Chapter 11
Only when Ming Chunxi asked did Qing Mengzhu come back to his senses. He opened the car door and climbed into the driver's seat. "It's nothing. Goodbye."
Ming Chunxi nodded slightly. "See you."
For some reason, though Ming Chunxi was far from approachable, Qing Mengzhu felt much more reassured after meeting him. On his way back to the village, he felt more motivated to work hard.
The chili seedlings in the field had grown to four or five centimeters tall. Most farmers would wait until they were a little taller before transplanting them, but Qing Mengzhu couldn't wait.
He had started his seedlings late, and it was already May. If he didn't transplant them now, his chilies probably wouldn't even have flowered by the time everyone else's hit the market.
Planting chili seedlings was no easy job, and Qing Mengzhu wasn't used to farmwork. With so many seedlings, it would probably take him nearly a week to plant them all by himself.
It wasn't ideal to leave too long a gap between planting chilies in the same field.
Qing Mengzhu simply hired three aunties in town to help, paying each of them two hundred yuan a day.
The aunties were much more skilled than he was. In just over half a day, they had planted nearly all three mu.
Qing Mengzhu was inexperienced and had started too many seedlings. As they neared the end of the three mu, he still had plenty left. After taking a look, the aunties said there were enough to plant another two mu.
He hurriedly paid extra to jump the queue and hired a man from town to come plow that afternoon. He had another two mu plowed, mixed in the base fertilizer, and planted the chilies. In the end, he planted five mu of chilies altogether.
It had been raining on and off ever since May began.
Qing Mengzhu had picked a good time to plant his chilies. Fine, gentle rain drifted down, and after the chilies were planted in their new field, their leaves soon turned deep green. Their stems shot upward, growing noticeably taller in just a few days.
He went to inspect the field and felt the survival rate shouldn't be a problem.
As the saying went, "The rain goes on, and spring slips away unnoticed; the sun comes out, and summer is already well advanced." While it rained, no one noticed much, but once the sky cleared, the high temperature soared above thirty degrees Celsius, and the weather suddenly turned hot.
Once it got hot, the crops in the fields began losing water rapidly through transpiration.
Qing Mengzhu had to water the chilies morning and evening, or their leaves would easily wilt.
For the first two days, he watered them with buckets. The river was right beside the field anyway, so he didn't have to carry the water far.
After two days, he couldn't stand spending hours watering all five mu every time. He bought a water pump, drew water straight from the river, connected a hose, and sprayed the chili field. At last, the work became a little easier.
The pump could be connected to hoses of several sizes. Since the chili seedlings were small, he used the mist setting, which was better than watering them directly with a dipper. At least it didn't wash the soil into a mess.
The lotus pond was near the chili field, and whenever Qing Mengzhu tended the chilies, he would also inspect the pond.
As the lotuses grew taller, he gradually added water to the pond, always keeping the waterline below the lotus leaves.
One day, while inspecting the pond, he looked at the emerald-green lotus leaves floating on the water and suddenly sensed something was wrong.
Why weren't his lotus leaves as round and whole as before?
Those notches in the leaves-could they have an insect infestation?
This was Qing Mengzhu's first time farming in earnest, and he couldn't tell how serious it was.
After taking a look, he immediately took off his shoes, rolled up his pant legs, and went into the water for a closer look.
There were about twenty centimeters of mud at the bottom of the pond, and the water was now more than half a meter deep. As soon as he stepped in, it came up to his thighs.
The strange feel of the mud and the buoyancy of the water made his steps uneven. After taking several steps, he nearly fell into the water.
Standing in the pond, he could see the condition of the lotus leaves more clearly.
There were indeed plenty of notches in the leaves. Some kind of insect had been chewing on them.
The lotus leaves had been so fine that he couldn't bear to sell them before, yet now insects had chewed on them.
Qing Mengzhu stared at the lotus leaves and felt a deep pang of distress well up from the bottom of his heart.
What a waste! Damn bugs!
He held a lotus leaf and turned it over and over, but saw no insects. Instead, the tiny prickles on the leaf stalk left him tingling and itching.
The damage to the lotus leaves wasn't severe, but it wasn't a minor matter either.
He pulled his phone from his pocket and scanned a lotus leaf. The Mall Assistant gave him no relevant information, and for the moment, he had no idea what had bitten it.
Qing Mengzhu made his way around more than half the pond before finally finding some insects clinging to the undersides of the lotus leaves.
