1983Fishing and Farming between Mountains and Seas

Chapter 266: High Buildings Rise, High Buildings Collapse

When he arrived at Yuehai Restaurant, Du Ziteng was not sure what he had brought this time. In his opinion, it was unlikely to be chicken claw snails, because the day agreed to supply chicken claw snails had not yet arrived.

"Is it blackfish or grouper this time?" he asked as he walked up.

Before he asked, Liang Ziqiang had already brought the things in front of him.

Seeing the snake-like thing attached to the catfish in the bucket, Du Ziteng's face twitched instinctively, but then he became happy:

"Is this a lamprey? I haven't received this kind of stuff in a while! I heard that the fishermen got it from a giant mackerel before. I've never seen it sucked on this kind of sea catfish!"

"This thing will suck up anything it sees, as long as it's a slightly larger fish, from a few kilograms to several thousand kilograms, it will suck it up!" Liang Ziqiang explained, "But it's still very rare in the South China Sea. Anyway, I rarely come across it normally. This time it was just a coincidence that half of the sea catfish I caught were sucked up."

Du Ziteng nodded:

"It is rare indeed. To be honest, the last batch they got from the giant mackerel was fatter than your lamprey. Yours must be a little cheaper than his!"

He thought for a moment and said, "We're old friends, and it's not much cheaper. I charge six dollars for his fat one, and I'll charge five dollars for this one!"

"This head is actually not bad. I'll take your word for it. Five dollars is five dollars!"

Every transaction with Du Ziteng was quite smooth, so Liang Ziqiang didn't bargain.

After all, my father just said that Zheng Liu charges a little more than one yuan!
From Zheng Liu it flows into Yuehai, and the price difference is quite big after going through all these layers.

After agreeing on the price, Liang Ziqiang and his companions carried two or three hundred sea catfish to the warehouse, but they were unable to weigh them immediately.

The valuable monsters are still clinging to the sea catfish!

"You're being a bit lazy this time. People pick the eels before selling them, but you don't even bother digging them out!"

Du Ziteng said, and shouted to the kitchen next door:

"Find a few more guys, bring files, scissors, kitchen knives, etc., and come over to dig lampreys together!"

After a while, five or six men and women came into the warehouse. They were all working at Yuehai.

"That's not enough. Call the cleaners as well! Also call the waiters who are not in a hurry to serve the food!"

There are even more coming down now, seven or eight of them have all come in, plus there are thirteen or fourteen in front.

They all carried knives. The most professional ones were long, sharp fish-cutting knives, but the others were all kinds of weapons.

There is no way around it. Dozens of strange teeth in the funnel-shaped mouthparts of the lamprey are densely embedded in the flesh of the sea catfish. Normally, you can't get them out by picking or pulling.

This requires using a knife, one cut at a time, to dig it out of the flesh of the sea catfish!
"Whoever has an extra knife, give one to us. Two more pairs of hands will make things faster!" Liang Ziqiang said.

Du Ziteng naturally considered this for him.

Someone really brought a few extra knives and handed them to Liang Ziqiang, Zhu Tianpeng, and Lao Peng.

Except for Manager Du, who didn't want to dig out such ugly things himself, everyone else at the scene had a knife in hand.

Du Ziteng knew a lot about lampreys, so he reminded everyone to take precautions, wear gloves, and not expose their arms.

There were two fat guys who were wearing short-sleeved shirts, so they went to the kitchen to find two sleeves and put them on before working.

Soon, there was a bloody storm.

One of the fat guys was a chef who had dealt with lampreys many times. He was very excited and was introducing the lampreys to the two waitresses:
“Let me tell you, it looks a bit like an eel, but it’s not an eel at all, nor is it a fish. The word ‘eel’ in its name is just a random choice!

What, you ask what it is? God knows what it is. Anyway, it tastes good, has no thorns, no spine, and only a little cartilage in its body. If it is not delicious, why do some customers ask for this dish by name?

