My 1995 Small Farm.

Chapter 459 Letting go

In the early morning, the sun rises in the east.

After a light rain last night, it was another hot and sunny day.

Pushing open the window, the fresh air after the rain rushed in.

A few cries of hawks reached my ears, mixed with the playful barking of dogs from the fields...

Needless to say, the dog and kite at home must have gone out to have some fun.

Chen Ling stretched and slowly walked downstairs.

It's been raining a little every night for the past few days.

After dinner, before I felt anything, raindrops started falling from the sky.

Sometimes, when the moon is hanging in the night sky, it starts to rain.

Sometimes it's just a light drizzle, which stops in less than an hour.

Sometimes it rains all night long.

In short, it's been raining non-stop every day and every night lately.

I quickly prepared breakfast in the kitchen, and forked a pickled fish from the water tower as my breakfast.

White rice porridge, steamed buns, and served with salted duck eggs, pickled fish, and pickled vegetables.

When you cut a salted duck egg in half, the yolk is sandy and already red and oily.

The dish features pickled fish, a deep reddish-brown fish jelly, and soft, tender fish meat.

Crisp and refreshing pickled vegetables.

It's served with hot steamed buns and light, fragrant white rice porridge.

It really whets the appetite.

"This pickled fish is just like salted egg and pickled vegetables; you can take it out and eat it right away, which is very convenient."

Chen Ling slurped down two bowls of white rice porridge and let out a satisfied burp.

"Yes, make more another day, this stuff is delicious."

Wang Susu fed her son and smiled as she asked, "Are we going to Huangni Town today?"

"Yes, we have to go and take a look. Chuangzi said there are a lot of defective products there, and the prices are cheap, but the quantity is too large. The garment factory has accumulated a lot of them, and he can't make up his mind."

Chen Ling responded.

"Are you taking Rui Rui with you? If you are, don't ride a horse, take a motorcycle instead."

"Don't take him. Let him stay home and play with our dad herding sheep."

Chen Ling has to go to the small courtyard in the south of the city today to try planting some things. He's been tinkering with some new varieties these days since he had nothing to do, and he's going to give them a try.

Now that Rui Rui has learned to remember things, Chen Ling dares not use spiritual water to accelerate the growth of things in front of him again.

After finishing his meal, Chen Ling mounted his little green horse and charged towards Huangni Town.

Unexpectedly, just as they left the village and reached the dam of the reservoir, a cry rang out from the sky.

Upon hearing the neighing, the little blue horse also let out a series of soft neighs.

Chen Ling looked up and saw a magnificent yellow-clawed falcon circling overhead. He whistled, "Er Tuzi, come down and fly."

"Whoosh—" After a whistle blew.

The hawk suddenly swooped down and flew low alongside the little blue horse.

"Haha, Baldy, your skills are truly worthy of being called a flying champion among birds of prey."

I just finished praising him.

Suddenly, I heard a sharp, whooshing sound of wings flapping the air coming from my left ear.

Turning my head, I saw that my two little pigeons had also flown over.

These two little pigeons have already learned to fly.

However, because Chen Ling raised them well and bred them as breeding pigeons, they were more affectionate than the pigeons kept in the village yard.

Pigeons are naturally gentle and affectionate.

Even when offered food by strangers, these domestic pigeons will dare to fly over and snatch food from their hands.

Therefore, it is no exaggeration to say that pigeons are the easiest birds to train.

Even ordinary people who have no bird training skills can become more affectionate than they imagine once they raise them properly.

"Goodness, you all followed me here."

Upon seeing this, Chen Ling felt a surge of pride and immediately pulled on the reins, urging the little blue horse to speed up.

Now nourished by the spiritual water, the little blue horse is plump and strong, glossy and muscular. Once it's let loose, its speed can be described as lightning fast.

Its long mane and tail sway in the wind, making it both beautiful and majestic, and giving it an exceptionally heroic appearance.

