Chapter 881

Li Long hauled the watermelon seed flattening machine back to the county, and after entering the large courtyard, he didn't unload it. The next morning, after eating, he drove the jeep to the Fourth Team.

The jeep drove to his eldest brother's courtyard first, but his brother wasn't there.

"Your eldest brother went to help the team leader's family clear wasteland." Liang Yuemei was tidying up the wooden shovels and wooden forks—wheat harvesting and threshing were about to begin; the wooden forks were for picking up bundles before threshing and for picking up wheat straw after threshing; the wooden shovels were for winnowing.

"Clearing wasteland for the team leader's family?" Li Long was stunned for a moment and asked, "The team leader's family is clearing wasteland too?"

"Yeah, to the east of the Yangzi Canal, along the edge of the East Great Ditch. The team leader came over yesterday. Not only does he want to clear wasteland, but he also asked your eldest brother to see if he could plow a canal—that is, to extend the team's canal toward the wasteland to the east, so it would be easier to irrigate later."

The Yangzi Canal was the name of a piece of land to the east of the Fourth Team. There was a model agricultural canal there; the canal was built very flat and straight at the time, serving as a model. The land reclaimed there was collectively called the Yangzi Canal.

Heh, this Xu Chengjun, he had already started at this time.

Xu Chengjun's family later became a wealthy household in the team, but of course, they didn't belong to the "village bully" type. He didn't do things that caused public anger, like occupying others' land or embezzling others' subsidies.

As a production team leader, he had too many opportunities to let his own family and his relatives' families get rich.

To give a simplest example, when the state gave the team a drip irrigation demonstration project, he was the only one who knew when the township notified them about the project.

At this time, he would tell his family, laying out plans in advance to build a drip irrigation tape factory first.

The total arable land of the Fourth Team was over twelve thousand mu at its peak, and the basic farmland demonstration area reported to the township was seven thousand mu. The renovation cost for these seven thousand mu was over ten million, nearly twenty million.

And within this, the procurement of various drip irrigation tapes alone amounted to several million. Moreover, this drip irrigation tape stuff couldn't be used forever; new ones had to be used every year—of course, old ones could be exchanged for new ones, but it wasn't a one-to-one exchange.

This drip irrigation tape stuff wasn't high-tech; with a machine and plastic raw materials, it could be produced.

This project itself was carried out in the team, and the production team leader also had a certain say in procurement—it was unlikely that the construction party would look far for what was near. As long as the price was kept low in the first year and they didn't make too much profit, the construction party would definitely procure drip irrigation tapes locally.

Starting from the second year, the people in the team had to buy drip irrigation tapes every year for farming.

Think about it: someone in the team had built a factory, so wouldn't most of it have to be purchased from the team?

The cost of drip irrigation tapes per mu was eighty to one hundred yuan, and the whole village's procurement was nearly a million.

This drip irrigation tape factory didn't just supply one village; at the beginning, it supplied from one brigade to half a township!

Not many people had this awareness at the beginning, and by the time other drip irrigation tape factories were built, the Xu family had already eaten their fill of the first piece of fat meat.

This was just one of them.

Let's mention another: at the beginning, the state had some project subsidies. When the production team leader went to the township for meetings, the township would notify them, and then after returning, the team leader only needed to delay the announcement on the loudspeaker for a few days, letting his own family know first. Because of those few days of delay, others wouldn't be able to get some projects.

For example, subsidies for improved cattle and sheep, subsidies for medicinal herb planting, etc.

For various subsidies, the autonomous region later printed a "Understanding Manual," which clearly stated the subsidies available year-round, but whether such manuals issued to the village party secretary level would continue to be issued downward depended on how the village committee operated. Some would issue them, and some would "forget."

Of course, returning to the original point, there was also wasteland clearing.

In the early 2000s, one year, the price of cotton skyrocketed, and the cost of contracting land rose the following year. A craze for clearing wasteland emerged in the team because cotton could grow in saline-alkali land.

