Chapter 473 Cleaning up farmland
In the days after renovating the roof of Zhang Mingsong’s house, Zhang An and Zhang Jianguo were basically busy helping the villagers renovate the roof.
During this period, there were many houses renovating their roofs in the village, dozens of them, and most of them were damaged houses.
On the one hand, I thought that the renovation would be completed long ago, so I would feel more at ease while living there.
On the other hand, I want to take advantage of the good weather these days and finish it as quickly as possible.
After all, no one knows that the moody God will be able to clear up for a few days this time. If after a while, he suddenly changes his face like the previous few days, it will be too late to hurry up.
So in the past few days, before one family has finished, another family will come to the door, as if there is a queue.
The main reason is that everyone is very busy during the sunny period after the rain. Many families in the village are busy with crops in the fields.
Although the corn in the mountains and fields was almost destroyed by the heavy rain, everyone in the village did not want to give up.
It should have been the time to fertilize for the first time, but the corn seedlings are no longer in shape. Everyone looked at me and I looked at you, so I just reluctantly dug up the seedlings in the ground and planted them again. kind.
After so many years of farming, everyone knows that there is no hope for this season when they see it in this state.
Fortunately, it is not too late now. It is not too late to plant seeds again. The worst thing is that the harvest time will be later.
But compared to the result of no harvest, everyone can still accept the late harvest.
At first, only one family in the village did this, but later other families saw it and followed suit.
So the busy farming scene some time ago is now beginning to reappear in the village.
As for the rice in the fields, there is basically no hope, not to mention that many fields are still flooded.
Even if the paddy fields are not flooded, it is difficult to replant them.
The fundamental reason is that the cultivation of rice is too time-consuming. It is not as simple as corn, where you can just plant the seeds directly.
First of all, we need to accelerate the germination, then we need to cultivate the seedlings, and finally we need to transplant the seedlings. In this series, it takes more than a month.
If it is really replanted, it is estimated that it will not be harvested until December. Even the latest rice seeds will not be so outrageous.
And in November, the temperature will drop a lot. There will be no results from planting such rice. There is no doubt about this.
So everyone completely gave up on the rice in the fields and could only let it flow. In the end, they harvested as much as they could, and everyone was also prepared to harvest no grains.
Therefore, for a while, the villagers focused on replanting corn.
Although corn is not as valuable as rice in all aspects, it can at least help everyone get through this difficult year.
The Zhang An family now only cultivates paddy fields. As for the mountainous areas, there is basically no cultivation, so they don’t have to be busy with replanting like other families.
Renovating a roof is a major project that requires a lot of manpower, so when people need help, their home is naturally the first one to think of it.
In fact, Zhang Jianguo and Zhang An will take the initiative to help others without asking for help at this time. This way, others will take the initiative to help if there is something at home in the future.
By the time everyone in the village had finished their work, the water in the river had receded, revealing the familiar riverbanks, paddy fields and stone roads.
As everyone thought, the seedlings in the field looked a bit miserable after being submerged in water for so long.
Basically none of them were standing upright, they were all lying limply in the field.
Not to mention seedlings, even humans, after being soaked in water for so many days, are guaranteed to be softer than these seedlings.
And besides this, there are more serious problems.
The river water is washed down from other mountains upstream, so there must be a lot of branches and weeds in the water.
It would be fine if it were in other places, but now, these various things washed down from the upper reaches are all piled up in the fields on both sides of the river bank.
Have just finished replanting corn, and are busy cleaning up the garbage in the field again.
Although everyone has given up on the seedlings in the fields, we still have to deal with these weeds and branches.
Now that the river water has just receded, the garbage has not yet settled into the soil in the fields, so it is not too troublesome to clean it up.
If we don’t do it now and wait until next year to solve it, it will probably all sink into the soil, and it will be difficult to turn it over with a rake.
It’s not impossible to do it, but it will definitely take several times more effort than it does now.
No one wants to have trouble again next year, so everyone is busy with this matter.
Zhang An's family is no exception, but although their family has more fields than other families, the area affected by the disaster is only about the same as other families.
