pastoral fragrance

Chapter 249 Raising Summer and Autumn Silkworms
Ever since those nasty women were beaten up by Qiulin and Hu Bianhai last time, they went home and cleaned up their own bosses. Now these women are not very peaceful, at least they dare not look for them again. Trouble for the Qiulin family!
This time, thanks to the participation of Xiaohei and Xiaoqing, Qiulin's family made more than 50 jars of rock candied loquat, which were sold for a total of 14 taels of silver.After the loquats were ripe, the mulberries by the fish ponds on the slopes of the field began to mature one after another.After the mulberry is ripe, it should be picked quickly. The fruit period of this mulberry is relatively short, and it will fall in half a month.

Although the mulberry trees in Qiulin's family are relatively scattered, all the mulberry trees are planted beside the fish ponds on the slopes of this field.There is no way, now there are a lot of silkworms in the house, and a lot of mulberry leaves are needed, and the ash and manure are poured too much. The mulberry tree seems to grow when it sees the wind. Not only the leaves grow fat, but also the black and purple mulberries. Knots are everywhere.Usually Qiulin can pick a whole basket of mulberries without picking a few trees.

This mulberry cannot be carried in a basket like a loquat. The skin of this mulberry is thinner, and it is easier to be crushed than a loquat. If the juice escapes, the mulberry will not be fresh.Not only can mulberries not be carried on the back of a basket, but one must be careful when picking them. They cannot be squeezed too hard, and they must be handled lightly when they are placed in bamboo baskets, so as not to bruise their skin.

Therefore, picking mulberries is a slow job, and the skin may be broken if you are not careful.So Qiulin and the others picked almost five or six days in a row before picking almost all the mulberry fruits on the mulberry tree.Xu Nanshan and Han Shi cleaned out the mulberries at home, drained the water, picked the fruit stems, and put them in the jar.After filling a jar, scoop a few spoonfuls of white sugar into it and seal it well. After a few days, the sweet juice will come out.

The taste of this mulberry is even better than that of loquat. Loquat has a slightly sour taste, but this mulberry has no sour taste at all. It tastes sweet, suitable for all ages!
A total of more than 30 jars of honey-soaked mulberries were collected from the fish pond on the slope of the field. Qiulin's family took one jar from Xiaohei's family, and one jar from Xia Yan and Shenqing's family, and gave them to the uncle and the others. One jar, and the rest was sold to Murong Yunfan.Nowadays, most households in the village are raising silkworms, so there are naturally a lot of mulberries, so the villagers don't need to give them away.

Qiulin's sericulture technology has been repeatedly explored by Han's Qiulin and her family. Now her family can not only raise spring silkworms, but also summer and autumn silkworms.But this is obviously more tossing than spring silkworms.In May, everyone once again put the silkworm eggs laid after the silkworm chrysalis united into the fast silkworm winnow, and began to raise summer silkworms.

The old house of Qiulin's family faces south, with windows on the south and north sides, so the ventilation is good.It's just that the temperature is high in summer. In addition to maintaining indoor ventilation, it is also necessary to avoid the warming effect brought by direct sunlight.When the indoor temperature is too high, those silkworms are prone to illness or death.

Han asked someone to put up pergolas on the west, east and south sides of the old house, just to prevent the sun from directly shining on the walls, causing the room to be stuffy.In order to raise the summer silkworms, the Han family specially asked someone to dig a well on the side of the old house.The water in this well is like cold water in winter, icy cold and cool.Sprinkling this well water in the house at noon can cool down the room.In addition, this well water can also be sprinkled on the mulberry leaves to increase the humidity of the mulberry leaves and reduce the temperature.

The mulberry leaves should also be picked in the morning before the sun rises and after the sun falls to the ground, otherwise the temperature of the mulberry leaves will be too high for silkworms to eat.The leaves need to be picked and transported quickly, and the hot mulberry leaves cannot be fed directly to the silkworms.After the picked mulberry leaves are washed and drained, they are placed in a special tank for mulberry leaves, and a wet cloth soaked with well water is spread on it. When it is dry, some well water can be sprayed on the mulberry leaves to moisturize.

In addition to carefully cooking the food of the silkworms, the house should also be sprinkled with plant ash for disinfection. If you find any sick and dead silkworms in the silkworm dustpan, you should throw them away in time, otherwise all the silkworms in the silkworm dustpan will be infected.

At noon and night, they also had to feed the Can'er. For this reason, the Han family basically went to bed late and woke up early, and was often tossed by the Can'er so much that they couldn't sleep well.Qiuyue saw that her mother was working so hard every day, but there were many more sick and dead silkworms in the duster than spring silkworms, she frowned and did not want her to continue raising them.

Raising summer silkworms feels like a thankless effort. It's been so hard, but the silkworms have already died of illness.After such painstaking efforts, the output is not high, so why bother?
Han Shi is now facing off against Xia Can'er, and Qiuyue's persuasion cannot shake her determination to raise Can'er.This is to build a pergola and dig a well, isn't it all for silkworm rearing?Now that they have just started to raise summer silkworms, it will naturally take more effort.They are all raised for the sake of the third-instar silkworms, so how can you say that if you don’t raise them, you won’t raise them?She had to work hard enough to feed the summer silkworms!

Sister Qiuyue Qiulin found that this woman's temperament is really not as good as before, and now she knows how to persevere.Seeing that she was so excited, as if she wanted to use her whole body to compete with these summer silkworms, they had no choice but to let mother toss.Fortunately, the mulberry leaves that Can'er wanted to eat were delivered by Mrs. Zhang after picking them early in the morning and late in the evening, so she didn't have to go to the slopes to pick them herself.

The summer silkworms are not as easy to raise as the spring silkworms. When the silkworms spun silk, everyone obviously felt that the silkworms spun out no more silk than the spring silkworms.After it was reeled, it was weighed, and there were only eight catties of silk, which was nearly half less than before.

However, very few people in these ten miles and eight villages have cultivated summer silkworms, so the price is naturally higher than the price of spring silkworm silk, which has been sold for three taels of silver per catty.

Ever since, although the silk produced by the summer silkworms has decreased a lot, the price is high. In this way, raising the summer silkworms is not a disadvantage.Han shi was very happy, and continued to put the silkworm eggs on the sterilized silkworms, and started to breed the next round of summer silkworms.During this round of silkworm breeding, and with Qiulin Qiuyue's occasional suggestions, coupled with Han's own practical experience summary, Han's silkworm breeding technology is more mature now, and the habits of silkworms are also familiar. Knowing all the details, knowing when they eat mulberry leaves, when they enter the dormancy period, and which time to eat which kind of mulberry leaves, Han is very clear.

The Han family raised four batches of summer silkworms in a row, and the output was higher each time, and the last time it even reached the output of spring silkworms.Now the family relies on silkworm farming, and can earn hundreds of taels of silver a year. This is the result of Han's hard work and bold practice!
(End of this chapter)