Specifically, someone wanted to contract and clear a piece of land, but they were short on money for the contract, so they went to the team leader to see if they could clear the wasteland first. The team leader said he would study it—and then there was no follow-up.

Two days later, the tractor started up, and his relative had cleared the land. If you went to ask, his family would say someone else had already paid first and signed a contract with the team. What could you do?

So later, Team Leader Xu's family was very rich. Where did the money come from? Didn't it all come from this?

Of course, it was basically all utilizing policies. Although the people in the team were envious and jealous, most of them had nothing to say.

After all, the facts were there; they didn't occupy extra subsistence allowance quotas, the subsidies that should be issued were all issued, and the benefits they fought for from the township for the team were also quite a few.

Sometimes, they would even issue some subsidies to families with high prestige or those in difficulty—for example, the state wanted to build high-voltage power line towers and bury culvert pipes underground. This stuff passing through farmland required subsidies for the farmers.

He only needed to give the construction party a hint as to where to shift it, and the target of the subsidy would be different. In such situations, the team leader would sometimes directly shift the subsidies to families of the "five guarantees" or those old residents in the team who were in difficulty. Regarding such matters, no one had anything to say.

Also, whenever there was a funeral in the team, he would directly shout on the loudspeaker for the young and strong laborers to go and help. He himself would also work, even in wind and snow, and that was how the cohesion was built.

So Li Long actually admired Xu Chengjun quite a bit—he knew how to get things done, could make money, and had a good reputation.

"I brought a machine for pressing watermelon seeds," Li Long said. "We don't have that kind of watermelon seeds at home now, so I'm going to Daqiang's family to try it out."

"For pressing watermelon seeds?" Liang Yuemei was a bit curious. "Don't need to press by hand?"

"No, use a tractor to drive it."

At this time, civilian electricity was unstable and electric motors weren't widely used, so this watermelon seed flattening machine designed by Factory Director Du was driven by a small four-wheeled tractor—which was actually driven by a diesel engine.

Li Qing Xia was very interested in the watermelon seed flattening machine Li Long mentioned. Originally working in the vegetable garden, after hearing Li Long say this, he simply came out of the vegetable garden, got into the jeep, and followed Li Long to Tao Daqiang's home.

When the jeep drove to Tao Daqiang's home, Tao Dayong was driving a small four-wheeled tractor into Daqiang's courtyard.

Li Long's jeep followed the tractor directly into the courtyard.

When Tao Dayong got off the tractor, Li Long and Li Qing Xia also just got off the jeep. Seeing Li Long, Tao Dayong was still a bit awkward.

Tao Jian She and Tao Daqiang's couple were both pressing watermelon seeds in the courtyard, with the children playing on the side. Seeing Li Long and Li Qing Xia come over, they all stood up to greet them.

"I borrowed Daqiang's tractor to go to our wheat threshing ground to use the roller to press it down." Tao Dayong explained to Li Long.

Li Long wanted to laugh. Tao Dayong was Tao Daqiang's older brother; he didn't need to report or explain to Li Long for using Tao Daqiang's tractor. What did this indicate? It indicated that his own prestige in the eyes of people like Tao Dayong was quite high.

Actually, it was of no use.

Li Long smiled and asked:

"Is the threshing ground over at your place all set up?"

"All set, all set." Tao Dayong hurriedly responded with a smile.

Ever since marrying Ma Chunhong, Tao Dayong had directly transferred to the wheat threshing ground on the Ma family's side. According to common sense, he should be in the same threshing ground as his father and younger brother, but Tao Dayong had a softer temper in the previous years and listened more to Ma Chunhong. After the family split, he partnered with his in-laws.

In the last two years, Tao Dayong had recovered and re-established his authority as the husband, but one couldn't just change threshing grounds at will. If he wanted to be in the same threshing ground as his father and the others now, he still needed the consent of the others in the threshing ground.

