Chapter 12: Digging for blue crabs
“Haha!”
“Looks like I can make some money today!”
A smile appeared on Zhao Dahai’s face.
The mangrove ecology is very rich, and there is no shortage of small fish, shrimps, mud snails and sea melons. However, these are small things and are not profitable. However, there is one thing that can make money and the price is good, that is, blue crabs. This is a common type of crab in the sea. It eats small fish, shrimps, etc. It usually grows in places such as intertidal muddy beaches and mangroves. During the day, it hides in holes to avoid natural enemies, but more importantly, it Sunshine will kill them once they lose water. They only come out to look for food at night. This is the blue crab hole in front of you. This time we entered the mangroves, and the mud snails and sea melon seeds were just for starters. The real goal was to dig for blue crabs.
Zhao Dahai was not in a hurry to dig immediately.
There are many holes in the mangroves, especially the earthen dams on both sides of this small ditch. But not all holes are blue crab holes, and it is impossible for all blue crab holes to contain blue crabs. . Generally speaking, blue crab holes are relatively flat. In addition, blue crab holes are divided into old and new ones. The old holes are abandoned holes, and the new ones are holes that have just been dug. The blue crab holes are a little shallow, but generally speaking they are deeper. The bigger the holes, the deeper they need to be dug. In order to avoid wasting all your efforts and finding nothing, before digging blue crabs, you must determine whether the hole is a blue crab hole. If so, then determine whether the hole is a new hole or an old hole. If it is a new hole, you must also determine whether there are blue crabs in it. The newly dug hole. It is also possible that there are no blue crabs. This is because when the blue crabs come out of their holes to look for food and find that the sun is rising or the temperature is rising, they will immediately dig one anywhere before returning to their original holes. It is too late to find a small puddle to lie down in.
Zhao Dahai observed carefully. The entrance of the cave was damp and rough, with a puddle of granular black mud. I reached out and pinched it, and there was obviously water. This was new mud that had just been dug out not long ago. There were slender marks scratched by sharp objects such as knives or branches near the entrance of the cave. This is caused by the claws of blue crabs when they crawled. I carefully looked at the area of two square meters around the entrance of the hole. There are only traces less than half a square meter at the entrance of the hole. They all extend from the outside in. They are left behind by crawling in. .
Blue Crab Cave! New! There are blue crabs in it.
Zhao Dahai didn’t hesitate at this time, and dug directly with a hoe. The mangroves were full of tree roots, which was difficult to dig. At the same time, digging was to protect tree species, but there were no mangroves growing on both sides of the ditch. The soil for tree roots is generally soft, so use your arms hard and dig down to a depth of half a meter in three strokes and five divisions.
Zhao Dahai stopped immediately when he saw water at the bottom of the pit. Blue crabs need to be soaked in sea water to avoid dehydration and die, but at the same time they cannot remain submerged in sea water and need to breathe. When blue crabs dig holes, they will stop when they reach the water and dig a little deeper. They hide in the holes during the day by lying on the waterline. When digging blue crabs, you must stop as soon as you see water. Don't use a hoe to dig violently. Otherwise, if the hoe goes down, the blue crab will be split into two halves or the claws will be broken, and you won't be able to sell it for money.
Zhao Dahai pulled a few times to clean up the soil dug out by the hoe. He piled it up in a circle around the hole to prevent water from the ditch from pouring in. He reached out and carefully dug out the hole at the water line and cleaned it. while expanding it.
Zhao Dahai held the edge of the dug hole with his left hand and grabbed a ball of mud with his right hand. It was not big or small and could be held with one hand. He leaned down and pushed the mud ball in front of his hand into the hole. .
Blue crabs have amazingly strong pliers. For a big old blue crab, if you use the pliers hard, the chopsticks can be broken. If your fingers touch it, the skin and flesh will be torn. If you are unlucky, the bones of your fingers will be broken. .
There are no blue crabs in the cave. Blindly reaching out to dig out is like seeking death. Rub a ball of mud into your hands and push it in. Once it encounters a blue crab, it will be directly stuck in the face. In addition, the cave is narrow. ——The blue crab's burrow is tailor-made according to its size. It is impossible to make a three-bedroom, two-living room or a hundred-square-meter hall—no matter how powerful the pliers are, there is no use for it.
