After fleeing famine, I have thousands of acres of fertile land

Ye Qing scooped some water from the small bucket he brought and watered the pepper seedlings to moisten the soil so that they could germinate as soon as possible.

After Ye Qing finished watering the pepper seedlings, he took his small bucket to the wasteland. In the wasteland, Ye Lao Da and his son were working together to plant sorghum. Ye Lao Da used a hoe to dig a hole, and the youngest son carried a basket in one hand and put the seeds in the other hand, and then used his feet to cover the soil.

Ye Dalang and Ye Erlang were also working together to plant sorghum. They were all used to hard work, and they had planted half an acre of land in a short time.

Sorghum is not picky about the soil it grows in, and its stalks have many uses. They can be laid on roofs, used as dumpling curtains, and used as pot covers. Sorghum ears can be used as pot brushes.

Ye Qing looked at the sweet potatoes which had grown to about thirty or forty centimeters. The juicy sweet potato vines were growing well, with green leaves extending and crawling in the fields.

Ye Qing took a wooden stick and carefully picked up the sweet potato vines. Many white roots grew at the branches of the sweet potato vines. Then he turned the sweet potato vines to the other direction, thus preventing the vines from taking root.

The wasteland lacks fertility, and when the vines take root, they will compete with the taproot for fertility, affecting the yield of sweet potatoes.

The seedlings should be turned over when the sun is out, so that they will not continue to take root. Soon Ye Qing's face was covered with sweat.

There were only about a hundred sweet potato plants on this piece of wasteland. It took Ye Qing more than an hour to turn them over. Looking back at the turned sweet potato vines, he felt very satisfied.

Ye Qing counted and thought that from the more than one hundred sweet potatoes, he should be able to harvest four to five hundred kilograms. He could leave three hundred kilograms for seeds, and the rest could be roasted, boiled, or made into vermicelli.

Looking at the two mu of land that had not yet been reclaimed, Boss Ye was a little anxious. It was too hard to reclaim the land. The grass in the dry land had grown and needed people to pull it out.

Boss Ye decided to just weed the wasteland and not turn the soil over. He would sprinkle vegetable seeds on the remaining land and let as many vegetables as possible grow, so that they could be used to feed the rabbits later.

When Ye Qing returned home in the evening, he was surprised to find mint at the door. It turned out that his second brother picked mint before coming back. It felt good to be remembered.

Ye Qing washed the mint leaves with clean water, and then went to the stove to get hot water, and the mint tea was ready. Ye Qing took a sip, and it tasted cool, and the heat in his body went away a little.

The house was built, the crops were planted, and the basic survival problems were solved, so Ye Qing wanted to make some money.

Among his three older brothers, only the eldest one is a little older. The other two brothers are still old enough to go to school for a few more years. If they can pass the imperial examinations, the family can be exempted from some land taxes.

Ye Qing also wanted to have an excuse to recognize Chinese characters, otherwise it would be difficult to explain how he learned to recognize Chinese characters. Although traditional Chinese characters were used now, Ye Qing recognized most of them.

Ye Qing thought that the backyard was still empty, so he wanted to buy some chickens, ducks and geese to feed them. The ducks and geese could be released in the river during the day, and the chickens could be fed some vegetable leaves.

There are many vegetables planted on the riverbank and wasteland. We definitely can't eat them all by ourselves. Even if we make them into dried vegetables, we still can't finish them.

"Grandma, let's go buy some chickens, ducks and geese to raise. Raise more and leave the feeding to my brother and me."

"Qingya is really a successful person. Grandma doesn't have much to do at home, so she can help. The chicken manure can also be used to fertilize the soil."

Li thought for a moment and said, "Buy two more pigs, and your mother and I will feed them at home."

"Na, buy 60 chickens, 60 ducks and geese each. We can sell the eggs to make money later."

"Isn't Qingya a bit too much? How much food will it take for so many to eat?" Ye Dalang was a little worried that there would not be enough food.

"Brother, the ducks and geese mainly find their own food in the river, so you only feed them a little at night. You can bring back the grass you pulled during the day to feed them, and you can also bring back the earthworms you encounter when you hoe the ground to increase their nutrition."

Ye Qing thought about it again, and then said: "In this way, I only need to cut some pig grass every day. I will go to the forest every day to check the pepper and cotton, and I can bring them back along the way."

The rest of the family thought the same thing. Since there were many people in the family, each person could bring back some grass to eat. When the vegetables on the two mu of wasteland grew, they would bring them back to feed the pigs.

Ye Qing knew that the villagers who had fled the famine had not brought any hens with them, so they could only buy chicks. A chick cost two cents, while ducklings and gooselings were more expensive, costing three cents each. A piglet cost 300 cents each, and if they bought all of them, it would cost more than one or two taels.

The second brother was counting the money. Chicken eggs and duck eggs were one cent each, and goose eggs were two cents each.

Even if you can get 160 chicken eggs, duck eggs, and goose eggs a day, you can earn coins a day. You can get your money back in a few days. This job is worth doing.

Ye Qing added: "We can also eat an egg each every day, and we can eat meat during the Chinese New Year."

Everyone in the family was excited. What a wonderful day it was, they could eat an egg every day.

"I can't bear to eat this, I can only eat one every two days at most." Ye Dalang was already excited just thinking about it.

As for meat, a chicken in the town costs about 20 wen, a duck costs about wen, and a goose costs wen. If you calculate it this way, if you sell of each by the end of the year, you can earn more than five taels of money.

Ye Qing also suggested that each person should be responsible for production, and the profits could be split 40% to 60% with the family, and the person could also save some money for himself, which would be enough motivation.

Old Man Ye and Mrs. Li have already handed over the management of the household to their son and daughter-in-law. Mrs. Zhou still has the jewelry given by Ye Qing, so she doesn't care about this little money.

Children will have money in their hands and can learn about financial management, so they will not be cheated by others for a small profit in the future.

Ye Dalang planned to raise geese. The geese laid eggs in the water, and the geese could swim and pick up the eggs.

Ye Erlang raised ducks. He had the same consideration as his eldest brother: his younger brothers and sisters were too young and he did not dare to let them go into the water.

Ye Wulang was preparing to raise chickens, so he followed his father to pull weeds and catch insects to feed the chickens.

Ye Qing chose rabbits, mainly because rabbits can produce a litter every month, reproduce quickly, and there is no need to find insects to feed them, just cut some grass.

Old Man Ye and Mrs. Li raise pigs. Mrs. Li is always at home, which makes it convenient for her to cook pig food.

Boss Ye asked several other families, and everyone wanted to raise some, so in the end everyone went to Wu'an City to buy them. Because they bought more, they could save twenty cents.

Boss Ye dug a composting pond on the riverbank outside the yard. The first thing he did every morning when he got up was to clean up for himself.

Ye Qing cleaned up the feces produced by the rabbits and dumped them into the composting pond. Then, she went to cut grass and feed the rabbits with her two sisters from her second and third uncles' families. The morning passed quickly.

In the afternoon, Ye Qing went to the mountain to see the pepper trees again. The pepper trees were now fifty centimeters tall and looked very vigorous.

In some places there were several pepper seedlings, and Ye Qing divided them up. He gave each family a few of the extra pepper seedlings. From now on, these would be the Ye family's cash cows.

After checking on the pepper seedlings, Ye Qing went back to feed the rabbits, and then went to the fields to check on the growth of the wheat and rice. When the time was right, Ye Qing planned to persuade his brothers to help with artificial pollination.