.
Xiulan took the flower, blinked, and smiled softly, "Let's go to Red Maple Mountain quickly, and then come back for dinner."
"good."
Lin Heng carried Xiaoxia out of the yard and carried her to Hongfeng Mountain. At this moment, Lin's father had just finished feeding the shrimps and was sorting out their harvest from the mountain with Lin's mother.
Chestnuts were dried in three large bamboo winnowing baskets, Chinese medicinal herbs such as wild lilies and Polygonatum sibiricum were dried in two winnowing baskets, and one bamboo winnowing basket was filled with lotus pods.
Seeing Lin Heng, Father Lin asked with a smile: "Son, when did you come back?"
Lin Heng put Xiaoxia down and said, "I just came back not long ago. We have almost finished discussing the shrimp business. I have to go down tomorrow."
As soon as Xiaoxia landed, she ran to peel lotus seeds and ate them. She was very smart and recognized that they were delicious at first glance.
Lin's father and mother did not stop him because this was originally prepared for their granddaughter.
"Have you reached an agreement?" Father Lin was a little surprised.
"Yes, if nothing goes wrong it will be successful, and the selling price will be much higher than those offered by wholesalers." Lin Heng said with a smile.
Then he explained the situation in detail to his parents. The two elders were a little shocked. It was just as Lin Heng said, good things would never be hard to sell.
"Then let's put the cage down now." Father Lin said quickly.
"You guys go, I'll look after Xiaoxia." Lin's mother nodded.
Lin Heng went into the house and took out two traps, wrapped some feed in cloth as bait, and threw them into the two shrimp ponds respectively.
"You guys have harvested a lot of chestnuts these days." Lin Heng said as they returned.
Father Lin smiled and said, "It's over at Chestnut Mountain. The chestnuts this year are better than last year, and there are a lot of wild boar shit and footprints over there."
"Then after I sell all the prawns, I'll go and see if I can catch some wild boars to eat." Lin Heng said.
"Okay, we'll go together when the time comes," said Father Lin.
Back home, Lin's mother prepared food for them, including vegetables, lotus pods and chestnuts.
"By the way, remember to buy some rapeseed and wheat. We still need to grow some crops." Lin's mother reminded.
"The child will come tomorrow morning. Why are you saying this now?" Father Lin looked at her and said.
"I'm afraid I'll forget it tomorrow, so what's wrong with saying it again first?" Lin's mother glared at her husband.
"I understand." Lin Heng agreed and went home with Xiaoxia in his arms.
When they opened the door, Xiulan had already placed the dishes on the table waiting for them.
"I poured you some sweet wine." Xiulan said with a smile.
"Okay." Lin Heng smiled and sat down, took a big sip of rice wine, then picked up the chopsticks and took a bite of the stir-fried tea tree mushrooms.
This kind of mushroom is very chewy after being dry-fried with lard, and it still has the original aroma of the mushroom, making it a perfect match with rice.
In addition to this, Xiulan also made stir-fried winter melon and stir-fried pork with sour beans.
"It's a pity that we didn't pick many tea tree mushrooms this year, so we won't be able to eat them next year." Xiulan said regretfully.
"Mushrooms are generally not doing well this year. Let's see what the situation will be next year." Lin Heng said.
Compared to last year, picking mushrooms this year is much more difficult, especially good mushrooms such as Matsutake.
"I hope there will be more next year, so I can pick mushrooms then." Xiulan said with a smile. It was a helpless thing for her not to be able to go up the mountain with a big belly.
"Okay, I'll accompany you then." Lin Heng said with a smile.
They chatted while eating. The chestnut rice was particularly sweet and Xiaoxia liked it the most.
After eating and washing up, it was already half past nine. The weather was getting cooler in late autumn, so the three of them did not stay in the yard for long and went back to the bedroom to rest early.
The next morning, Lin Heng got up early, had a simple breakfast, and went to Hongfeng Mountain with his elder brother.
After oxygenating the shrimp and packing them, the two drove to the city.
Lin Heng first went to the largest Taibai Restaurant to have the goods inspected.
After confirming that there was no problem, the order was confirmed immediately. Two hundred kilograms of fresh shrimp were directly requested. After agreeing on a time, Lin Heng went to other restaurants and negotiated many orders in one day.
We also talked to several state-owned companies that specialize in purchasing seafood, because after all, there are relatively few restaurants, and the larger ones have to rely on these companies to sell.
After the deal is done, the next step is to exchange money for goods.
Originally, he asked Liu Sheng to help deliver the goods, but after thinking about it carefully, he felt that the time was not right, so he decided to do it himself first.
After renting a tractor and buying several bottles of oxygen, it took Lin Heng five full days to finally sell the first batch of shrimps.
With this first batch of business, it will become easier to do other businesses in the future.
In the next few days, Lin Heng talked to a state-owned company that specialized in purchasing aquatic products. After the negotiation, he sold all the prawns in five batches.
Many people in the village have been observing these days, because every once in a while there are trucks going to Hongfeng Mountain to transport goods, and the villagers also know that the green shrimps farmed by Lin Heng have matured.
The most heated discussion in the village these days is whether Lin Heng's shrimps are making money or losing money.
In the blink of an eye, it was already November 1st. There were no more cars coming to Hongfeng Mountain, and most of the prawns in Lin Heng’s pond had been sold.
Payments for the goods have also been arriving gradually.
That afternoon, at Hongfeng Mountain, Lin Heng was holding an account book and calculating the expenses and income, trying to figure out how much money they had earned.
Sitting in front of him were Xiulan, Lin's father and mother.
The reason why Lin Heng waited until today to settle the accounts was that he did not want to reveal whether he made money or lost money too early.
His eldest brother, third father, cousin Lin Hai and others had come to help before. They all wanted to know Lin Heng's profit results.
