1983Fishing and Farming between Mountains and Seas

Chapter 138: None of the green crabs in love escaped
"Wait, don't throw this away! You normally can't find something you want to find, and you just throw it away?"

Liang Ziqiang quickly grabbed her, took it from her hand and took a look.

"Why, is this valuable?" Chen Xiangbei was surprised.

"Ordinary clams only sell for a few cents to ten cents. The Xishi Tongue you mentioned only sells for ten cents. This one is at least sixty cents. When the market is good, it can go up to seventy or eighty cents. It's many times more than ordinary clams. Do you think it's worth the money?!"

After listening to what Liang Ziqiang said, Chen Xiangbei was amazed. She didn't expect that this ugly and even somewhat creepy thing was actually so valuable.

"It seems there's more underneath, and it looks like quite a lot!"

She immediately pointed her finger under the mud.

Liang Ziqiang followed her finger and dug down quickly. This time, because it was deep in the mud and sand, the shovel was more useful than the rake, so he used the shovel to dig down hard.

Sure enough, two, three, five, six...

They were dug out one by one. Although they were covered with some mud, after rinsing them with water, they were all gray-black in color, with a trace of blood-red liquid oozing out from inside.

Occasionally, the cuts were not closed tightly, and the flesh inside was exposed, looking like a wound, bright red.

"Remember this next time, this is called blood clam. It's not that it's been dug out and bleeds, its meat is bloody!" Liang Ziqiang told her as he dug.

Chen Xiangbei also used a spiked rake to dig in, asking as she did so: "Is this delicious?"

"I think the taste is just so-so, and it may even smell like blood. Of course, if it's cooked well, it's still fresh and tender, and some people love to eat it. It's not expensive because of its taste, but mainly because many people now think it's a great blood tonic. Anyway, it's said to be magical."

In fact, blood clams are the opposite of other seafood.

Many seafoods were as cheap as cabbage in the 1980s, but their prices skyrocketed unexpectedly in later generations.

Blood clams are expensive in this era. This is mainly because many people in this era believe that like cures like, and they have exaggerated the nutritional value of blood clams, believing that blood clams have miraculous effects in replenishing blood and regard them as "a great tonic." In coastal areas, it was once popular for women to eat blood clams during confinement.

It is precisely because of these reasons that it is sold at 70 or 80 cents, which is much higher than the price of ordinary clams.

In later times, although the price of blood clams is still higher than that of ordinary clams, it is no longer seven or eight times higher. The reason is that people no longer believe that blood clams have magical effects.

In the blink of an eye, the two of them had dug out half a bucket of blood clams, probably about ten pounds.

Chen Xiangbei dug like a money-grubber and couldn't stop:
"This is almost half a bucket. Did you get rich again today?!"

"It's not a big fortune, but it's a small fortune!" Liang Ziqiang was also happy.

They dug almost three feet into the ground, and only stopped when there was indeed nothing left.

Change position and continue looking for harvest along the water's edge.

"Are there crabs?"

The two men simultaneously discovered three or four crabs in a shallow puddle.

"This is a stone crab. Among all the crabs, stone crabs are relatively cheap, but they can still be sold for 40 cents, which is not bad!"

As Liang Ziqiang spoke, he collected several stone crabs one by one with curved iron pliers.

"How come your hands are so fast? I was afraid that one or two would escape!" Chen Xiangbei was a little surprised at the speed at which he caught crabs.

"You will get the same if you catch them a few more times! Wait, be careful, there are a few more over there, they look like blue crabs, blue crabs are at least twice as expensive, this is a good one!"

"Then you get a dollar? Hurry up, or he'll be gone in a moment!" Upon hearing that it was so valuable, Chen Xiangbei was more excited than him.

In a blink of an eye, I collected a few more blue crabs. Just a few steps away, I saw two blue crabs lying together in a puddle. Strictly speaking, they were not lying together, but one was lying on the other, looking very serious and working hard...

"Ah, this is..." Chen Xiangbei didn't react for a moment.

"It's such a familiar scene, can't you tell? Just like humans, they like to face each other when making babies, looking into each other's eyes. They look quite affectionate, haha." Liang Ziqiang leaned close to her ear and whispered, "The male is on top and the female is on the bottom, with their claws holding each other. Look how cooperative the female crab is, learn from her..."

"You deserve a beating!" Chen Xiangbei's face flushed instantly, "Pick it up or not? If you don't pick it up, both of them will run away!"

"I can't run away. I'm enjoying it! Don't worry, just watch it first. It's a good thing to learn more!"

"You learn it slowly by yourself!" Chen Xiangbei turned around and left angrily.

"Ah, what to learn? I love learning things the most. My second brother and second sister-in-law will teach me so I can learn something too!"

At some point, Litchi came over and called out excitedly.

Liang Ziqiang and Chen Xiangbei almost slipped into the sea at the same time, and were surprised by Lizhi's eagerness to learn.

The next second, Lizhi saw the pair of blue crabs showing their affection and asked curiously:

"What are they doing? It's so strange. Do we have to learn this too?"

Chen Xiangbei glared at him: Let’s see what you can do!
Liang Ziqiang quickly calmed down and explained seriously:

"They are fighting! They are trying to kill each other, it seems they have a deep hatred! The one on top is not as fat as the one on the bottom, but its small body can strangle the one on the bottom tightly. There are two moves that most people can't learn!"

Liang Lizhi seemed to understand:
"Why learn this? You and your second sister-in-law don't usually quarrel. If you really have to quarrel, you will give in to your second sister-in-law. You definitely won't put her down like this, right?!"

Chen Xiangbei: “!!!”

Liang Ziqiang: ???

Sister, are you sure you are really stupid, or have you been pretending to be stupid since you were a child?

In order to prevent Liang Lizhi from squatting and watching, Liang Ziqiang quickly took action and deftly put the pair of blue crabs in love into the bucket.

As soon as they fell into the bucket, the two crabs dispersed and stopped making babies.

Now Lizhi finally walked away with boredom, and the two of them finally heard silence.

"Look, what is Duobao doing? Does he like playing in the water?"

The two walked a few steps along the beach, and when they looked up, they saw the edge of the sea in front of them. Duobao was stepping into the shallow water step by step, holding up a paw and not knowing what he was doing.

The two men walked over quickly. Duobao was quite focused. He didn't even look at them and seemed to be concentrating.

"There are fish underwater. Duobao wants to catch them?!" Liang Ziqiang saw two fish in the puddle at a glance, guessed, and answered Chen Xiangbei.

It happened in a flash. As soon as he finished speaking, Duobao lunged forward and pressed his claws into the water.

This guy was also catching fish for the first time, so he was still trying everything. The two claws went down, and he obviously used too much force. A large splash of water was stirred up, first splashing Duobao's face. Some water droplets flew over and splashed on Liang Ziqiang and Chen Xiangbei's feet.

Duobao was startled by the splash he made and took a step back, feeling a little discouraged.

However, the next second, it found that one of its claws had actually hit the fish's head. As water splashed, the fish reacted violently and bounced up, landing in a shallower water, next to its hind leg claw!
Seeing this, Duobao became very excited. He dived into the shallow water, raised his head, and held a fish firmly in his mouth.

Liang Ziqiang took a look and found that the fish was not too cheap, it was a sea bass...

(End of this chapter)