Chapter 893: An unprecedented big order: The pressure is great!

While Shaokelaiti was helping to clean the sheep offal, Li Long was in a gully nearby, bending over and holding a gun, slowly moving towards the slope.

Talihar didn't catch any prey the day before and ran into a group of wild boars. He couldn't shoot, but Li Long became interested after hearing it. After asking clearly about the range of the wild game, Li Long carried his gun and a sack today to take a look.

If he could shoot a wild boar, he would; if not, he would pick mushrooms.

He didn't pick many mushrooms. After walking through two gullies, Li Long heard the grunting of wild boars.

Li Long wasn't clear whether these wild boars ate wild mushrooms, but in the lush mountains and forests, there were many things they could eat. Wild boars have a miscellaneous diet; they can eat moss, pine nuts, and wild fruits like wild strawberries and wild apples.

So under normal circumstances, when people discover them, it's when they are foraging, because after eating, the wild boar group will drill into the big mountains to find a hidden place to lie down and rest.

According to Talihar, the scale of this group of wild boars wasn't small; there were ten, twenty, or more, and the momentum was quite large, with big and small ones inside.

"The biggest one I saw was almost two hundred kilograms, almost as big as a yellow ox," this was Talihar's original words, "Short and thick, the teeth on its mouth were sticking out, curved, like small knives, looking very fierce!"

Wild boars often run in the mountains and forests, unlike domestic pigs which are long. If it were a domestic pig, at two hundred kilograms, the length would be almost two meters.

Wild boars aren't that long; they grow thick—the sows might be slightly longer.

Of course, the most common ones are still those of dozens of kilograms, and those over one hundred kilograms are few.

After all, there are other natural enemies in these mountains.

Li Long had already heard the grunting sound of small wild boars. According to Talihar, there were seven or eight small wild boars in this group, the kind of ten, twenty, or thirty kilograms.

There were also several half-grown ones, the kind of forty or fifty kilograms.

Li Long was thinking that if he were to shoot, he would shoot those of that size.

The very small ones, although delicious and tender, had too little meat.

The very big ones didn't taste good.

When he slowly touched the top of the slope, he bent his waist lower, because Li Long heard the sound of wild boars not far from the other side of the slope.

Slowly raising his head, aiming the gun, he saw a group of wild boars gnawing on things on a gentle slope of two or three mu.

On this patch of grass slope, not only were wild strawberries growing, but also other plants like Codonopsis and Tianshan red flowers.

However, this had already been arched into a mess by the wild boars. When they gnawed on wild strawberries, they arched the plants up and ate them together.

Maybe Li Long's footsteps were suppressed by the sound of the wild boars arching the grass themselves, or maybe they were too absorbed in eating, or maybe it was because the more vigilant big wild boar happened to be in a place relatively far from Li Long.

So when Li Long aimed the gun at a half-grown wild boar that was no more than thirty or forty meters away from him, those wild boars hadn't discovered him yet.

"Bang!" Li Long pulled the trigger leisurely, and that wild boar fell to the ground in response.

This gunshot suddenly exploded the wild boars, and they scattered and fled. Two small wild boars rushed directly towards Li Long's side, and after rushing out ten meters or so, they saw Li Long, and then turned around and changed direction.

"Bang! Bang!"

Li Long fired two more shots, one of which fell, and the other stumbled, then quickly climbed up and rushed into a cluster of shrubs, running away and disappearing.

Li Long was actually quite satisfied; one half-grown one, and a seventeen or eighteen kilogram one as a bonus.

Enough to eat.

Anyway, Yushanjiang and the others didn't eat them, so he would simply clean them up in the mountains, put them in the jeep, and take them back.

Carrying the gun and walking over, he looked around. The wild boar group had completely disappeared without a trace. These guys look clumsy usually, but in reality, sometimes they are also very timid. When encountering danger, they rush faster than roe deer.

Putting the gun's safety on, Li Long carried the big wild boar in one hand and the small wild boar in the other, looked at the direction, and walked towards Yushanjiang's winter shelter.

When he arrived at the winter shelter, Shaokelaiti and the others had already cleaned the offal, and at this time were looking at the meat in the pot.