Because Zhang Jianwen helped transfer all his family's fields to the entrance of the village last year, the few acres at the entrance of the yard are on higher ground and have not been flooded. Naturally, there will be no garbage rushing into the fields.
But the few acres along the river bank were not spared. They were all submerged, and because they were upstream of the bridge, there were more residual branches and weeds rushing in from the fields than those downstream.
And that's not all. The strawberry field in the nest and the watermelon field with grass were also completely wiped out, and a lot of tree limbs were also piled up.
So it would probably take a lot of time to clean everything out of their house.
Getting up early in the morning, except for Su Ying, the family of three all carried pitchforks and started going to the fields.
After the school gave all students two weeks of make-up classes, the final semester began, so now Su Ying and the others are on vacation.
She is a little tired of staying at home now and wants to go to the fields with her.
But how could Wang Fang let her follow her? After all, she had a bulging belly, and the field ridge was not a good place. If she accidentally slipped and fell, the consequences would be disastrous.
And not to mention that she is pregnant now. Even if she is not pregnant, Wang Fang will not let her follow her to the ground. It has always been like this before.
When we came to the field, some of the thicker branches didn't take much effort. We could just pull them out a few times.
But those weeds, tree vines, and relatively slender branches are very troublesome.
Because they are not only entangled with themselves, but also entangled with the seedlings more than a foot high in the field.
There are even several piles that are relatively large, and more than one or two rice seedlings are entangled.
The three members of Zhang An’s family slowly untied the tangled weeds and branches bit by bit, and then carried them outside in batches.
"No, we can't do this in the afternoon. It's too slow. We should bring the sickle and use it to chop."
Although I brought a pitchfork in the morning, more It is handled with bare hands.
But this was too hurtful, and the progress was extremely slow. Only a small piece of land was cultivated in the morning, not even half an acre, and Zhang An was very dissatisfied.
So after lunch, Zhang An decided to bring the sickle with him when he went in the afternoon and serve him directly with the sword and axe.
“But if you use a sickle to cut, the seedlings must not be damaged, no, no, no.”
Although everyone said that there was no hope for this year's food supply, Wang Fang still had a glimmer of hope for them.
Zhang An wanted to take the sickle with him in the morning, but Wang Fang was afraid that he would also cut down the seedlings, so he refused to use the sickle. "Mom, the seedlings in the field are all like that. You can cut them as soon as you can. When the time comes, you can get them back to feed the sheep. If you don't use a sickle, just rely on your hands to pull them slowly. It will take so many years and months. , at our pace this morning, it won’t be possible to finish it in another half a month. Besides, our family has more than a few acres of land to clean, and there are also dozens of acres in the nest.”
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What Zhang An originally wanted to say was to simply cut all the seedlings in the field.
After all, it would be a waste to leave seedlings that cannot produce food until autumn.
It is better to cut it back while it is green and tender and use it as green storage to feed the sheep.
But when Zhang An thought about his mother's temper, he thought about it and let it go.
“And we still have so much millet at home that we can’t finish it in a few years, and it won’t be short of this season this year.”
“It’s better to chop it with a sickle and clean it out early. I can feel at ease as soon as possible."
Zhang Jianwen and Zhang An had the same idea. He saw so many twigs and weeds in the field today that it made his head grow bigger.
Finally, after much persuasion, Wang Fang was convinced.
The most important thing was that the warehouse of food piled up at home gave her confidence. Zhang An’s statement that she would finish it in several years was no exaggeration at all.
After all, their family has not sold a grain of grain in the past two years, and now there are at least tens of thousands of kilograms of millet in the barn.
Sure enough, I took the sickle to the fields in the afternoon and the cleaning speed was much faster than in the morning.
Whenever he encounters a ball of grass wrapped together, Zhang An directly picks up a sickle and chops it open, and it is cut open in a few strokes without any entanglement.
"Zhang An, why don't you call me when you have something to do? I'll be embarrassed if you call me for dinner next time."
Zhang An looked back and found that Chen Ze was running over. , and this guy took off his shoes, rolled up his trouser legs, and was ready to go to the fields to help.
Both Zhang Jianguo and Wang Fang are used to Chen Ze coming to help with work.
After all, Chen Ze has come to help with a lot of work in the past six months.
