1994: Vegetable farmers strike back

Chapter 49: Seeding (Please read and vote for me!)
The sun at noon is like a huge fireball, baking the earth scorching.

An agricultural vehicle loaded with fermented pig manure was parked on the side of the mechanized farming road in Dongxiang Vegetable Market.

Chen Jiazhi, Ao Dehai and Zhao Yu, wearing straw hats, unloaded bags of manure and piled them on the roadside.

Fortunately, it was fully decomposed, otherwise the stench would make it impossible to eat.

"Lao Ao, I'll have to trouble you two this afternoon and tomorrow morning to spread these 1.5 tons of manure and quicklime on field number 6."

"Row."

One acre of field No. 6 has been sprayed with herbicides.

1.5 tons of manure is just enough for 1 mu, and the cost is 450 yuan. After selling the vegetables tomorrow morning, I can go get another truck and finish the No. 6 plot in batches.

When the three of them were unloading the truck, many people in the market saw it. Before Chen Jiazhi even entered the market, he heard Li Mingkun next door say:
"Scholar, you are really willing to invest. I heard that this land will be expropriated next year. All the hard work you put into the soil will be wasted, right?"

Chen Jiazhi wiped the sweat off his forehead and said, "There's still more than half a year left. How can it be wasted? As long as we can produce one or two good dishes, the cost will be recovered."

"How can it be so easy? How can we predict the future?"

"Why are we going south to Flower City? It's because Flower City's economy is developing faster. With good economic development, the demand for vegetables and prices will rise."

"Anyway, I wouldn't dare to invest like that."

"If you don't want to use the pig manure, I suggest you put up the shade nets as soon as possible. In summer, the film will not be as effective as the shade nets. If you don't manage it well, the film may suffocate the vegetables in the greenhouse."

The film can actually be used for a while, but the sunshade net can not only protect against the sun and reduce temperature, but also prevent erosion by heavy rain, which is more practical than the film.

The film can be used in winter.

Li Mingkun was as timid as ever: "Forget it, I'll take a look."

Qi Yongfeng also came out: "Brother Zhi, we are not like you. We have made a lot of money recently and are confident. Even if I want to invest, I don't have that much money."

Chen Jiazhi felt that Qi Yongfeng had changed a bit. The most obvious thing was that he no longer praised him for being handsome in a roundabout way recently.

Huang Juan was not as enthusiastic as before, maybe because things had slowed down. Although Chen Jiazhi helped Qi Yongfeng, Qi Yongfeng also helped to bring vegetables every day. Seeing him harvesting vegetables in large quantities and earning much more money than others, she felt a little jealous.

"It's up to you guys. Don't blame me for not reminding you when the time comes."

After entering the room, Li Xiu had already prepared half a bucket of hot water for him. His second sister was cooking at the back door, while Chen Jiafang was cooking. Yi Dinggan took out a pen and paper to write and draw.

"Go take a shower, Jiazhi, so you can eat and sleep after you've showered."

In this kind of weather, it is normal to take a shower two or three times a day, not to mention that I just moved organic fertilizer and there is still a smell on my body.

While taking a shower, Chen Jiazhi met Guo Mancang.

"Jiazhi, where did you buy the fertilizer?"

"It's the new one that opened at the entrance of the village. But some of their fertilizer brands don't have enough nutrients, so you have to choose carefully."

"I'll just buy what you want."

"Hahaha, of course you can trust me if you want."

Guo Mancang seems to have been keeping a low profile, but in fact he has been selling vegetables recently, and his business is very stable, with a good income.

Compared with Li Mingkun's timidity and thriftiness, he is more willing to invest, and now he is obviously preparing to stock up on some fertilizers.

Chen Jiazhi was happy to see this.

He is not afraid of others living a good life. As long as everyone is still a vegetable farmer, they can never compare with him.

After taking a shower, when he returned home, the meal was already on the table. The big, shiny, red pork elbow looked very tempting on the plate. Chen Jiazhi swallowed unconsciously.

"Brother, come and eat, you picked a good elbow."

"Eat it all, eat it all, don't wait for me."

"You definitely have to wait, otherwise I'm afraid you won't buy it next time."

"Brother Yi, why don't you just buy it?"

Yi Dinggan and Chen Jiafang have been producing pretty good vegetables recently. The area of ​​their small shed is no smaller than that of Chen Jiazhi, and they also have more open-air vegetable area.

Although various problems occurred along the way, his income should still be second only to Chen Jiazhi.

Yi Dinggan is not a stingy person.

"Seeing how much you've invested, I want to try my luck too. I can't always be outshined by you. I don't want to work for you."

"Uh……"

"I have more land, so my total investment is not less than yours. I may not be able to afford such a good pork elbow in the future."

Chen Jiazhi looked at his second sister, and Li Xiu also looked at her.

Chen Jiafang said: "You don't have to look at me. It can't be that Li Xiu can listen to Jia Zhi, but I can't listen to your brother Yi."

Yi Dinggan smiled proudly.

Li Xiu: “…”

Chen Jiazhi: "Second sister, are you sure Brother Yi is as reliable as me?"

Chen Jiafang raised an eyebrow: "How can you talk like that? You've only made progress recently. Your brother-in-law helped you a lot in the past."

"That's not what I meant..."

Uh...if it was more than a month ago, Brother Yi was indeed more reliable.

But things are different now. Without me holding you back, shouldn’t you, second sister, see through Brother Yi’s true nature sooner?
However, it is a good thing that Brother Yi and Second Sister are willing to take a gamble with him. As long as they can serve the dishes, making money will definitely be no problem.