The insects looked a little like cabbage caterpillars, plump and soft. He wasn't afraid of bugs, but when he turned over a lotus leaf and suddenly saw several of them, he couldn't help getting goosebumps.
Quite a few people in the village saw him wandering around in the pond.
After finishing his work, Tan Wenlei came over specially and stood on the pond bank. "Mengzhu, what are you doing?"
Qing Mengzhu had finally found an experienced farmer. He quickly picked a lotus leaf and brought it over with the insects on it. "Uncle Wenlei, you came at just the right time. Please help me figure out how to deal with these bugs. There are so many on my lotus leaves."
Tan Wenlei squatted down. "Let me see-looks like tobacco cutworms?"
Seeing him frown, Qing Mengzhu hurriedly asked, "Aren't they cabbage caterpillars?"
Tan Wenlei said, "They're a little different from cabbage caterpillars. Tobacco cutworms do more damage."
Qing Mengzhu took out his phone and searched online for cabbage caterpillars.
When the pictures loaded, he looked at them, then at the insects on the lotus leaf, and found that they did look more like tobacco cutworm larvae. "They really are. What pesticide should I use on them?"
Tan Wenlei said, "Plenty of pesticides will deal with them. A sugar-and-vinegar solution works too. Go ask at the pesticide shop later."
As he spoke, Tan Wenlei looked at Qing Mengzhu's pond and asked in puzzlement, "Why do your lotus leaves seem to be hit especially hard? The ponds and fields next door don't have that many bugs."
Qing Mengzhu hadn't noticed until he mentioned it.
Now that he had, Qing Mengzhu saw it too. "My lotus leaves really do seem to have been chewed up especially badly."
"Right?" Tan Wenlei said. "The water spinach, sweet potato leaves, and young amaranth growing next door don't have nearly as many bugs."
Qing Mengzhu's heart skipped a beat at that.
Could it be that my lotuses are such good quality that they attract more bugs?
Chapter 11
With insects on his lotuses, Qing Mengzhu made a point of scanning them with the Mall Assistant, hoping to get more information. It would be even better if he could sell them.
Unfortunately, the Mall Assistant determined that they weren't merchandise and refused to provide any information.
Disappointed, Qing Mengzhu could only find a solution himself.
The infestation couldn't wait, so Qing Mengzhu went home to look up information, then went into town to ask the people at the pesticide shop.
After weighing his options, he chose a low-toxicity microbial insecticide called "Spodoptera litura nucleopolyhedrovirus" and planned to spray both ponds.
The insecticide was a virus specifically targeted at tobacco cutworms. It wouldn't harm the environment or endanger humans, livestock, fish, birds, or other organisms. Unlike other pesticides, it wouldn't kill other creatures along with the pests. Its drawback was that it was rather expensive.
Spodoptera litura nucleopolyhedrovirus had to be applied in the evening or on a cloudy day, and used as soon as it was mixed.
That evening, Qing Mengzhu made a point of waiting until the sun had set. Then he strapped on a pesticide sprayer and, stepping unevenly through the pond, turned over the lotus leaves and sprayed them.
Tobacco cutworm larvae liked to hide on the undersides of lotus leaves, so he had to turn the leaves over to control them effectively.
After finishing his work, Tan Wenlei saw Qing Mengzhu seemingly struggling to turn over the lotus leaves and spray them in the pond. He came over specially. "Are you spraying pesticide? Why are you doing it like that?"
"I have to spray the undersides of the lotus leaves," Qing Mengzhu said.
Tan Wenlei sniffed. "Huh, you're not spraying cyhalothrin, are you? Aren't you trying to deal with tobacco cutworms?"
Cyhalothrin was another pesticide, and it was very cheap.
"No, it's Spodoptera litura nucleopolyhedrovirus," Qing Mengzhu said.
Tan Wenlei didn't quite catch what he said, only that it was a pesticide he didn't know. He muttered, "You college students always have so many fancy ways of farming."
Qing Mengzhu turned over a lotus leaf to show him. "I don't have a choice. Look how badly my lotus leaves have been chewed up. Ordinary pesticides can't deal with it."
Tan Wenlei took a look and had to admit that his lotus leaves were indeed badly affected.
Setting aside the choice of pesticide, Tan Wenlei added, "Why don't you hire someone to spray with a drone? It's very convenient, and it does a good job too."