The naan made the day before had also been broken into pieces, put in a clean bed sheet, and placed on a wooden table.

The long table placed outside the wooden house was quite practical, and Yushanjiang and the others also learned to make solid wood tables. Although they weren't as good-looking as the tables Li Long got from the furniture factory, they were quite good to use.

The space in the winter shelter was small. If these dozen people ate, they definitely couldn't sit inside, so it was better to be outside.

Seeing Li Long carrying the wild boars over, Shaokelaiti didn't care, and even wanted to come over to help.

Li Long didn't let him. He threw the wild boars onto the grass by the gully, didn't even put them by the water pool, and prepared to deal with them later.

"Our captain said that one point five yuan per mu is too expensive, at most one yuan." After being scolded by the captain, Shaokelaiti knew this time, and spoke about the business first.

"One yuan is fine too." Li Long smiled. Actually, in his opinion, grassland is much easier to harvest than wheat fields. Don't say one yuan, even eighty cents could harvest it.

So he readily agreed on behalf of Yushanjiang and Talihar.

How much harvest can they have herding in the summer pasture for a year?

Harvesting grass here for half a month is more than the harvest of herding in the mountains for half a year.

Why not do it?

"How many mu of grassland do you have over there to harvest?" Li Long asked another key question.

"One or two thousand mu, right?" Shaokelaiti wasn't sure either, but in his opinion, the captain and vice-captain would definitely want their own grassland harvested, and his own grassland didn't necessarily need to be harvested manually. Just the money from the wild mushrooms in two or three days was enough for the grass harvesting fee.

How convenient!

Shaokelaiti has three hundred mu of grassland at home, not saying it's big or small. In previous years, if he harvested it himself, it would take one or two months. Now that these wild mushrooms are so profitable, there's no need to spend that effort.

Leave it to the tractor!

Watching the meat wasn't cooked yet, and Yushanjiang and the others hadn't returned from harvesting grass, Li Long took a bag of salt and a knife to the stream below to start processing the wild boars.

Over the past few years, Li Long's skinning technique had changed from raw to skilled. Although it wasn't as smooth as Yushanjiang and Halimu's slaughtering of sheep, the process was also very smooth. In three or two strokes, the skins of the two wild boars were peeled off, and the internal organs were also taken out.

Because time was limited, Li Long only let the wild boars' stomachs and intestines release their feces, and hadn't cleaned them when Yushanjiang and the others came back.

When Yushanjiang and the others came over, Li Long rubbed salt on the wild boars, put them into sacks, and put them into the jeep.

After eating lunch, he cleaned up the blood and debris in this place, either washing them away with water or burying them, at least letting Yushanjiang and the others not see them and not be bothered.

Finally, it was processing Shaokelaiti's mushrooms.

"The mushrooms this time are good." Li Long opened the bag, looked at the mushrooms that were cleaned quite cleanly, nodded and said: "As long as they are mushrooms like this, then I can rest assured. As long as there are some, I will buy them, the more the better!"

Shaokelaiti was very happy. With this promise from Li Long, he could safely and boldly find more people to pick mushrooms.

What Li Long pulled back this time wasn't just Shaokelaiti's mushrooms, but also three sacks of wild mushrooms picked by the herdsmen for him. Shaokelaiti thought Li Long also paid for these mushrooms, so he was even more at ease. He left in a hurry to do the right thing.

Fortunately, after being scolded, he knew to report the matter Li Long agreed to to the team first, and then went to find people.

Li Long told Yushanjiang and the others about the Animal Husbandry Team offering one yuan to help harvest grass.

Yushanjiang hesitated, but Talihar and the others were very willing. Talihar had a tractor, but to be honest, the things he brought back this year weren't enough, and he had borrowed money from others. To pay it back as soon as possible, either harvest more grass for others this year, or earn money to pay it back, and another way was to hunt more after returning to the summer pasture.

He planned to earn some money first. Li Long helped them buy the tractor, but diesel and these things still cost money. He didn't know how much a barrel of oil could be used for. Without oil, the tractor couldn't run.

Then he must earn the oil money later first. Yushanjiang agreed after hesitating. Anyway, using two tractors to harvest grass was already saving time. The time saved was used to harvest grass for the Animal Husbandry Team.