At the beginning, Wang Fang and Zhang Jianguo were embarrassed to ask others to help. After all, this was a rich young man, so what was the point of letting others farm the land.
But this guy Chen Ze comes whenever he wants, and sometimes he even takes the old man with him to do some exercise in the name of exercise.
This is true. At first, he just thought it was fun, so he wanted to come over and join in the fun.
But later I discovered that after following Zhang An’s family several times in the fields, his health was much better than before.
In the past, when I walked a little further, I was out of breath after climbing a high slope. When I went into the mountain, Zhang An had to stop and wait for him and Ding Yi after taking a few steps.
It’s different now. The food tastes delicious and the body feels great. Climbing up this mountain twice is no problem at all.
So this guy still likes farming a little bit now. Whenever Zhang An’s family has to do any work, he will come over to help.
That way, he doesn’t look like the city dwellers from before, he looks like he has muddy legs.
Not only that, he and his old man opened up a vegetable patch in the extra space in the yard, and now they are growing a lot of things.
On weekdays, they not only eat it themselves, but also often give some to Jiang Qiong and the others.
Later, Zhang An found out that this guy was just trying to show off in front of Jiang Qiong.
Because Jiang Qiong was also a city dweller who had never been in the countryside. When she saw that Chen Ze, a young man, could do so much farm work, she felt different in her heart.
"How did you know we were here?"
The more than an acre of field on the roadside has been cleared just now, and now this field is in the corner of the nest.
You can't see this place at all from the bridge. Zhang An was curious about how Chen Ze found this place.
"I went to your home. Xiaoying said you were here and I came over."
He is not stupid. Standing on the bridge, you can see so many villagers burying their heads in the fields. Working hard, Zhang An’s family has more fields than ordinary people, so he must be busy in the fields.
"Then you don't have to accompany Teacher Xiao Jiang today?"
Although Chen Ze is straighter than Zhang An imagined, what is surprising is that not long ago, he was not so straight I got that little teacher Jiang done without revealing anything.
Later, Zhang An found out that during the heavy rainstorm, this guy braved the rain every day to deliver supplies to Jiang Qiong and the others.
Because Jiang Qiong and the others had just rented a house in the village for a short time and did not have any reserves of daily necessities.
Especially during the days when the power was out, it was even more difficult.
Chen Ze thought of this immediately and braved the rain to send a copy of everything he had at home.
Anyway, give whatever you need, and give whatever you don’t need.
Just like that, after a few days, the little teacher Jiang was completely moved.
Then under the coaxing of Chen Lili and the other three, they were brought together by chance.
Later, Zhang An asked Chen Ze to thank God. If it hadn’t been for the heavy rain that lasted for so long, and Chen Ze’s stupid temperament, the two of them would probably still have to wait until the layer of paper wasn’t broken. A long distance run.
After Mr. Chen found out that they were all in the same village, he had met Jiang Qiong many times and had a good impression of this female doll.
Although their family is considered a wealthy family, they have no requirements for Chen Ze and his family to be well-matched in their personal problems, as long as the children are satisfied.
This can be seen from the fact that Chen Ze's brother took Su Ying's sister in the past.
"No, she is also at your house now, discussing teaching issues with Xiaoying and some training that will be done in the next few days."
Chen Ze said to Zhang An while carrying the weeds that Wang Fang had just chopped out of the field.
In the past, whenever Jiang Qiong was mentioned in front of Chen Ze, this guy would blush and become very shy.
Not anymore. This guy seems to have evolved and is able to handle this kind of thing.
"Oh? Did they get training so soon this year?"
Zhang An remembered that last year, Su Ying and the others did not organize pre-job training before the school started.
Because last year there was also a group of new teachers who had just graduated from school like Jiang Qiong and others, Su Ying was the one who went there to join in the work.
I just didn’t expect that the organization would start so early this year. It seems that the problem of teacher recruitment this year has been solved.
“Yes, it starts on Monday, it seems to be the day after tomorrow.”
Chen Ze is now just like Zhang An. He has stayed in the village for a long time and has become timeless in the mountains. He doesn’t know what day it is. .
(End of this chapter)