Chapter 316: Sorting

The farce early in the morning gradually came to an end under the scolding of Ye Eldest Sister-in-law.

After a group of children finished eating, they stood at the door with their schoolbags on their backs, watching them sort crabs and tie crab legs, all reluctant to go to school.

After washing the bowls and chopsticks, Ye Eldest Sister-in-law came out and saw them still gathered there talking, not having left for school. Suddenly, anger rose again. She returned to the room, picked up the whip, and lashed it toward them again.

The one suffering was, of course, Ye Chenghai.

He instantly jumped up, his face crying. "Why are you beating me again?"

"Beating you, one by one reluctant to leave when it's time, didn't eat enough breakfast and waiting to eat the whip?"

"It's not just me... hey... you guys don't run... wait for me..."

Walking slowly, he ended up eating another whip...

Sigh, being the eldest is really too difficult...

Ye Yaodong, Ye Father, and Ye Mother sorted and tied the two baskets of crabs. The old lady also helped slowly on the side.

The four of them only spent a little time sorting out all the crabs and tying their legs.

The thinner ones, the ones with broken big legs, and the dead ones, they kept for themselves to eat. There were more than 40 jin of intact ones picked out. The vitality of crabs is still quite tenacious.

For the ten-plus jin kept for themselves, he let his mother decide how to distribute them to relatives and friends, anyway, the family couldn't finish eating them, and then he lifted the sorted baskets onto the cart.

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Although the quantity in each basket wasn't much, they had to be put in baskets after being sorted. By the way, he also lifted the large yellow croaker caught last night onto the cart.

Sent to the pier, the crabs sold for more than twelve yuan, and the large yellow croaker sold for more than 16 yuan. The two combined sold for less than 29 yuan.

This could be considered an unexpected fortune.

He happily collected the goods list and asked Ah Cai to help him save 50 jin of miscellaneous fish and small shrimp as bait today.

There were still quite a few sand worms at home, which could also be used as bait, so fish and shrimp could be appropriately reduced. If it weren't for the thought of having a rich variety of bait, and he also wanted to dry a bit more sand worm, he wouldn't need to buy any at all, sand worms as bait would be enough.

He went home happily. He didn't know how long it would take to clean those two large baskets of sand worms, fortunately, there were many people at home who could help with work.

When he went back, Ye Eldest Sister-in-law and Ye Er Sister-in-law were also holding chopsticks to help clean, and were discussing that they would also go catch more to dry when the tide receded. Sand worms were indeed delicious and could nourish yin and tonify the kidneys.

Don't look at the two baskets here plus what was left yesterday, the quantity combined wasn't small, but in reality, there wasn't much after drying. One jin of sand worm could probably dry out a little more than one liang, about eight jin to produce one jin of dried product.

He also kept a few jin as bait, and yesterday he brought a bucket back for his father-in-law and mother-in-law. The rest was estimated to dry about six or seven jin. When they came to pick up Lin Guangyuan, he had to let them take some dried ones back. Counting it up, there really wasn't much, enough for each family to share only one or two jin...

No, have to send Lin Guangyuan to catch more in the afternoon!

Ye Mother also said there, "When the tide recedes in the afternoon, I'll go with you, catch more, this is delicious no matter how you cook it. After the beginning of spring, there's a lot of rain, haven't been out to sea much, there's no stock at home, those dried goods are almost eaten up, have to dry more."

"We thought so too..."

Today is the 16th of the lunar calendar, the tide will be full after 1 o'clock in the afternoon, lasting for more than an hour, and then it will gradually start to recede, receding to the bottom after 7 o'clock.

Just right, at that time in the afternoon, the few little ones will also be out of school, can be sent out!

He wasn't afraid that there would be no sand worms to catch today. Generally, mating and reproduction will last for a few days. If there are none on the surface of the beach, dig under the sand, and you can dig them up.

It's just that when they were busy, Auntie Lan from next door and her three daughters-in-law came over to clean the house. Seeing them, they also gathered over to greet them.

"Yo~ so many sand worms? Caught on the beach? You went to the beach to catch them so early?"

Ye Eldest Sister-in-law also said, "This must be several tens of jin, can dry a lot, how long did you pack them? Should there still be some when the tide recedes in the afternoon? We'll go catch some then, this is very fresh."

Ye Mother smiled. "The house has been built for a few days, when are you moving?"

"Still have to wait half a month for a date. We took the time to come over to clean up in advance, and the area around the door also needs to be tidied up, get a small piece of land to plant some vegetables."

"Have to plant some vegetables, there's little land around here, can only plant a little for ourselves by squeezing in."

"Yeah, so come over in advance to tidy up, the men aren't at home, went out to sea, can only be done by us women."

After they said a few words, they went to the new house next door to get busy.

Ye Er Sister-in-law was a bit unhappy and said, "It's fine, but there are a few more families next door. Fortunately, that large king squid was discovered early in the first lunar month, otherwise, it might have been discovered by them first."

Ye Yaodong looked at his second sister-in-law unexpectedly. Her brain was quite strange, actually able to associate so far? It had been several months...