I’m afraid that Brother Yi will be even less willing to work for him from now on.

The Dongxiang vegetable market was quiet at noon.

Even the dog lay lazily in the doghouse, not moving.

It wasn't until he heard the sound of light footsteps and a basin falling to the ground that Chen Jiazhi woke up dazedly. His eyelids felt as if they were weighed down by a thousand pounds, and he didn't want to sleep at all.

In the dim light, I felt a figure busying around in and out of the room.

After a while, I woke up and found that it was Yi Dinggan. He was putting the soaked seeds from the bucket onto the soaked cloth, and then wrapping it tightly.

"Brother Yi, what seeds are you soaking?"

"Veng Teng Cai."

"If you're going to plant seeds now, hurry up."

Chen Jiazhi reminded that today is the 15th, and there are only 10 days left before the 5.25 rainstorm. Local vegetables will not recover so quickly after the rainstorm, and the market will definitely catch up, but the sooner you go, the higher the profit will definitely be.

Yi Ding laughed dryly and said, "It's okay. I planted seeds yesterday and the day before yesterday."

Very good, very powerful, this is the Brother Yi in his impression who always has good luck from time to time.

How can you get lucky if you don't take a few more gambles?

"I'm going to be busy now."

The sun was already on its way down.

Chen Jiazhi took a hoe and went out.

Ao Dehai, Zhao Yu and Li Xiu all applied fermented pig manure to plot No. 6.

Ao Dehai carried bags of fertilizer to the field. Zhao Yu cut the bags open with a knife and poured out the fertilizer bag by bag.

Li Xiuze used a hoe to mix it evenly.

The three of them probably hadn't been out for long, they only got a piece of land. Chen Jiazhi soon joined in and carried fertilizer bags with Ao Dehai.

Wait until the sun sets before going to harvest the vegetables.

Although water spinach is delicious, Chen Jiazhi no longer has the passion to harvest it.

After the price reduction, the amount of vegetables collected did not decrease, but the profit from selling them was much less.

There was no more choy sum left, so they could only collect the "rotten choy sum" left by Liu Minghua.

The only easy and enjoyable job was cutting loofah and bitter melon, but in order to make her children more handsome, Li Xiu firmly monopolized all kinds of high-quality melons.

Maybe because we didn’t cut them enough in the past two days, some of the loofahs and bitter melons are a little too ripe today.

If the loofah is overripe, the flesh will become fibrous and unsuitable for consumption; if the bitter melon is overripe, it will be very bitter.

Not suitable for merchandise sales.

Li Xiu was a little troubled when she saw the overripe loofahs that kept appearing. Chen Jiazhi said, "The market is not good right now. It's better to save the overripe ones for seeds. The loofahs can still be used to wash dishes."

Li Xiu felt a little regretful: "This is the only way."

The market is going downhill.

In the early morning of the next day, all the vegetable farmers were a little depressed. They sat in rows, waiting for customers to come.

At the same time, several people including Liu Minghua saw another side of Chen Jiazhi.

Whenever he sees a potential buyer he's familiar with, he'll strike up a conversation, calling them "brother" on his left hand and "sister" on his right, and he's very humble when it comes to bargaining.

Just a week ago, Chen Jiazhi's motto every morning was: "If you want a bargain, go next door."

Things have changed now.

"Boss, look at mine. They're locally grown water spinach. They're cheap, good, and come in large quantities, filling enough to last you a while."

Even though he was rejected and ridiculed by many people, Chen Jiazhi never got tired of it.

Everyone looked at his baskets full of water spinach and cabbage hearts, and then looked at the way he tried to attract customers. It turned out that even a scholar had to face this situation.

They had fewer dishes and were not under as much pressure as the scholar, so they sold out the dishes after a night of grinding.

It’s different for Xiucai. The loofah and bitter melon are in small quantities but of good quality, so they are naturally easy to sell.

Cowpeas and green beans are also being picked again, but there is no shortage of sales.

But I have to eat more than 300 kilograms of water spinach every day, which is quite a burden.

Since the Chinese cabbage was grown outdoors and transferred by Liu Minghua, it was of average quality and had some worm holes, so it didn’t sell quickly.

What amazed them was that even though there were all kinds of problems, for four or five days in a row, no matter how much food was transported, Xiucai was able to clear it all out at the last moment, without any of it rotting in his hands. Sometimes he would even force it onto people's cars, and most importantly, he could still get the money back.

It turns out that you can force people to sell vegetables!

Several people were enlightened again.

In fact, Chen Jiazhi was cursing in his heart. All the crops taken to the market were sold out, but there was still some in the fields!

The Chinese cabbage that Liu Minghua transferred was damaged by flea beetles and had holes in it because he didn't take good care of it in the later stage. In the end, he could only pick the good ones to harvest.

He also kept a slightly smaller piece of Chinese cabbage seedlings because his own Chinese cabbage was out of stock and he had to rely on the Chinese cabbage from Plot No. 6 to make ends meet.

Customers who want 30 kilograms of Chinese cabbage still take it every day, and they are very efficient, just coming, paying and leaving.

Chen Jiazhi still wants to keep this client.

The other vegetables in Plot 6 will probably just rot in the field, and it will be difficult to recover the transfer cost of 1700 yuan.

In addition, the sequelae of allowing the large-boned green to grow fully also came. The second batch of water spinach in Plot 2 was a little old and had flower buds.

I can only put it on hold for now and harvest the water spinach from plot No. 6 first.

As for the remaining large-boned green groves, since the area is small, Chen Jiazhi plans to keep the seeds, hoping that God will be merciful and give him better luck so that he can keep some good seeds.

(End of this chapter)