Pond

Zhao Danshi's family did not have much farmland, just over seven mu in total, and it was scattered about. Three mu lay near the stream, two mu and eight fen at the foot of the mountain, and another mu or so up in the hills—terraced fields the Zhao family had reclaimed long ago.

After all these years, the terraced fields had long been thoroughly cultivated and were still fairly fertile.

Zhao Danshi took Li Ping around to look them over. "Senior Brother, I feel like we still don't have enough land. I want to rent a few more mu and bring it up to fifteen."

The young and middle-aged people who remained in the countryside to farm usually cultivated at least twenty or thirty mu. Zhao Danshi thought that he and Li Ping were both beginners and also had Dou Dou to care for, so he did not dare plant too much. A little over ten mu would be about right. If they could not keep up, they could hire help in time.

Li Ping had no objection. "Which fields have you got your eye on?"

"That stretch over there." Zhao Danshi pointed to the connected plots in the distance. "It would be best if they were next to our fields. I still need to go ask around the village with Grandpa. I don't know whether they'll be willing to rent them out."

After looking over the land, Zhao Danshi and Li Ping walked home side by side while discussing their plans. "For vegetables over the next half year, I mainly want to grow cucumbers, long beans, eggplants, peppers, sweet potatoes, and water spinach. For staple crops, corn, soybeans, and sweet potatoes. For fruit, strawberries and watermelons. Other than soybeans and sweet potatoes, six or seven fen of each crop should be enough. I still haven't found reliable sales channels, so if we grow too much, we might not be able to sell it."

Actually, it would not matter too much if they truly could not sell everything; Watcher could take it all. But if he sold to Watcher, Zhao Danshi would not receive any money. His savings would only go out and never come in, and they might dwindle further and further in the future.

Li Ping asked, "Most of these are planted in spring. Won't it be too late?"

"If it is, we'll hire someone to lend a hand." Zhao Danshi smiled at Li Ping. "These next two months will definitely be exhausting. Grandpa will probably have to put more effort into looking after Dou Dou."

Li Ping did not mind being tired. He was only afraid Zhao Danshi would fail to recoup their costs.

Zhao Danshi was not worried about that. "It's fine. I'm mainly taking the high-end route with this batch of vegetables and fruit. We definitely won't lose money; it just depends on how much we make."

The two of them specifically made a spreadsheet for everything they planned to grow, listing each crop in detail: what needed water and where to plant it, what feared waterlogging and where to put it, what required rich soil, what grew best in sandy ground... After consulting Grandpa and looking up relevant information online, they laid everything out clearly.

They also listed the times for planting, fertilizing, and so on for every crop, so that when they got truly busy, they would not neglect one thing while attending to another.

Grandpa looked at it curiously. "You educated folks really farm differently. You've even estimated the day each thing will be harvested."

"We only made rough calculations, so we won't be unprepared and flustered when the time comes." Zhao Danshi smiled at Grandpa. "Grandpa, don't you know how to judge the crops? When the time comes, help us estimate when the things we've planted will be ready to harvest, and we'll compare it with the spreadsheet and revise it."

Grandpa gave their chart a quick look and said, "You've got the vegetables wrong. Some mature earlier. Take these cucumbers, for example—they don't need three months. You can start harvesting them bit by bit after two and a half months. Watermelons are the same. With enough fertilizer, you can eat them after eighty days."

Following Grandpa's guidance, Zhao Danshi added notes one by one.

Dou Dou woke up and waved his little arms and legs, making the rattle hanging from the basket jingle. Zhao Danshi hurried over to check his diaper and mix him some formula.

Grandpa asked, "Where's Li Ping?"

"He went to hire someone to plow the fields."

Spring planting was about to begin, and plowmen were in high demand. Li Ping had gone early in the morning with Brother Spoon to hire someone.

Grandpa did not ask further. Zhao Danshi remembered something. "Grandpa, how are those few mu of land we want to rent coming along? Have they loosened up?"

"Not yet. I don't think Old Gray's family will rent to us. His grandson was just born last year, and this year they may want to plant more land to support the child. I asked twice, but he wouldn't give me an answer."

Zhao Danshi was a little disappointed. "Then forget it. Renting someone else's land is the same. Grandpa, please ask around quickly. Otherwise, I'm afraid we'll run out of time."

"All right, I'll hurry." Grandpa stood up. "I'll go chat with them right now."

Farming could not do without fertilizer. Zhao Danshi and Li Ping had already looked up the information and consulted Grandpa. This year's fertilizer had to be bought in advance, and they needed to apply a round of base fertilizer before planting.

After discussing it, Zhao Danshi and Li Ping decided to use a mix of chemical fertilizer and farmyard manure. The chemical fertilizer would mainly include nitrogen, phosphate, potassium, magnesium, boron, and zinc fertilizers, while the farmyard manure would be plant ash and animal dung.

Zhao Danshi bought two cartloads of pig manure and one cartload of cow manure from families in the village that raised pigs. Together with Grandpa, he mixed the manure evenly with straw and fermented it. It would be ready to use after some time.

Besides these fertilizers, they also needed to combine Watcher's specially supplied fertilizer and Spirit Spring Water to top-dress the various plants.

During this process, Watcher gave quite a few suggestions.

Watcher's scanning function was a godsend for farming. It could basically scan what nutrients Zhao Danshi's vegetables lacked and what problems they had, saving him from having to consult experts. With Watcher around, whenever their crops had problems, they could simply prescribe the right remedy.