You mean me? Of course I am the best at making this dish! Xiao Cui, let me tell you, when all the customers praised the braised lamprey, they all thought it was made by my chef, but it was actually made by me..."

Just as he was saying this, he looked up and saw his master coming from the kitchen and stepping into the warehouse.

The little fat man quickly continued:

"I stood by and watched my master cook the food with my own eyes! Through this process, I learned a lot from my master!"

His master cast an approving look in his direction...

Liang Ziqiang was originally worried that if he and Zhu Tianpeng had to stay in the warehouse and slowly dig out the eels, they wouldn't know how dark it would be by the time they returned.

Now, with a burst of chopping and killing accompanied by a lot of chattering, like a whirlwind, all the bodies of two or three hundred sea catfish were dug out clean.

Du Ziteng's method of temporarily bringing in more than a dozen reinforcements was indeed very effective.

Of course, this method was indeed very "torturous" for that batch of sea catfish.

The lampreys were all dug out and put aside, but the hundreds of sea catfish had a really bad fate. First, they were sucked by the sea vampire, and then they were dug into by various knives.

Before my eyes, fish blood was flowing everywhere, and every catfish had holes on its body and looked shattered.

Torture has never been so cool...

Liang Ziqiang's lampreys and his father and brother's buckets were placed in two different baskets after being dug out.

For now, let's call him Liang Ziqiang first.

His more than 100 lampreys weighed 29.4 jin. They were not fat, and on average, each one weighed nearly 2 jin, which was lighter than a real eel and more like the weight of some yellow eels.

Five yuan per pound, more than 29 pounds, is 147 yuan.

Then his father and his brother also dug up more than a hundred fish from their boats, and the weight was not much different, 27 pounds and 2 ounces, which came to 136 yuan.

The whole ground looked like a crime scene, with catfish all over the ground. No one was going to want them.

As for the sea catfish, Yuehai Restaurant never accepts intact goods, let alone this incomplete one.

It's so damaged that even if I bring it back to the dock and give it to Zheng Liu, he won't want it.

But Liang Ziqiang still picked up these things, which were not valuable in the first place, one by one and put them back into the big bucket.

The appearance is no longer there, but when you take it home, wash it, cut it, and dry it, it won't be affected at all!

After paying the bill, Liang Ziqiang received the money, which included more than a hundred yuan of his own money and more than a hundred yuan of his father's money, and put it all in his pocket and took it back.

After leaving the restaurant, the two were hungry, so they found a restaurant on the street nearby. Liang Ziqiang invited Zhu Tianpeng to have dinner together.

By the way, the five dollars of wages were also given to Zhu Tianpeng.

When returning to Sham Shui Po to sail home, Liang Ziqiang first drove towards Xiaolang Village and dropped Zhu Tianpeng off at the coastal pier of Xiaolang Village.

In this way, it would be very convenient for Zhu Tianpeng to go home carrying a flashlight, and it would only take a few steps.

Afterwards, Liang Ziqiang drove back to Changwang Village.

It was already a little late when he got back today. Liang Ziqiang gave his father and his brother's share of the lampreys, which amounted to more than a hundred yuan, to his father. It was up to his father and his eldest brother to divide it equally.

Liang's father also gave Liang Ziqiang 56.30 yuan. The 56 yuan was the income from the 200-plus kilograms of bluefin bream and normal sea catfish, as well as two bonito and more than 20 flat sea bream and black sea bream Liang Ziqiang sold to Zheng Liu. Adding the 147 yuan from the lamprey, the total income from the longline fishing trip today reached 203.30 yuan. Excluding the wages paid, there was still 198.30 yuan left.

In fact, today's more than 1,000 hooks have not been used all yet, and the income can reach about 200 yuan, which is considered a very high income for longline fishing.

Of course, the bottom line is that the "blood-sucking monster" on the sea catfish is valuable, and this kind of luck certainly doesn't come every day.