Zhao Dahai moved very slowly and stretched out half of his forearm. When he reached the bottom of the cave, he encountered a hard object. He pushed forward with a little force and the hard object moved.
Blue crab!
Zhao Dahai was so excited that his heart skipped a beat.
The bigger the storm, the more expensive the fish! The bigger the hole, the bigger the blue crab. The opening of this hole is more than twenty centimeters wide. If it is not there, it will be large.
Zhao Dahai stabilized his mind. The most important thing at this time was not to be afraid of running away, but to catch the blue crab safely and smoothly. He pushed forward hard and pushed the mud ball in front of his hand, which was a bit uncomfortable. I was so relieved that I grabbed a small ball of mud and went in to squeeze the blue crab tightly. If it was small, one hand would be enough. However, the one in the hole was larger. I put two hands in, spread out ten fingers, and pressed The wolf thrust forward hard against the wall of the cave, and dug out a ball of mud the size of a football. The blue crab's pincers could not be stretched open due to the pressure of the sea mud, and the mud ball was packed into a mesh bag and soaked in the ditch. It shook a few times and the sea mud scattered. "Ha!"
“This head is really good!”
Zhao Dahai picked up the mesh bag and saw a big blue crab that weighed more than one and a half kilograms and showed its claws. There is abundant food in the mangroves, including big and plump blue crabs. A half-pound crab costs forty-one pounds, and a pound of crab can reach fifty or sixty, so you can only earn one hundred and eighty yuan. I caught the blue crabs from the net bag and tied them with a thin vine on the edge of the ditch. The blue crabs were so strong that if they were not tied properly, the pliers would easily fall off if they struggled. Once they were dropped, the price would be greatly reduced and half of them would disappear immediately.
Make money!
Zhao Dahai felt happy, took a drink of water, took a rest, filled the dug hole, and walked forward along the small ditch with a mesh bag and a small hoe.
The sun hangs in the sky.
The mangroves are airtight.
There is no obstruction on the top of the small ditch.
It’s as hot as a steam oven with a fire.
Zhao Dahai was sweating profusely, his clothes were wet and dry again, covered with a fine layer of white salt frost, and the seawater in the ditch was already hot from the sun.
Zhao Dahai looked at the mesh bag in his hand and didn't feel tired at all. In two or three hours, he dug out five blue crabs, each weighing more than a kilogram. He got another three to four hundred yuan. .
Work hard!
Come on!
Roll up your sleeves and work hard!
Earn enough money to repair fishing boats early so that you can go out to sea to fish.
Zhao Dahai stepped on the water and kept walking forward until the sun set in the west. Halfway through, the sun seemed to disappear. It was so dark in the mangrove that it was almost impossible to see clearly.
Zhao Dahai stopped wading in the water, climbed onto the earth dam, and walked along the edge of the ditch. He turned on the flashlight and kept shining it on the mangroves on the side. The tide had not yet risen, and the bottom of the mangroves was covered with mud. There are small holes in the beach. From time to time, a few small red crabs about the size of a thumb crawl out. One has big pincers and the other is too small. These are fiddler crabs. Things like mangroves are densely packed. Sometimes You can even climb directly into the tree. When you get into the mangroves, you have to be careful about this thing falling from your head to your neck. It's not particularly painful when you pinch it, it's not as painful as a blue crab, but it's very uncomfortable when you're startled and pinched at the same time.
Zhao Dahai’s target is not these fiddler crabs. No one really wants these things. Blue crabs are the target. Mangroves are not the only places with blue crab holes in small ditches. There are more in mangroves. , but you can’t dig, you can only wait to run out of the hole. Night is the best time. As soon as it gets dark, blue crabs will come out of the hole to look for food. Ten minutes later, you have the first harvest. After about ten minutes, I found another blue crab.
"Is this the time to get rich?"
Zhao Dahai's eyes widened and he did not let go of any inch that the flashlight swept.
(End of this chapter)