He had originally worried that his cattle and sheep were placed at Halimu's, and there was a tiger roaming near the summer pasture, which might not be very good.

But now thinking about it, a few days earlier or later didn't actually change much. Halimu and the others had guns in their hands, and they had caught a tiger, so they shouldn't be afraid.

After confirming, then honestly harvest grass.

After Li Long returned to the county, he directly went to the big courtyard. He had to deal with those two wild boars first.

He kept the small wild boar for his own family to eat, gave a leg of the big wild boar to Li Xiangqian, and took the rest to the Fourth Team.

Big brother Li Jianguo was still cutting wheat every day. Now the wheat of the Fourth Team had been cut, and he was still cutting in the nearby villages.

Tao Daqiang and the others were also cutting wheat in various townships, earning the biggest sum of money this year.

Doing a good wheat season earned more than half a tractor. How could they not do such a good thing? Being a bit tired was fine, as long as they could earn money. After all, they could rest for a whole winter, and they could recover.

The wild boar meat was not only given to everyone there, but a wild boar leg was also placed at the old horse number. After returning, he also put a few kilograms of meat at Sun Jia Qiang's place, which was considered an extra meal for him.

For the next period of time, Li Long had to go into the mountains almost every day. Actually, the dozen people in the mountains, besides four people taking turns driving tractors, two people responsible for security, and one person cooking, the rest were hunting and picking mushrooms.

After finishing harvesting the grass here, Li Long not only harvested four or five hundred kilograms of dried wild mushrooms, but also over a dozen skins.

It was considered quite a harvest.

After Yushanjiang and Talihar finished harvesting the grass on the Animal Husbandry Team's side, they went with Talihar to the grassland on the Animal Husbandry Team's side. In the middle, Li Long supplemented them with two barrels of diesel.

After ten days of grass harvesting work, both of them were already very skilled in the application of tractors and harvesters, and there was no problem driving them over there themselves.

What surprised Li Long was that the remaining herdsmen stayed behind, waiting for the grass to dry and then bundling it up to transport it back to the winter shelter, and then either picking mushrooms or hunting, working very happily.

After Yushanjiang and the others finished harvesting grass on the Animal Husbandry Team's side, and drove the tractors to the purchasing station, and finally rode horses into the mountains and returned to the summer pasture, Li Long took stock, and was also very surprised. During this period of time, not mentioning the income of the purchasing station, just the things obtained from the mountains, the income exceeded twenty thousand.

Yushanjiang and Talihar and the others harvested nearly three thousand mu of grassland on the Animal Husbandry Team's side, much more than previously expected.

It was mainly because tractors harvest grass really fast, and the grass harvested is very neat, and it's convenient to bundle it up after drying.

Although it costs a lot of money, the money from selling wool in the spring and the money from selling sheep, some people can still take it out.

Yushanjiang and the others harvest grass much faster than cutting wheat. Cutting wheat requires attention not to crush the wheat, so it's very slow and steady when driving, but this consumes oil and time.

Harvesting grass is different. Just drive and run. Anyway, the grassland is so big, it doesn't matter if you drive a bit crooked, just harvest along the way.

So cutting wheat might not necessarily be a hundred mu a day, after all, it has to pass through many families, and a lot of time is wasted on the road.

But harvesting grass is fast. It's possible to harvest a hundred and fifty mu a day. So when Yushanjiang and Talihar drove the tractors back from the Animal Husbandry Team, they were both tired and thin, but their mental state was very good.

After deducting the cost of diesel, the two of them earned over one thousand yuan each.

Real money in hand, earned by driving the tractor themselves, made both of them very excited. Even though Yushanjiang was nearly forty, he was also very excited when talking about this matter in front of Li Long.

"Actually, such things happen every year," Li Long smiled and said to him, "Next year, maybe you will earn more, because more people will know the convenience of using tractors to harvest grass."

Yushanjiang nodded. He believed this was true.

Although the tribe will still live in the mountains, they don't mind life getting better. With money, they can buy more and better food, daily necessities, and even buy some forage, especially concentrate feed, when winter comes, to avoid the cattle and sheep losing too much weight in winter.