Around the little blue horse, a magnificent hawk flew in circles with two pigeons.

The hawk would occasionally display dazzling skills, soaring and swooping around the blue horse.

Sometimes they even dart past under the horse's belly with lightning speed.

The two pigeons were slightly less capable, but they still followed closely behind the little blue horse, flying low in the sky.

The newly built mortar road is wide and flat.

The little blue horse ran very happily, its hooves making a dense clattering sound on the mountain road.

Accompanied by the sound of horses' hooves and the cries of eagles, they sped towards Huangni Town.

Passersby couldn't help but stare and mutter curses, wondering who this showy kid was, riding a horse and releasing a falcon so early in the morning on such a hot day.

"What do you mean by releasing a hawk? I'm clearly releasing pigeons."

Chen Ling muttered to himself, then thought about growing the flock of pigeons a bit bigger in the future, and then making a few more bamboo whistles to tie to the pigeons' legs.

What a beautiful thing it would be to release pigeons every morning, watching them soar in the blue sky, making a 'whoo-whoo' sound as they flap their wings.

"Huh? Where are the pigeons?"

Distracted for a few seconds, I suddenly realized the pigeon was gone. I turned around and looked, and Baldy was gone too.

"Are they tired from flying? Never mind, they all know the way home anyway, so there's no need to worry."

Once the little blue horse was let loose, it became extremely excited. In the early morning, when there were few pedestrians on the road, it was able to run happily.

They only slowed down when they reached the county seat.

It knew that it couldn't be too reckless or disregard people in crowded places. But unexpectedly, just as the little blue horse slowed down, it heard the cries of a falcon and the cooing of pigeons from ahead.

Chen Ling quickly reined in his little blue horse and looked in the direction of the sound. He saw two pigeons perched on the eaves of a house.

The hawk, on the other hand, seemed more like a leisurely old man, perched on a telephone pole outside the eaves, preening its feathers with a relaxed air.

This display of power almost left Chen Ling dumbfounded.

"Holy crap, I thought you guys were tired from flying and stopped to rest at the back. I didn't expect you to fly up to the front in the blink of an eye."

"Coo coo," "Coo coo"...

Two pigeons, their crops bulging, perched on the eaves, their heads bobbing back and forth, cooing loudly. As if they had been waiting for a long time and were getting bored, the two began to fight and play with each other.

"Damn it, are you guys making fun of me?"

Chen Ling whistled loudly, "Let's go, lead the way."

Only then did the three creatures react to the sound, flapping their wings and taking flight into the sky.

After visiting Huangni Town, Chen Ling examined the substandard clothes and the quality of the fabric, and immediately decided to buy them all.

Actually, Wang Qingzhong meant that he wasn't planning on asking for too much.

However, when Chen Ling came here and saw that the quality was quite good, even the defective products were still decent.

Since that's the case, we might as well take them all.

Although he wouldn't sell the defective products as genuine ones, it wouldn't be bad to let Wang Qingzhong and the others sell them at a low price in Fenglei Town first, just to make the most of the market.

After all, those T-shirts don't actually generate any money.

Outside Fenglei Town, there are many people doing manual labor at the docks, so selling substandard goods at a lower price is perfectly acceptable.

"The goods are pretty good. I'll drive my tractor over this afternoon to load them onto the truck."

After saying goodbye to the Han brothers, he rode back to the county town. When he arrived at the small courtyard in the south of the town, he let the little blue horse, the hawk, and the pigeon rest for a while and then gave them some water.

Chen Ling took out a hoe, cleared away a patch of weeds, scattered some seeds in the vegetable garden on the south side of the yard, and watered them with undiluted spiritual water.

The lush green seedlings began to grow wildly, flowering and bearing fruit, which soon turned into large, dark green watermelons.

Chen Ling squatted down and knocked on each one, listening to the sound.

This black watermelon is different from those striped watermelons; the rind is too thick, so you can't tell if it's ripe or not.