Once Zhao Danshi and Li Ping had settled everything, they began working according to plan.

They dealt with the strawberries first. Strawberry seeds needed to be soaked in cold water, then stored at low temperature in the refrigerator to pass through dormancy. Corn did not need to be planted so early; first, they had to plant eggplants, peppers, and other fruits and vegetables.

Farming was exhausting, and the two of them could not manage it all alone. Zhao Danshi hired several people from the village to lend a hand and got everything planted.

At the end of March, Yazi Mei came back after selling vegetables and bought a batch of chicks. She did not get many, only around thirty.

Only then did Zhao Danshi remember that they could raise chickens. Free-range native chickens sold for a high price here, fifteen to eighteen yuan per jin. If they could raise seventy or eighty chickens, they would basically be ready after a year of free-ranging, and selling them then would bring in another large sum.

Raising chickens was not much trouble. The mountain behind their house was woodland allocated by the village to Grandpa. Zhao Danshi planned to fence off an open area in the mountain and raise chickens there from then on. With free-range chickens, he only needed to feed them some grain and the like every day.

Chickens were more obedient than ducks and generally did not run around. As long as they were raised here and got used to the place, they would keep staying there. Unless they encountered thieves, there would basically be no problem.

They might encounter thieves, but Zhao Danshi was not worried. Even if thieves came, they would have to wait until the chickens were nearly grown. Chicks that had only been raised for three months were so small that no one would bother stealing them.

Besides, their family had Dahei, a fierce wolfdog. With Dahei watching over the place, thieves probably would not dare come near.

Since they were raising chickens, Zhao Danshi also considered raising pigs. Raising pigs was not much trouble either, as long as they were given enough feed every day.

Everyone here knew how to grow rice, and they took their rice to town to be milled themselves. After milling, there would be rice bran, which was not expensive. Zhao Danshi had asked around: one hundred jin of rice bran cost forty yuan. They could gather some aquatic plants from the river, cut some pig feed from the fields, and save their usual vegetable leaves as feed. It should be easy enough to raise pigs that way.

Raising pigs would also provide pig manure, while they needed fertilizer for growing vegetables. Once this batch of pig manure fermented, it would be enough for their own use and would save them from polluting the environment.

Grandpa disagreed after hearing Zhao Danshi's plan. "One or two days might not be tiring, and three or five days might not be either. But if you keep this up long-term, you and Li Ping will have to care for the child and tend the vegetable fields. What if you work yourselves sick?"

Grandpa's attitude was too firm. Zhao Danshi thought it over and finally said, "Then I won't raise pigs. I'll raise some fish instead. Who owns that big pond at the village entrance? I wonder whether they'll rent it out. If they will, ask whether I can rent it to raise fish."

"It belongs to the village chief's family. He probably won't rent it out. Their family raises fish, and they've been doing it for years. They're still raising them now. If you want to raise fish, we can dig our own pond."

Zhao Danshi thought about it and felt that raising fish himself would be more cost-effective.

There were already very few people left in their village. Most had moved their household registrations elsewhere, leaving the fields abandoned, so village land was very plentiful. Zhao Danshi felt that if he submitted an application, the authorities probably would not reject it.

With that in mind, Zhao Danshi and Li Ping simply invited the village chief to a meal and sounded him out.

Zhao Danshi's household registration was not here, but Grandpa's was. If their family wanted to dig a pond, the village chief had nothing to object to. He first told Zhao Danshi to follow the proper procedure and write a formal application. He would submit it to the authorities above. Barring anything unexpected, it would be approved within half a month.

Their village chief shared the same ancestor as them and was also surnamed Zhao. His name was Zhao Huayong. Over the meal, when he heard Zhao Danshi mention the matter, he offered some advice. "Are you really planning to stay home and farm? Digging a pond isn't cheap these days. You can't do it without two or three thousand yuan. If you're only farming for a year or two, you'd be better off renting a pond. It'll save you a lot of money."

Zhao Danshi smiled. "I'd still rather dig one. Even if I don't stay home to farm in the future, isn't my grandpa still here? I can leave it for him to raise some fish, enough for our family to eat."

"Then how big are you planning to make this pond?"

"Just over two mu. It doesn't need to be too deep, half a meter to one meter is enough."

Zhao Danshi had even decided where to dig the pond. There was a relatively flat patch of land on the mountain behind their house.

Back when living conditions were poor, Grandpa and the others had reclaimed that patch of land. Unfortunately, it was so barren that not even sweet potatoes would grow there.

Once they had more land, the Zhao family abandoned that plot again. Zhao Danshi saw that it was not far from the mountain spring. It might not be convenient for growing crops, but it would be quite suitable for digging a pond.

Grandpa worried that the mountain water might be a little too cold. If the water was cold, the fish would not grow quickly enough. While others might raise fish for one year, he would have to raise them for two, and there would not be much profit in the end.

Zhao Danshi did not mind. Although it would take a little longer, fish raised in a mountain pond tasted good and could still sell for a high price. Besides, even if raising fish ultimately brought no results, he could use the pond to raise ducks instead. Then the pond mud could fertilize the fields, and selling the ducks once they were grown would bring in another income.

Raising ducks was not much trouble either. They just had to guard against thieves and feed them three times a day.

The village chief had no objection. Zhao Danshi thanked him, then searched Baidu for a relevant application template and carefully wrote one.