Old Yutou shook his head while eating pork rib soup and said, "It's not so easy to spend money! Save more money in your hands, and you have to deal with whatever happens in the future! By the way, Dahai, you go to town tomorrow Go back and buy more grain. I don’t know when it will rain from the weather! If the drought does not ease, the price of grain will definitely rise.”
Yu Caifeng frowned and said, "In the dog days, the food is prone to worms! If you buy too much, it will rain in a few days, and the food will be ruined?"
Old Yu finished eating the last piece of pork ribs, looked at the pair of children and said, "Buy more sorghum, wheat and so on. When the weather is sunny, pull them out to dry more, and you won't lose much!"
Yu Caifeng remembered what happened when her family was in the Northeast, and said worriedly: "Father, do you want to remind the village chief to let everyone in the village store up some food. Otherwise, only our family will have food at that time, and we can borrow one or the other to ask for it. It won't last long! If people are hungry, they won't talk about feelings!"
During the drought in Northeast China last year, their family's food could last until the beginning of spring, but they were worried about it later, so they had to leave their hometown to join their natal family. She didn't want her younger brother's family to repeat the same mistakes.
Old Yu thought for a while, nodded and said, "After dinner, I'll go to the elder brother's house to chat with him."
Yu Xiaocao was eating delicious boiled corn. That's right, boiled corn! In her previous life, Yu Xiaocao would always buy a few ears of fresh corn when they came out, boil them until they were soft and glutinous, and they would leave a lasting fragrance in her mouth. She loves this bite.
After being transmigrated, corn has not yet spread to the Central Plains, and there is nothing to eat if you want to eat it. After finally getting the seeds from the Xiaojun Wang, and planting more than ten acres of corn, how can I not get a few ears to satisfy my hunger
Taking advantage of these few days, when the supervisor of Xiaojun Wang was not around, Yu Xiaocao asked Xiaobutianshi to ripen some corn. Today, he picked more than a dozen ears of corn cobs and boiled them for everyone to taste together.
After all, the imperial court valued corn, and when Yu Xiaocao came back, Liu Shi, who was making dinner in the kitchen, almost didn't freak out. Stealing and eating the corn that was planted on trial is a serious crime of beheading. Why is her girl so courageous, she broke the corn back without making a sound. Now she can't grow up even if she wants to, so she is so angry that she is holding the fire pick stick and pushing the grass to beat her. Fortunately, Xiaocao's legs and feet are fast and flexible, so she can avoid being "poisonous".
Seeing Yu Xiaocao gnawing on corn like a little squirrel, Liu gritted his teeth and said, "Eat! You dare to eat it in your mouth!! If the county prince finds out, I won't blame you if you don't beat me." !! If it is reported to the imperial court, it might be beheaded!"
Yu Xiaocao rolled her eyes disapprovingly, and said, "Don't you just eat ears of corn? As for what? It doesn't matter how many ears of so much corn you eat even if the king of the small county is here. I won’t go back, and it’s a waste if I don’t eat it. Auntie, Uncle, Junping, eat it too! If you don’t eat it, I can eat it for you!”
Seeing Yu Xiaocao's relaxed demeanor, Yu Caifeng relieved the tension in her heart a bit. What my niece said is right, anyway, it has already been broken off, so just eat it! She took one ear and handed it to her man, and said with a smile: "How big a belly do you have, can you eat more than a dozen ears of corn by yourself? Are you not afraid to hold on?"
Seeing that both mother and father had eaten, Liu Junping also took an ear, imitating Yu Xiaocao, and gnawed a big mouthful. The unique fragrance of corn spreads slowly in the mouth, with a hint of sweetness in the soft waxy.
To be honest, corn moistened by Lingshi water tastes better than waxy corn. Even little Fang Ping gnawed happily. Yu Xiaocao reminded: "Xiao Pingping, you have to chew it carefully before swallowing. Otherwise, when you poop, you will pull out whole corn kernels!"
Little Fang Ping chewed hard, not caring about speaking, and nodded vigorously to express himself.
Liu Yan'er also likes the taste of corn. She savored it carefully and took a long time to swallow it down. She said: "This corn is indeed a high-yield crop. Three or four corns are boiled in such a large pot. I weighed it. One corn The stick weighs at least half a catty. Uncle, how many corns do you think this acre of land needs to produce, and how many catties of grain it produces!"
Little Fangping tried hard to swallow the corn in his mouth, and said with a smile: "Yes, yes! There are so many corns, I can't finish them every day!"
Liu Junping knocked him on the head, and said: "You snack! Just want to eat!! The corn in uncle's field was planted for the imperial court. If you eat all the corn, what will you give to others when the imperial court comes to ask for it?" ? Don’t talk about eating corn outside, or the government will take you away and put you in jail!”
When Xiao Fangping heard that he would go to jail for eating an ear of corn, he immediately held the half-eaten corn, wondering if he should continue eating.
Yu Xiaocao felt that he was about to cry or not, and felt very cute. She pinched his little face and said, "As long as you don't tell it, the government won't arrest us if they don't know! We planted so much corn , one or two trees are missing, who can tell? Eat quickly, after eating, my cousin has something delicious for you!"
