Affection for Sidaogou during the Famine

On the thirteenth day of the first lunar month, Niu Xiaoyun is back!

The pioneering team grew larger. After several discussions among the three friends, they also absorbed Niu Xiaomin and Niu Xiaolian into the team.

It is easier to get things done with more people, especially since the new members of the team are two half-adults who are older than them.

Next, they redistributed the work. Han Zhaozhao led Niu Xiaomin and his team to the other side of the hillside, where they chose a depression near the stream closest to the wasteland and began digging the silt.

The silt here has been accumulated over the years and is far away from human habitation, so no one has ever touched it.

With a shovel, all that was dug up was black, old pond mud.

"Wow! This mud is really black, and it looks very fertile!" Xiaomin and Xiaosanzi said in surprise.

This is the dry season. If they come to dig mud during the flood season in summer, they won’t be able to smell the stench.

The time to dig the silt is just right now. After lifting the top half-finger thick ice shell, the silt underneath is slightly frozen.

A shovel is inserted into the soil. The moisture is just right, not too soft or too hard. One shovelful of soil makes a large piece. One shovelful of soil makes a large piece. The shovel does not get stuck, but it can be shaped and is easy to carry.

They were working with great enthusiasm. Niu Xiaomin was shoveling in the front, and the four younger ones started to move the food into the basket directly.

If there is enough for a basket, two people can carry it away.

After digging the silt for two consecutive days, Han Zhaozhao quickly called for a stop. School was about to start, and the children's bodies could not bear it if they continued working like this.

After a day's rest, the three older children all went back to school, leaving only two girls, Han Zhaozhao and Niu Xiaoyun, who were able to work.

Anyway, it was still a long time before the thaw, so they were not in a hurry. After breakfast, they strolled to the fields.

The two girls began to spread fertilizer, smashing the silt they had brought into pieces and spreading it evenly on the cleared wasteland.

As the saying goes, manure is the treasure of crops, and saving manure is like saving gold. A thin person will have a yellow face, and a thin land will have no crops. Whether there is production or not depends on water, and whether there is more or less depends on fertilizer.

Since the ground could not be dug, Han Zhaozhao and Niu Xiaoyun were not idle either. They spread weeds on the ground and started to make fertilizer.

Han Zhaozhao had already shaved the hillsides on both sides, so there was no need to worry about causing forest fires.

Han Zhaozhao lit a fire and ran along the upwind side following the flames. Niu Xiaoyun stood beside him with a shovel to assist him. If the fire got out of control, she would cover it with soil to put it out.

The two girls carefully burned the fertilizer in pieces and dug up the grass roots bit by bit from the softened areas.

The soft grass roots they dug out were dried and used as fertilizer, and the hard ones were carried home at night. In this way, the two of them dug out an acre of land, meter by meter.

While Niu Xiaomin and Xiao Sanzi were resting, the five of them started digging grass roots and worked even faster.

Before the Waking of Insects, all the grass roots and visible stones on the ground had been dug out.

Han Zhaozhao now practices martial arts in the morning and evening, and works overtime on the farm in the space. He also drinks space water and space food all the time. His physique has changed a lot now, and he is as strong as a calf.

She didn't feel tired, but Niu Xiaoyun did. If Han Zhaozhao hadn't secretly supplemented her food and provided her with space water to drink, the child would have collapsed from exhaustion.

In this way, blisters appeared on her palms, and then they were rubbed, healed, and finally turned into thick calluses.

I heard that she has to hold the cat's tail before going to bed at night. She must be exhausted from doing such heavy physical work every day.

Han Zhaozhao felt very distressed, but there was nothing she could do. She had to pull her to work despite her distress.

The more you endure now, the less you will go hungry in the future. You won’t have to watch your family members starve and be unable to help, struggling and suffering.

She knew that many people starved to death during the nationwide famine in the 1960s, but those who survived were also miserable.

Most people are not only physically weak and suffer from multiple chronic diseases, but also have many health risks.

According to later medical research, children born to pregnant women who experienced the famine were particularly likely to develop cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

Han Zhaozhao felt that it would be more appropriate to help her good friends save themselves than to risk her own life by sending them food.