Liang Ziqiang remembered that he had not fed the broodstock in the evening, and was about to go to the shrimp pond with a flashlight, but his father told him that he had already fed the broodstock for him.

The twenty-odd basins of fishing lines piled on the floor of the main room were naturally a mess, and it would take time to sort them out.

Liang Ziqiang thought about it and decided that he was indeed a little sleepy tonight. He might as well go to bed early and get up two hours earlier tomorrow. In the morning, he would comb the fishing line and put on the bait. It would be better to do both at the same time.

I had 198 on me and asked my wife to take it. Now, with the 2,150 originally at the bottom of the box, I had saved up 2,350.

"Is it tiring? Do you think casting a net is more tiring, or is longline fishing more tiring?"

Sitting on the bed, the wife was also concerned about the first longline fishing and asked him.

"It's hard to say which is more tiring. Casting a net means drifting on the sea to find fish, which is tiring. If you are lucky enough to encounter a group of fish, each net will be heavier, and it will be even more tiring to pull it up. This kind of longline fishing cannot be done one net at a time. You can only keep reeling in the line, picking up fish, and constantly re-baiting thousands of hooks. Your hands will be more sore!"

"Then come here, let me massage your hands!" The wife pulled his hand over, massaged his forearm, and then massaged his wrist and the back of his hand.

When she rubbed his palm, he stopped her from moving any further. He closed his big hand and squeezed her small palm into it.

So the two of them sat together and talked.

"I heard from my dad that you guys caught a very strange vampire fish today? It sounds scary. Is it ugly? What does it look like?"

His wife said it was scary, but at the same time she asked him to describe it to her.

"It's really ugly, but I'm afraid you won't be able to sleep tonight, and you'll have nightmares if you fall asleep..." Liang Ziqiang's scalp tingled just thinking about that mouth full of sharp teeth. It's definitely the natural enemy of trypophobia.

From the perspective of prenatal education, he decided not to say anything. Of course, he felt that the ugliness that could be felt but not expressed in words was a bit beyond his ability to describe.

She clearly said she would massage him and help him get rid of his fatigue, but after a while, she herself became tired first, and as she was talking, her head moved closer and closer to his shoulder, and finally hung on his shoulder like a gourd - she fell asleep.

In fact, she got up as early as he did this morning and accompanied him to put on a lot of shrimp baits on the hooks. She was also busy making longline fishing a few days ago.

Although they were all light manual work, she would get tired easily given her current condition.

He picked her up, moving gently, and slowly moved her from a sitting position to a lying position.

Her face was quiet as she slept. Liang Ziqiang lay down in front of her and looked at her again and again. Her lips were like flower buds, her nose was straight, and her eyebrows were still beautifully curved even when she was asleep.

More than half a year ago, he was still a sour fruit, but now the childishness at the corners of his mouth has gradually disappeared, and more flavor has emerged between his eyebrows.

After turning off the lights, he quickly fell asleep after a tiring day.

When I woke up the next day and prepared to organize my longline fishing, I found that there was a faint drizzle in the air.

This kind of weather is rare, so naturally I decided not to go longline fishing and headed to Longju Ridge instead.

This time, after driving to Longjuling with Li Liang and his team, the result was inevitably disappointing, but it was also within expectations.

Last time, all other spring fish disappeared, leaving only the thousand-pound thornfish. This time, even the thornfish season is completely over.

The huge floating gill net only caught a few small fish and shrimps. It was hard to say whether the small harvest was enough to cover the diesel fee for the round trip.

Without the fish season, there is no decent harvest from the seabed diving here.

I put away the floating gill nets and fished out all the seabed fish. This time I have completely given up and will not come to Longju Ridge again for the time being.

As it happens, May is approaching, and the chances of temperature dropping will become less and less. The risks in Longjuling will continue to increase, and it is no longer suitable to set foot there.

On the way back, the drizzle had stopped and the sun came out a little.