But Lin Heng never settled the account and waited until today to do so.
Seeing Lin Heng stop writing, Xiulan and Lin's father and mother all showed anticipation.
Lin Heng shook his head and said, "It seems that raising shrimps is not suitable."
Father Lin couldn't help but asked nervously: "What's wrong? Did we lose money?"
"Impossible?" Lin's mother said in disbelief.
Lin Heng smiled and shook his head: "I didn't lose money. This time, the shrimps were sold for a total of 16,218 yuan. After deducting various costs, I still made 10,000 yuan in the end."
"That's not enough! We're making a lot of money!" Father Lin said in surprise. For a moment he didn't know where to put his hands, and he started walking around the room.
"That's right, earning more than 10,000 yuan a year is simply making a fortune!" Lin's mother was so happy that she couldn't close her mouth. She patted Lin Heng's shoulder and said, "Son, you said that raising shrimps is not suitable. Are you deliberately scaring us?"
Even Xiulan nodded and said, "It's great that we didn't lose money in the first year and made so much money."
She had been thinking about how to comfort Lin Heng if she lost money, but she didn't expect that she would make money in the end. It was totally unexpected, and she felt relieved all of a sudden.
Lin Heng explained: "Raising shrimps takes too much effort. I have to stay in the pond every day to check the water quality and observe the shrimps, but I only make this much money, so I think it's not worth it."
The reason why he was able to make money this time was largely due to his breeding experience in his previous life. He had paid all the tuition fees in his previous life, so he could succeed directly in this life.
But he found that this thing was a bit too delicate. The cost of feed was already high, and now transportation is underdeveloped, there is no cold chain transportation, and there is not even a large cold storage in the city.
Although green shrimps are expensive, a lot of effort is put into every step of the production process, which is very worrying.
Also, although there are rivers here, most of the land is mountainous, making it difficult to expand the scale of breeding.
Lin Heng added: "Moreover, if we take into account the expenses of building the shrimp pond last year, the final profit would only be one thousand yuan."
Lin's mother disagreed with Lin Heng's idea: "I think it's good. We have already mastered the basic breeding techniques this year. It will be good to make 10,000 yuan every year in the future."
Father Lin smiled and patted Lin Heng on the shoulder and said, "I think it's good too. There are not many businesses that can make 10,000 yuan a year these days. It doesn't matter if you put in some effort. Planting crops is also a lot of work, but in the end, you won't make as much as you do from shrimp farming. If it weren't for the new seeds and fertilizers, we wouldn't even have enough to eat."
Compared to Lin Heng's idea, Lin's father and mother were completely content with a small fortune, and they felt that this was good enough.
Xiulan understood what Lin Heng was thinking, and looked at him and said, "Mom and Dad are right. We don't have to worry about food and clothing now. We can take our time with other things. We will eventually get them if we accumulate them slowly."
She knew that Lin Heng wanted to open a feed factory, and that it would take three or four years with this little profit to buy machinery, which was too slow for him.
Lin Heng thought for a while, then smiled and sighed, "Alas, you are right, I am indeed a little greedy."
Xiulan's reminder made him realize that he had indeed fallen into a dead end. He felt that now was a good time to start a feed factory so that he could directly catch the wind of reform in four years.
So he couldn't wait to build and operate the feed mill.
But after his parents and Xiulan reminded him, he came to his senses. Yes, even if the feed factory cannot be opened, so what? He can still make money by investing the money he earns in other industries.
There is absolutely no point in worrying about things that you can't get. After all, you still have the first-hand opportunities in the next 40 years, and there is plenty of room for error.
Lin Heng smiled and said, "Now that we've made the money, we should spend it. Dad, Mom, Xiulan, if you want to buy anything, let's go buy it. It can be considered a reward for our hard work for a year."
Xiulan smiled and said, "You and I don't have to be so separate. See what mom and dad want to buy."
"What are you going to spend? Save it all. I don't want to buy anything. Ask your mother." Father Lin looked at him and said.
Mother Lin also shook her head: "I don't have anything I want to buy, so don't spend money recklessly."
Lin Heng smiled and said, "That's definitely not possible. If you don't want to spend it, I'll give you each one thousand as salary. You've all worked hard for a year."
Father Lin said quickly, "I really don't want to buy anything. You should keep the money. We will have to spend a lot of money when our two children are born next year. Your mother and I have made hundreds of dollars catching scorpions this year. We have plenty of money to spend, so don't worry."
"If you really want to buy it, just buy one set of clothes for each of us, and don't spend money on other things." Lin's mother said with a smile.
"Okay, I'll buy you some simple things, and then we'll celebrate properly." Lin Heng said.
He knows his parents' mentality very well. If you insist on spending a lot of money, they will definitely not agree. But if you ask them to spend a small amount of money, they will accept it.
Xiulan reminded, "Remember to buy something for Big Brother and Third Father. They have helped a lot this year."
"I remember this." Lin Heng nodded, took a deep breath, and looked at the hot sun outside with some happiness.
It was already late autumn, and the two banks were covered with red and yellow leaves reflecting the blue sky and clear water, which was simply beautiful beyond words.
Just like the mood of Lin Heng's family at the moment, they are surrounded by all kinds of colorful emotions.
"Dad, can you buy me a toy? This year... I helped feed the chickens." Xiaoxia grabbed Lin Heng's clothes hanger, put one hand behind her back, looked at him with her big watery eyes, and thought for a long time before she came up with a reason.
Everyone was immediately amused by her childish voice.
"Of course you can. Xiaoxia has been very well behaved and capable this year." Lin Heng picked her up and kissed her.
"Yes, Xiaoxia can tell stories to people and write. She is amazing. Grandma will buy you toys too." Lin's mother said with a smile.
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