What is worrying is not the lack of support but the inequality. There are so many neighbors in the alley, who should she help and who not? If she is targeted, won't she be ruined?

Only by letting good friends fend for themselves and being tied together, nothing will go wrong. She doesn't want to test people's hearts, this way, it will be better for everyone!

As spring approaches day by day, the Waking of Insects is about to come.

As the saying goes, if you don’t plough the fields during the Waking of Insects, it’s like steaming buns without letting the steam escape.

As soon as the ground thawed, Han Zhaozhao and his team quickly took action.

He collected hoes and shovels from several households in the alley, and started to plow the soil with great enthusiasm.

They divided the land into sections and each person was given several plots of land. Some dug and some worked hard for ten days before they thoroughly plowed the wasteland.

One inch of plowing depth is equivalent to a layer of manure on top!

As they turned the soil, they picked up the insects that came up from the ground. There were many wireworms, cutworms, and mole crickets in the newly reclaimed wasteland, especially the fat white grubs.

This is good stuff!

They prepared canning jars, and they could fill a whole jar every day. Coincidentally, Han Zhaozhao's family "bought" two half-grown hens, and they fed them insects, so they grew very fast and saved food.

Niu Xiaoyun: "Zhao Zhao, your grandma is really good at calculating. It's just the right time to buy chickens!"

Han Zhaozhao smiled and said: Grandma, I'm sorry, I'm putting the blame on you again!

On March 3rd, shepherd's purse is as beautiful as golden elixir.

As the weather warms up, small green sprouts appear on the wild vegetables in the fields. Shepherd's purse, bitter herbs, dandelions, and ground cress... all pop out of the soil.

Sister Niu Xiaoyun was very excited. After eating pickles for a whole winter, they could finally see green leafy vegetables.

The wild vegetables are relatively small and mixed in with the brown weeds on the ground. They are difficult to find without careful searching.

No matter how capable a child is, it is difficult to fill a basket even if he runs all day.

Fortunately, the reclaimed land is at the bottom of the valley, sheltered from the wind and facing the sun, so the wild vegetables grow larger than those on the hillside, some growing as big as a tea bowl.

When they plow the soil, they will collect the grass together, and when they go home in the afternoon, they can fill a basket every day.

However, the roots are just a little bigger, and although they are a bit bitter, it is harmless to eat more of them, and they eat them with the roots.

Nowadays, you can’t ask whether the food tastes good or not, you have to see if it can satisfy your hunger. More importantly, you don’t have to spend a penny!

There is a saying among the common people that vegetables are half a year’s food!

Wash and clean the roots and leaves, chop them into pieces, mix them with cornmeal and add a little salt. Everyone enjoys eating them whether it is steamed corn bread or flatbread.

Han Zhaozhao recalled an essay he had read: Blanch shepherd's purse, chop it into small pieces, mix it with diced dried tofu, add ground ginger, pour sesame sauce, vinegar, or use dried shrimps... Mix well...

That requires people to pay attention to the way they eat, and they must pay attention to the color, aroma, taste and shape.

Ordinary people don't have this kind of elegance. Oil, salt, sauce, vinegar, dried tofu and dried shrimp all don't require money. It's too luxurious!

The purpose is to mix various wild vegetables with coarse grains to fill your stomach without spending any money.

It is not enough to turn the land over once, you need to harrow it again to make the soil fine without any large clods, in order to increase the germination rate.

Just two days after I finished harrowing the land, a spring rain came.

When the jujubes sprout, plant cotton. Around the time of Grain Rain, plant melons and beans.

Han Zhaozhao and his family did not plant cotton. Instead, they planted pumpkins, peanuts, spring corn and millet according to the solar terms.

After planting these staple crops, the land became a little dry and there was no time to plant sorghum, soybeans and sesame.

They have to wait for the next rain to come and moisten the land before they can plant again.

The children can finally have a few days' rest.

The spring of 1958 was relatively pleasant and sunny. A week later, the rice seedlings in the fields emerged.