"Daqiang, I brought a machine; let's use your family's tractor to do an experiment." Li Long didn't have much to say to Tao Dayong, greeted him to be polite, and then started talking about business with Tao Daqiang.

"What kind of machine?" Li Long spoke, and Tao Daqiang naturally had nothing to say. He went over, unloaded the bucket of the tractor, took off a belt from the large wheel to keep as a spare, and then followed Li Long to move things.

"It's a machine for flattening watermelon seeds." Li Long explained. "Put the soaked watermelon seeds in, turn on the machine, and it can press them flat directly; all that's left is to dry them."

"Is it that good?" Tao Daqiang asked in surprise. "Where was this machine produced?"

"I found someone to specifically design and process it." Li Long said. "Let's try to see if it works first."

Fixing the machine in front of the small four-wheeler and padding the platform underneath with a few bricks, he connected the pulley, and Tao Daqiang took the crank to prepare to start it.

The Tao family was very curious, including Tao Dayong, who had originally prepared to leave, stopped and followed to help.

There was no part for him in the work of flattening watermelon seeds that Li Long was doing. He was very envious, but he also knew that these jobs were all distributed to those families who were relatively close to the Li family.

He could only blame himself for not being up to the mark at the beginning, having such shallow vision, and insisting on splitting what Daqiang hauled back when Li Long and Daqiang were partnering.

However, it wasn't too late now. In the last two years, because of planting watermelon seeds, his relationship with the Li family had improved quite a bit. Tao Dayong believed that with his younger brother, and by putting in more effort himself, he would definitely be able to get on the Li family's boat in the future.

So he was also quite diligent during the experiment, taking the initiative to move the buckets of soaked watermelon seeds over, and doing whatever Li Long asked him to do next.

Seeing that the machine was fixed, Li Long asked Tao Daqiang to start the machine. Seeing the machine running smoothly, he began to add the soaked watermelon seeds into the hopper.

Li Qing Xia held a sack open at the discharge port, waiting to see how the watermelon seeds that came out were. Tao Jian She stood beside him, his expression a bit nervous.

Tao Dayong was holding a basin of watermelon seeds, waiting beside Li Long. The most calm was Yang Pingping. With so many vehicles in the courtyard, the machine's rumbling sound was quite loud. Fearing it would scare the child, she directly carried the baby to the innermost part of the courtyard.

Starting the machine for the first time, Li Long was worried that adding too much feed would lead to uneven pressing of the seeds, so he scooped a ladle of seeds from the basin Tao Dayong was holding and poured only half in.

One could hear the machine's sound suddenly get a bit louder, the small four-wheeler's rotation sound became more robust and powerful, and then watermelon seeds began to fall out of the discharge port in a scattered manner.

Li Qing Xia reached out to catch a few to look at, threw them into the sack after a careful look, and caught another handful of the ones that had just fallen. After looking, he smiled:

"Heh, not bad, they're all pressed flat!"

Li Long didn't continue to add feed inside; he also went over and grabbed a handful of the flattened watermelon seeds from the sack to look at.

Sure enough, this half-ladle of seeds were all pressed flat, and they were still a bit warm to the touch.

The start was smooth, so he began to experiment with increasing the feed, from the half-ladle just now to one ladle, and then adding two ladles.

After the experiment, it was found that if feed was added continuously at a rate of two ladles at a time, and the speed wasn't too fast, the watermelon seeds pressed out were all flat.

If the speed was too fast, or if a relatively large amount was added at once—exceeding five kilograms—then there would be unflattened seeds and broken seeds falling out of the discharge port.

"Heh, at this speed, wouldn't one be able to press two sacks flat in an hour?" Li Qing Xia sighed while catching the seeds. "No problem pressing ten or so sacks a day."

Tao Jian She was waiting on the side with a new sack, and they changed hands very quickly.

Although his words were a bit exaggerated, it wasn't impossible to achieve.

If the machine proceeded at this speed, it would be much faster than manual labor. With such a machine, if there were any more jobs for pressing watermelon seeds in the future, the Li family wouldn't need to find anyone at all; two machines and two people would be enough.