So I just picked one out at random, opened it up and saw that the watermelon rind was more than two fingers thick, the flesh was very red, there were few seeds and a lot of flesh, and the appearance was not bad.

But after Chen Ling cut off a piece and tasted it, he frowned slightly.

"Tsk, the taste is still not good. Even the watermelon grown with spiritual water is not as good as the ordinary watermelon from outside. This grafting is a bit of a failure."

This black-skinned watermelon was grafted onto a winter melon.

It inherits the advantages of winter melon, with a very thick skin that can withstand long-distance transportation.

Moreover, they are large, with an average watermelon weighing ten to twenty kilograms, and some even reaching forty kilograms.

However, winter melon also has its drawbacks, namely that it is not very sweet.

Let alone growing it outside.

Even when cultivated inside a grotto, the sweetness level is not high.

"Now that the long-distance transportation problem has been solved, the taste has become a new issue..."

"Does it mean we have to nurture them for several more generations inside the cave?"

This was the first time Chen Ling had experienced the feeling of failing to grow anything in the cave.

"Sigh, it seems the Sun and Moon Grotto-Heaven isn't a panacea after all; we can't just mess around with it..."

"But it's nothing, we can go back and try different methods, and breed a few more generations to see what happens."

Chen Ling shook his head and beckoned to the little blue horse: "Come here, the rest is up to you."

The watermelon cultivation failed, but the peach cultivation went quite well.

Perhaps this is related to the growth time within the cave.

The peach tree was planted by Chen Ling as soon as he obtained the cave.

It has a long growing period and has now become a peach orchard. It can be said to be a naturally bred and optimized variety.

"No wonder that in later generations, only the small-time watermelon farms have developed a lot of new varieties, and they sell them in limited quantities every year. It turns out that this thing is not as simple as I thought."

"In the end, peaches are easier to cultivate."

Chen Ling took out a peach from the cave, washed it, and broke it open. The flesh was a deep red color, which was very peculiar.

Take a bite, and the juice will burst forth, sweet and juicy.

This peculiar peach looks no different from an ordinary peach, but the color of its flesh is quite different, being a rare deep red.

This was grafted onto a wild cherry tree by Chen Ling.

This unique and delicious new variety has emerged after only two generations of breeding.

"This variety is good. We'll graft it onto the peach trees in the orchard next year and sell it as a new variety. It'll be better than the current ones."

Chen Ling pondered to himself.

Then they gathered the watermelons from the ground and brought them into the cave. They also brought out a big winter melon from the cave. Damn it, they failed to graft the watermelon onto the winter melon. So they went back and cooked a big pot of stew for lunch.

On the way back, I detoured to a phone booth and called my brother-in-law, Wang Qingwen, asking him and Wang Qingzhong to wait for me in town the next day, as I would be delivering a truckload of clothes and fabric to Fenglei Town.

After receiving the notification, he ignored the kites and pigeons that were flying and playing, and rode home at breakneck speed.

As soon as I got home, I saw my father-in-law holding my son and yelling at him. Gao Xiulan was also holding a big bamboo pole and cursing. A group of dogs were running around on the hillside, barking incessantly.

Wang Susu looked up at the sky and blew her eagle whistle.

"what happened?"

"Ah Ling, it's good that you're back. Several of our chickens have been eaten by eagles, and the hawk isn't home either. Several eagles are circling in the sky. Let's think of something quickly."

When Wang Susu saw him return, she hurriedly said.

After the wheat or autumn harvest, once the crops are harvested, the wild animals in the fields have nowhere to hide. Many eagles from the mountains will take the opportunity to fly over and circle back and forth in the fields in the cool morning and evening, looking for prey.

This is a very common thing.

Er Tuzi would often join in to change things up, and Chen Ling would often take his son to see the eagles.

Unexpectedly, today, instead of circling in the fields, these eagles came and caught and ate their chickens.

(End of this chapter)