Maybe after being cheated of money, suddenly having a large income made her remember it firmly in her heart. You have to know she previously disliked this area of the new house for being a bit remote.

"Zhou Yongsheng's family is also going to build next door, heard they are waiting for work to start after May 1st," Ye Mother said casually while busy. "It's good to have a few more families building houses here, it's lively."

"Not building together, knocking and hitting all day long, so noisy..."

"Building a house is always like this..."

Many hands make light work, everyone chatted, and the movements on their hands weren't slow, the two baskets of sand worms gradually hit the bottom.

Ye Mother saw that there was only a little left at the bottom, so she handed it to them to do, and she went to fetch water to clean.

After washing the sand worms, take advantage of the good weather these two days to dry them, and then she has to be busy with those few baskets of anchovies.

Fish sauce is made by fermenting small fish with salt. Its method is very wow, not inferior to the notorious surströmming.

Ye Yaodong watched his mother dump the small fish into a large vat, mixed with sea salt in a 3:2 ratio to start pickling. As for how much fish sauce a large sack of anchovies could produce, he didn't know, hadn't calculated.

After it's made, it can be taken to sell. Their whole family couldn't finish eating that large vat until the year of the monkey, and it couldn't be eaten as a meal, it was just a condiment for freshness. However, it was indeed indispensable for every household in their local area.

With Ye Father helping Ye Mother, he went into the room to play with the children.

When the tide receded in the afternoon, their whole family took tools to the beach, preparing to catch more sand worms.

Don't know if Auntie Lan's family next door leaked the news, when the tide receded in the afternoon, quite a lot of people came to the beach. The sand worms in the shallow beach were swept away as soon as they popped their heads, making them have to dig slowly on the beach, and the efficiency was greatly reduced.

Digging sand worms isn't directly shoveling at the hole, but around the hole, and then stepping on the shovel to quickly turn them out, which is more efficient.

At this moment, Ye Father and Ye Mother each took a shovel to turn them there, and Ye Eldest Sister-in-law and Ye Er Sister-in-law picked them up.

The children came over after school and were stunned to see the beach full of people.

"How long will this take to dig?"

"Dig slowly, just treat it as playing."

After a group of helpers came, Ye Yaodong didn't work seriously anymore, and started wandering around, by the way, to see other people's harvests.

Hmm... not as many as their family caught with shovels...

Wandered around, only picked up a few cat-eye snails that would spray water, and a few mudskippers.

There were too many people on the beach, probably almost picked clean.

Both his hands were full, could only walk back, but saw Ye Chenghu reaching out to a sea snail on the beach, scaring him to immediately run up and kick it away.

"Father?"

"Don't reach out and pick up anything you don't recognize," he said while walking to the snail, "Come here."

Ye Chenghu went over in confusion. "Ah?"

"Teach you to recognize it, this is called a cone snail, the shell is sharp and thin in the front, thick and large in the back, the shape is a bit like a chicken's heart or like taro. This is highly poisonous, the very small opening inside has poisonous teeth, can shoot venom, touching it can make you die."

There are many small seafoods to pick up at the seaside, but there are also fatal things, need to be careful, especially in this era, marine products are rich, and unknown things often appear on the beach.

Ye Chenghu was instantly stunned, motionless.

"Don't touch things you don't recognize in the future," he looked at the other children who gathered around, "You are the same, be careful when playing on the beach, don't pick up things you don't recognize."

"Oh, got it, Third Uncle."

"Go play!"

After letting them recognize it carefully, he kicked this cone snail far back into the sea. This snail is actually easy to recognize.

Seeing Ye Chenghu still in place, he patted his head again. "Go dig sand worms, will give you pocket money when we go back later!"

"Really?" Ye Chenghu's eyes shone with surprise.

Children are just forgetful.

"Really, only if you work hard, go."

He ran away pitter-patter, throwing this episode behind his head.

The whole family came out just after the tide receded, busy for two or three hours, went back at mealtime, only dug 20 jin or so, and were disliked by a group of children.

"Not as many as we caught yesterday!"

"Not as many as we caught at night!"

"Too many people!"

Ye Yaodong also felt that the efficiency today was too low. In the future, when dealing with these things, still have to put them at the back door.

"Little Uncle-in-law, we at night..."

Ye Yaodong knocked his head unceremoniously. "Stay at home and sleep at night, if I find you running to the beach secretly, I'll send you home directly tomorrow, and won't let you come over to play anymore."

Lin Guangyuan immediately shut his mouth. "I mean, what time are you going out to sea at night?"

"Two something."

"Then what time are you coming back?"

"Don't know what time in the afternoon, depends on the situation, depends on the tide, depends on the weather, depends on the harvest."

"Alright."

"Want to go out to sea to play, wait until you are a bit older."

"Alright."

Because he had to go out to sea at night, Ye Yaodong went to sleep after coming back from the literacy class.

He had a bit of a "three days of fishing, two days of drying nets" attitude toward the literacy class, only going when he was free, so he hadn't graduated yet. He also held the attitude of learning as many characters as he could, continuing to attend.