What Yu Xiaocao said was delicious was the stalks of corn. After picking the corn, Yu Xiaocao let the Butian Stone ripen the corn stalks. The corn stalks irrigated with Lingshi water taste sweet and fragrant, even better than sugarcane!
After dinner, each of the children held a piece of corn stalk and licked it relish. Xiao Fangping smiled and said, "Brother, the government won't arrest us for eating corn stalks, right? After harvesting the corn, let's chop the corn stalks back and eat them as snacks!"
"After the corn stalks are dry, there is no water, and they can only be eaten for a day or two. However, corn stalks are good for livestock. Our little gray and horses have winter rations! Sun-dried corn stalks , is also very good firewood!" Yu Xiaocao introduced the use of this corn stalk.
Xiao Fangping said happily: "Corn is full of treasures! Let's grow more varieties in the future!"
Yu Xiaocao estimated, "Our ten mu of land can produce at least 20,000 jin of corn. The corn is ground into noodles, and the staple food tastes better than millet noodles, and it doesn't burn your heart like sweet potatoes."
Old Yu was dumbfounded, and then he said for a long time: "This corn can produce two thousand catties per mu? It really is a high-yield crop. No wonder the emperor sent the county prince to travel thousands of miles to the west. If this corn can be popularized, the common people will not be afraid of starvation!!"
Yu Xiaocao sighed: "Yes! Your Majesty is really a good emperor who thinks of the common people!" So far, she is not bad as a fellow traveler, at least she is not a fool. Perhaps, if she is exposed one day, facing such an opponent, her fate will not be too miserable!
The gnawed corn cobs and corn leaves are left in the sun for a day and then used to light the fire. It wasn't until the corn cobs and leaves were completely burned in the hearth, turning into ashes and destroying the corpses, that Liu's heart was slightly relieved - no one should know, right
The drought continues. The Yu family went to the west mountain to fetch water every day and came back to irrigate the corn fields. The hot weather and the violent sun seemed to roast the earth.
On this day, Yu Xiaocao was wearing a straw hat and helping water the cornfield. From the distant mountain forest, the little golden cat rushed towards this side like a golden lightning bolt. Xiao Butianshi's voice was full of anxiety and a hint of joy: [Master, master! Something is wrong! !]
Yu Xiaocao didn't take it to heart, what's the big deal that made you so excited and happy
[Owner! My spiritual power is restored to the point where I can communicate with birds and beasts!]The little golden cat jumped on Yu Xiaocao's shoulder, showing off a little.
"Congratulations, congratulations!" Yu Xiaocao thought in her heart, it's a good thing that you can communicate with birds and beasts, what's so bad about it
The little golden cat seemed dissatisfied with Yu Xiaocao's absent-minded reaction, scratched her cheek with the pad of its paw, and said: [Be serious! ! What a big deal! !]
"Speak up if you have something to say, fart if you have something to say, don't be a joke, okay?" Yu Xiaocao was so busy that she almost couldn't straighten up, she didn't have time to chat with it.
Xiao Butianshi snorted unhappily, and said: [The birds in the forest are all flying to the south, do you know why?]
"Flying south? It's not yet the time when the weather turns cold? Could it be that the drought has intensified, and the animals are migrating predictably?" Yu Xiaocao was a little nervous. After all, natural disasters are often accompanied by man-made disasters. Do you want to buy a bigger house in the town, and the whole family will move there. There are people from the government in the town, so there should be no chaos.
Xiaobutianshi shook his head and said: [No, it's more serious than drought! !]
Yu Xiaocao became even more nervous, pinching the little golden cat's neck, shaking it vigorously, and said anxiously: "Can you tell the whole story? Don't just say half a sentence, can you whet your appetite?"
The little golden cat rolled its eyes straight after being pinched by her, and it turned into a ball of golden mist in her palm, floated out from between her fingers, and condensed into a golden kitten beside it again. Yu Xiaocao looked around like a thief, and found no one else, so she breathed a sigh of relief, and reminded Xiaobutianshi in her heart not to change in the sky, lest she be burned as a monster !
Xiao Butianshi rolled his eyes to her again: [Do you still need to say? The god stone has already been explored with spiritual power, and there is no one around!]
Before Xiaocao could continue to ask, it said solemnly: [I learned from those birds that there is a large group of locusts flying towards us in the south. Birds go south for a feast!]
locust? By the way, she vaguely remembered that locust plagues are usually accompanied by droughts. There are so-called sayings that "long droughts will bring locusts" and "drought extremes will bring locusts". The drought in the south is relatively severe, so the plague of locusts started from the south first.
Yu Xiaocao is not calm anymore, the locust plague is no joke. Once a locust plague occurs, tens of millions of locusts will devour seedlings and trees, completely destroy crops and forests, and bring unpredictable losses to people.
Locusts tend to water and like low-lying areas, and they will move from arid places to low-lying and flood-prone places. Dongshan Village is also a dry area, and these locusts should just pass by. But after the locusts passed, only famine and disaster were left to people.