In the past, cattle and sheep lost too much weight, so they could only be slaughtered or sold, but now, with money, buying feed, letting cattle and sheep pass the winter safely, will the cattle and sheep herds they own be more and larger?

Before entering the summer pasture, they also used tractors to pull a lot of coal from the open-pit coal mine for each family. For places where the winter shelter couldn't be reached, the coal was pulled to Talihar's door, and then using horses to transport it made it much closer.

After Yushanjiang and the others went to the summer pasture, Li Long went into the mountains less.

He agreed with Shaokelaiti to go into the mountains once every five days. Shaokelaiti would dry the mushrooms. When entering August, the black tiger palm mushrooms were also approaching the end of the season.

Huang Lei came over to collect dried wild mushrooms twice more. Now there were over four hundred kilograms of dried wild mushrooms in the purchasing station. Li Long judged that by the end of this season, when Huang Lei came next time, the purchasing station should be able to sell about six hundred kilograms of dried wild mushrooms.

Again, wait until next year.

Once the wild mushrooms are out of season, the things collected by the purchasing station will mainly be skins. There are still many Codonopsis in the mountains in autumn, but this stuff doesn't have as high a price as fritillaria, and it's not as easy to find as wild mushrooms. The final quantity collected might be less.

Li Long also greeted Sun Jia Qiang in advance. The things collected later won't be as many or as profitable as before, and the bonus later won't be as much.

"It's fine without it," Sun Jia Qiang was very content, "To tell the truth, I've been scared by the bonuses I've taken in this month or so. Now this money is enough for me to buy a courtyard in the county. So much, I'm really scared. It's normal not to have it later. My salary is high enough. To tell the truth, I wouldn't feel anything even if the boss didn't pay the salary later."

It could be seen that Sun Jia Qiang didn't become greedy because of the large amount of money issued before, but rather a bit fearful.

Li Long felt that he might have indeed issued a bit too much before. He thought that from now until next year, the bonuses issued to Sun Jia Qiang could be spread out. Issue more when busy, issue less when idle, but not to the point of not issuing. When busy, it couldn't be issued as much as before, that wouldn't be good either.

One day in early August, Li Long was playing with his children at home, and then Sun Jia Qiang came over and said Li Xiangqian called him to go to the supply and marketing cooperative.

During this period of time, Li Long had been busy with the purchasing station. Besides sending a wild boar leg to Li Xiangqian in the middle, and later sending a deer leg, he hadn't been to the purchasing station.

This time Li Xiangqian called, Li Long could roughly guess what it was.

Sure enough, after arriving at Li Xiangqian's office, Li Xiangqian, who was sitting behind the desk, gave him a document.

"Take a look, this work is definitely for you to do."

"Thirty thousand? How could there be so many?" Li Long took a look, and sure enough, his prediction was correct. This time it was the task of tying big brooms assigned this year.

It was just that he never expected there to be so many this year!

"Hmm, Director Qian called and said that our county's big brooms have made a name for themselves among the Autonomous Region leaders. This year, a batch of our big brooms will be supported to brother provinces, free of charge. This concerns the reputation of our Autonomous Region, so the work of big brooms, the bulk is given to us—a total of fifty thousand in the whole prefecture, thirty thousand are here with us. How about it, the leaders value you enough, right?"

"Thirty thousand..." Li Long wasn't happy this time, but a bit worried.

After all, there were only so many Jiji grass and poles. Although Meng Hai and Xu Haijun had prepared some, it was obviously far from enough.

Flipping through the document, it required delivery by early September.

One month's time, very urgent.

But Li Long knew that no matter how urgent it was, he had to ensure quality on his side.

However, these thirty thousand, he couldn't just check them himself. He needed to mobilize his family.

The top priority was to distribute this task to the two villages. Now they could cut Jiji grass to tie big brooms.

Thirty thousand, if adding the unqualified factors, that was at least receiving over a thousand every day.

Calculating that there were over a hundred households in the two villages, that was to say, each household had to tie at least ten or more every day.

Some households could do it or even exceed it, after all, like Liang Dacheng's family with many mouths, they were fast at tying.

Some households might not have enough.

It seemed he still had to mobilize people in other villages to join—for example, Liang Wenyu's side? (End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 894 =====