"Only one of these machines was customized; Daqiang, keep it here for your use for now." Li Long said. "Anyway, there are only so many watermelon seeds now. If you find any problems while using it, tell me, and I'll have the factory improve it."

"Good, good, good." Tao Daqiang said with a smile; Brother Long was still good to him.

As for machinery, there were few men who didn't like it. From Tao Jian She to Li Qing Xia, and then to Tao Dayong, everyone tried it out, and they didn't stop until all the watermelon seeds soaked by the Tao family were pressed.

Overall, the effect was good, and Li Long felt relieved. If Bai Xiu Ming still needed them when the watermelon seeds came down in the autumn, he could collect watermelon seeds from the team to press.

At that time, the collected watermelon seeds—pressed and unpressed—could have different prices.

Driving the jeep and carrying his father Li Qing Xia, he returned to his eldest brother's courtyard. At this time, his mother Du Chunfang had also returned from the front courtyard; she had been busy with the vegetable garden in the front courtyard, and hadn't heard when Li Long came over.

Seeing the father and son return together, she smiled and asked Li Long how Mingming and Haohao were, and about the situation at home—now that life at home was good, she was more concerned about the growth of the younger generation. Li Juan and Li Qiang were by her side watching; although Mingming and Haohao were close, they couldn't see them often, so she missed them quite a bit.

Li Long sat in the courtyard chatting with his father and mother about family matters, while Liang Yuemei went to cook, and Du Chunfang took the initiative to burn the fire.

The rumbling sound of the crawler tractor came from far to near, and Li Long could tell that his eldest brother had returned.

The tractor passed by the gate and drove to the front courtyard. Li Long stood up and walked to the front courtyard, entering just in time to see his eldest brother turn off the engine and get off the tractor. Plowing the land was dusty, especially on the saline-alkali land side, where there was little vegetation and even more dust.

Although the crawler tractor had a driver's cabin, when Li Jianguo got down, his face, head, and body were still covered in many gray-white spots.

While taking a towel to pat the dust off his body and face, he greeted Li Long:

"When did Without Xiao Long come over? Is everything alright over in the county?"

"Everything's good. I got a machine for flattening watermelon seeds, and just now I went to Daqiang's family with Dad to try it out."

"A machine for flattening seeds?" Li Jianguo was a bit curious and asked, "How is it? Is it easy to use?"

"It's quite easy to use; the work one machine does in a day is equal to two or three families." Li Long said. "No problem pressing ten or so sacks flat in a day."

"Heh, that's not just equal to two or three families." Li Jianguo was even more surprised; this efficiency was truly not low!

Li Long smiled; this was the advantage of mechanization.

Currently, the country was still mainly developing with intensive labor, but in the Northern Xinjiang region, the power of mechanization had already begun to appear, and what Li Long wanted was to gradually realize his goals one by one through mechanized development.

This could be considered "dimensional reduction."

At this time, the Tao family was still in the courtyard studying that watermelon seed flattening machine. After the Li family left, Tao Dayong wasn't so constrained anymore. He studied this machine, saying while looking:

"When the watermelons come down, we need to get two machines like this. When the time comes, just place them in someone's field; after the watermelon seeds are squeezed out, just pour them in directly, press them flat, and dry them—wouldn't that be good? Sigh, money won't be easy to earn in the future."

Tao Dayong's words were not without reason.

But Tao Daqiang shook his head:

"If you get a machine, just collect watermelon seeds and press them flat; the selling price will be higher. I heard Brother Long say that last year, the Supply and Marketing Cooperative collected unflattened watermelon seeds from other places for two yuan per kilogram. We sold them for three point five last year; why? Isn't it because our watermelon seeds were pressed flat?

If you want to earn money, then get a machine to collect seeds and press them; just press them flat and resell them to earn money—but with so many watermelon seeds planted this year, the price will definitely be even lower; whether you can earn money or not is another question. I say let's honestly prepare for wheat harvesting first."