Li Liang said with some regret, "If I had known there wouldn't be much fish on the seafloor of Longju Mountain today, I might as well have brought some longlines to fish out! In this weather, it's a good idea to find a place to fish."

Hearing him say this, Liang Ziqiang was a little surprised: "You have already finished longline fishing so quickly?"

"I went to the county town to have a look, and thought it would be too troublesome to do it myself, so I spent a little more money to buy a set of ready-made longline fishing hooks. I brought it home yesterday, and if it hadn't rained, I would have been planning to ask you to go fishing with me today!" Li Liang explained.

"Tomorrow! From tomorrow on, as long as God allows, we can go out fishing every day!" Liang Ziqiang thought that it would be impossible to go to Longjuling in the near future anyway, and the main way to go out to sea to fish next might be a combination of casting nets, longline fishing, and seabed diving.

Several people were wandering around on the sea, and now they could see some fish floating on the sea surface.

After walking around for half a day, they encountered two schools of fish one after another.

One was a needlefish, this time in a small group, holding up their needle-like long mouths and jumping out of the water from time to time.

Each of their boats caught nearly a hundred kilograms of fish.

Then, as we continued to wander around, we encountered another small wave of white mullets.

This one is a little less, estimated to be around 70 or 80 kilograms.

I returned to the village and brought the fish to the purchasing point. There were two fishermen selling fish in front.

After a quick look, it was found that the two men's catch today was no better than Liang Ziqiang and his friends'. They only caught a few barramundi and a few gobies, each weighing several dozen kilograms.

Deng Fei weighed the chin fish and said, "Even if this fish weighs a hundred kilograms, it can't be worth ten yuan. Your basket is only worth a few yuan. You didn't make much money this time!"

The villagers shook their heads and smiled bitterly: "It can't be helped. The two small schools of fish we encountered today are not valuable. This is how it is to make a living from fishing. We all rely on Mazu's favor! It's nothing like that in some villages. Going out for a night is like picking up money!"

Liang Nian, another guy who was weighing and moving fish next to Deng Fei, didn't take it seriously after hearing this. He wiped his sweat and said with a chuckle:
"You are probably talking about Longyue Village, right? That's not the way to say it! It's true that many people in their village have made a fortune by smuggling, but the crackdown on smuggling has become more and more severe recently, and they have caught more than 20 people in their village! Which one is more comfortable, sailing on a ship or going to jail? There's nothing wrong with the old saying, I'll just do my duty for a long time!"

After hearing this, Zheng Liu was very impressed with his subordinate Liang Nian's worldview and said:
"Yes, yes, what I like most in my life is people who stick to their duties!"

For a moment, everyone in the room rolled their eyes.

Zheng Liu, you really stick to your duties!

"Longyue Village? Isn't it the village where every household engages in smuggling secretly and many new buildings are built?" Zhu Tianpeng muttered.

"That's right. There is no other village called Longyue Village within a dozen miles!" Liang Ziqiang replied.

As soon as Liang Ziqiang heard the mention of Longyue Village, he instinctively listened carefully.

My daughter-in-law's second aunt Liu Mei had a nephew who caught a glimpse of Chen Xiangbei when passing by the Chen family. At that time, he kept instigating Liu Mei to destroy him and wanted to marry Chen Xiangbei.

If I remember correctly, the nephew who was praised highly by Liu Mei as having a bright future was from Longyue Village.

It is unbelievable that it was so prosperous last year, but only half a year has passed and the tall building has collapsed again.

Liang Ziqiang remembered that he had said something to Liu Mei last year, saying that Liu Mei's nephew would have "peanuts to eat" in the future.

Objectively speaking, eating peanuts might be an overstatement, but it's not that serious. But spending more than ten years in prison is very likely!
We caught about twenty people, and I don’t know if Liu Mei’s nephew is among them…

Two chapters are combined into one. Happy reading!
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(End of this chapter)