Chapter 96: Failure in Selling Fish for the First Time After the New Year

It wasn't until the tenth day of the Lunar New Year that Li Long and Tao Daqiang restarted the business of digging for fish in the ice holes.

There was a break of ten or twenty days in between, and the demand for oxygen by the fish in Xiaohai became more and more urgent. In one day, the two dug up over a hundred kilograms of fish. So many fish also startled the two, and then they pulled the fish back to start sorting, leaving the too big and too small ones at home. The Li family kept a part, and Tao Daqiang took some back.

The next day, Li Long and Tao Daqiang pulled the fish to sell, but what surprised them was that whether it was the black market in Maxian or the family quarters in Shicheng, the demand for fish was not so urgent anymore. The fish were placed there, and although there were many people coming to see them, even though Li Long shouted loudly, not many people offered a price.

By the time the two returned in the dark, the fish hadn't been sold out!

Li Long simply gave the remaining seven or eight kilograms of large and small fish to Zhong Guoqiang of the Meat Canteen.

Returning to the team, Li Long gave Tao Daqiang a five-yuan ticket, and then said to him:

"Daqiang, I don't plan to catch fish for the next half month. Now the fish are hard to sell, you saw it too. If you want to catch fish for your family to eat, take the net from my house. Fish, we won't do it for the time being."

Tao Daqiang was also very disappointed. Li Long didn't catch or sell fish, so he lost the way to earn money.

The money earned earlier was all spent at home, buying New Year goods, buying coal, and now he only had the five yuan Li Long gave him.

He didn't have much count when spending money when he earned it earlier, but now he felt that the five yuan in his hand was very precious and couldn't be spent casually.

"Then Brother Long, when—when can we sell fish again?"

"Wait for a while," Li Long thought and said, "Wait for half a month and see."

"Good." Tao Daqiang went home.

Half a month, he could afford to wait.

In fact, during this trip, Li Long also discovered a new situation. After the New Year, although people’s enthusiasm for buying things dropped a lot, the black market became more active instead.

The number of stalls in the Maxian black market was more than double what it used to be. There were eggs, meat, rice, flour, rabbits, and all kinds of things for sale, and some people were holding small baskets and small sieves they had made themselves. In short, it could be seen that the market had been activated, and the above seemed to have relaxed the setting up of stalls to sell things.

Although there was more competition, the market was activated, and naturally, there were more people buying things. Li Long was happy about such changes.

Returning home, Li Long told Li Jianguo about the situation, and Li Jianguo nodded and said:

"If you don't catch, don't catch. Anyway, the sea is so big, there are many fish, and you can catch them whenever you want. But after the snow melts in the spring, it will be difficult to catch fish."

"Not difficult," Li Long laughed, "Just set sticky nets when the time comes."

He remembered that in his previous life, there were quite a few fishermen in the team, using large car tires inflated as boats, with wooden boards tied on top, making two small paddles, paddling while setting nets in the sea. Setting nets in the afternoon of the first day, taking the nets in the early morning of the second day, taking the fish off directly, riding a bicycle to the county town to sell, and picking up the nets after eating breakfast.

At that time, the large crucian carp in Xiaohai were very popular, from two or three yuan per kilogram to fifteen yuan per kilogram later, and large crucian carp could sell for twenty to twenty-five, and there would still be people who wanted them.

After all, in the eyes of eaters, wild fish taste better than farmed fish. And because Xiaohai was full of reeds and later grew cattails, the crucian carp had things to eat, and the fish caught looked beautiful, fat, and shiny, and one could tell at a glance that it was different from the pale kind of farmed fish.

So until Li Long passed away in his previous life, the fish in Xiaohai were the most popular in the market, none of them.

Calculating this way, the matter of buying a bicycle had to be put on the agenda. And buying sticky nets, casting nets, getting tires, or making a wooden boat would need more consideration.

Hunting was something to be done, and Li Long wouldn't give up being a "fisherman."

Being able to earn money was even more of a hobby.

"Big Brother, do you know how to cast a net?" Li Long suddenly thought of something. He hadn't really seen his brother cast a net in his previous life before he passed away. "I know, but I can't cast it open, usually only half a net," Li Jianguo rolled a cigarette and said, "In the past, in my hometown, the best at casting nets was the second brother.

The second brother cast the net round, and could also cast it into a corner, wanting to cover wherever he wanted—when the big river flooded, there were fish under the bridge hole, and he took that big casting net, cast a small circle, just covering the square table-sized piece in front of the bridge hole, and not a single fish ran away..."

The second brother Li Jianguo mentioned was the second in the rank of their uncle’s brothers, a cousin, older than Li Jianguo. Li Long had no memory of this. His memory of his hometown had blurred, only remembering that he couldn't get enough to eat in his hometown.

"Actually, Dad can also cast a net," Li Jianguo lit the cigarette and took a puff: "In those years when food was scarce, every spring, Dad would go to the big river to cast a net, catching fish and shrimp to come back and boil to eat, although there was no oil, it was better than having nothing to eat."

He didn't expect that the dad who was unreliable in Li Long’s eyes actually had such a hand.

"Actually, it’s simple to learn how to cast a net well," Li Jianguo laughed, "When the snow melts, find a net, sweep the open space on the wheat field clean, and practice. As long as you know the starting gesture, practice a hundred or eighty times a day, and you will be able to cast, and cast round in a week."

Li Long thought it was the same. He knew the starting gesture of casting a net, but it wasn't casting a line, it was casting a small semicircle. The reason was just a lack of practice.

He didn't like the kind of disc net of later generations, he was still used to the old-fashioned casting net—practice when you have time.

The next day, Li Long went to the county town. When he came out of the department store, he pushed out a brand-new No. 28 permanent heavy-duty bicycle, also with an air pump. On the back seat of the car, he directly tied a bag of cotton socks, scarves, and other cold-proof things.

Then he went to the supply and marketing cooperative retail department, bought a few pieces of sandpaper and a scale. He couldn't do without a scale to sell things later.

!.

After buying these things, Li Long rode to the old house, took out the Type 56 semi-automatic rifle from the side room, and started to gently polish the rust spots on the receiver cover with sandpaper.

After getting the gun ready, Li Long put on his equipment, rode the bicycle, and headed toward the mountains in the whistling cold wind.

It was really cold, but the speed was also really fast!

It took two hours to drive the horse cart, but in less than an hour, he had arrived at Halimu’s winter shelter.

Halimu, who heard the dog barking, came out of the winter shelter and was very surprised to see Li Long riding a bicycle.

"This bicycle, must be very expensive, right?"

"It’s indeed not cheap." Although Li Long had money, he felt a bit of a heartache after buying this bicycle, "Over one hundred and sixty yuan, the price of ten sheep."

"That’s not expensive." Halimu felt that only ten sheep was really not expensive.

Handing the cotton socks and scarves to Halimu, Li Long said:

"I plan to look around in the mountains for these two days to see where else there are things to hunt."

"In these mountains, there are many things to hunt, too many!" Halimu laughed, "Just in time, I’ll take you. In some places, there are good things even in summer!"

Thanks to book friend 20180307133112452 for the reward, thanks to book friend Kong Zhimo for the reward, thanks to everyone for the large amount of monthly tickets and recommendation tickets support these two days.

It can basically be determined that it will be on the shelves at this time tomorrow. I have prepared twenty chapters of manuscripts, over forty thousand words, to respond to everyone’s long-term support.

I will put more words in the on-shelf testimonial, let’s just do this for now, sleep everyone.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 97 =====