Tao Dayong planted watermelons last year and earned quite a bit of money, but that money was used to add quite a few things to the family—TVs, bicycles, sewing machines, etc. —and improving life also cost quite a bit, so he was short of money when he wanted to buy a tractor.

He had some backbone this time; although he knew his younger brother's family had money, he didn't borrow it—actually, he also wanted to get a small four-wheeler, then get a harvester, and go to other townships to harvest wheat to earn money.

His wife Ma Chunhong had told him several times to go and talk to his younger brother Tao Daqiang.

After all, Tao Daqiang had helped his own brother-in-law Yang Yong get a tractor and a harvester. Not helping his own brother was unjustifiable no matter how you looked at it.

Tao Dayong stubbornly didn't go to talk. He retorted to Ma Chunhong: when Yang Pingping was in confinement, her mother came to help for a month, and after confinement, Yang Pingping went to live at her mother's home in the Third Team for a period. At that time, Ma Chunhong didn't even show her face!

Tao Dayong also wanted his wife to help look after his sister-in-law and ease the relationship between the two sides, but Ma Chunhong thought it was bad luck and just wouldn't go.

When people were in difficulty, you didn't go; now that you were looking for them to help, could you even open your mouth?

Tao Dayong was envious, but he never mentioned borrowing money. This year, he drew twenty mu of land and planted sunflowers according to the Li family's method. Looking at the growth, it was quite good. Tao Dayong's intention was to buy a small four-wheeler after the sunflowers were harvested and sold.

He actually had other ideas: with a small four-wheeler, when winter came, he would go to the sand dunes in the north or the no-man's-land in the west to hunt Mongolian gazelles. Even if he only hunted one a day, he could earn quite a bit of money. A winter hide of a Mongolian gazelle was at least thirty for a partial hide, and fifty for a full hide. He could get a gun; when he hunted them, the family would eat the meat, and the hides would be sold to the purchasing station—call Daqiang to go together, and he might earn the money for a harvester in one winter.

At present, there was more and more land in the production team, and quite a few people in the county were planting grain. Although there were many harvesters, in Tao Dayong's view, it was very easy to find wheat harvesting jobs.

After all, not every team could be like the Fourth Team, having three opportunities to earn money a year. In terms of family assets, they were much richer than other teams.

Tao Daqiang didn't know that his eldest brother had the intention of striving for success after being stimulated. He was now thinking about finishing the watermelon seed work with this machine as soon as possible, then properly maintaining the tractor and harvester, applying grease, and then preparing to harvest wheat.

Earning big money for the year depended on this time.

Sure enough, as Li Long thought, Bai Xiu Ming returned more than ten days later and collected the remaining nineteen tons of watermelon seeds. Upon knowing that there were only so many for now and that if he wanted more, he would have to wait until the next watermelon season, Bai Xiu Ming felt a bit regretful.

"To tell you the truth, after our goods were hauled back, roasted, packaged, and sold, they were very popular!" Bai Xiu Ming said to Li Long. "My meaning is that we should maintain a long-term cooperative relationship. When autumn comes, you must reserve the goods here for me."

"Sure." Li Long said with a smile. "Happy cooperation."

"Happy cooperation!" Bai Xiu Ming smiled.

He smiled, but Dong Zhi Chao couldn't smile.

The goods on Li Long's side were few, so he didn't pay attention. After the sales department of their roasted goods factory took the credit, the upper management of the roasted goods factory naturally didn't pay much attention either.

Ye Lanlan actually knew a little, but her position was low and her words carried little weight, so she really couldn't play any role.

By the time the goods from Bai Xiu Ming's food company occupied the market, the roasted goods factory became anxious. Through market research, they discovered that they had missed such a big opportunity!

Dong Zhi Chao was required to go to Northern Xinjiang again to find this kind of seed. He felt so bitter at this time.

Bow his head to a young, inexperienced kid?

He was not reconciled. (End of chapter)