Chapter 104: The Unpalatable Sorghum

It was once again the busiest time of the year; everything had ripened, and the Hunter Team had been repurposed into a gathering team, going out to collect food from morning till night without pause.

Baifeng placed great importance on the wild Job's tears, as they had a high yield, were easy to pick, and tasted very good, with a size almost no different from those of later generations.

The lotus flowers had withered, and the lotus seeds could be harvested, though they were still tender lotus pods; only a small amount could be cut and brought back for the tribespeople to use as a snack or to boil into porridge. If they were to cut them in large quantities, it would be too troublesome right now; a single lotus pod did not yield many seeds and took up too much space, with a cart unable to hold many, so they could only wait until the lotus seeds dried before knocking them off to bring back.

Baifeng's Fish Pond was also operating normally, living up to expectations. Fearing a lack of oxygen, the pipes at the water inlet were positioned quite high and divided into a row, entering the Fish Pond with a pattering sound like a sprinkler.

The Fish Pond was mostly permeable, though it did not have much of an impact as the leakage was not significant; the water inlet had to be closed every few days, otherwise the water would overflow.

The fish inside were also lively and vigorous. Because the varieties were very mixed, no specific feed was provided, and since the Fish Pond was large enough and they had planted so many water grasses and introduced things like pond snails, their normal survival was absolutely no problem.

However, the tribespeople would cut some green grass and throw it in to serve as feed for the herbivorous fish. Because the tribe's production capacity in all aspects had increased, many small iron tools had also been made, and the Fishing Team had even fashioned some iron scoops to scrape the mud along the banks, which could net a ladle of pond snails.

The tribespeople dared not eat this stuff, and Baifeng had no experience in this area either, so he dared not touch it for fear of parasites; without seasonings, it would not taste good anyway, as chili peppers were still far away in the Americas.

The people did not eat the pond snails, but this thing, which was everywhere, was indeed good feed for the fish. Every day, the Fishing Team could bring back several baskets of them; there was no other reason than that there were simply too many, the mud was full of them, and they bred quickly. Now, one could even sporadically see pond snails on the reeds in the Baifeng Tribe's Fish Pond.

Fearing that the stability of the entire Fish Pond ecosystem would be disrupted, the gathered pond snails first had to go through a stone mortar to be smashed into snail paste before being tossed into the Fish Pond. The snail paste was very popular; once tossed in, the water surface was immediately covered in fish scrambling for it.

Because of the artificial feeding, these small fish fry grew extremely fast, especially the black carp—the main fish species that ate the pond snails—whose size had already reached the level where they could be harvested, though the other fish had not grown as outrageously and were not yet as big as a palm.

Baifeng's project to cultivate water bamboo failed because he could not find the fungus that could infect the Gujiao, and there was none in Dahu either. Therefore, the wild rice was still wild rice and had not matured, and this meager yield was negligible, not even worth harvesting, so he just let Nature drop it into the water to serve as food for the fish.

The output from Dahu was far greater than what was captured in the forest. Because they had harvested a lot of hemp, there was not only enough to make plenty of Hemp Cloth, but also a lot of hemp left over to make rope. Rope was indispensable in every aspect of daily life; although other fibrous plants could also be used to make rope, they were far less sturdy and durable than hemp.

First, they made a larger and sturdier fishing net for the Fishing Team. Previously, they had used hooks, spears, and cages to catch fish, which was very inefficient. Later, they made grass rope and fashioned it into a fishing net, but unfortunately, it was not sturdy enough.

Now that this large fishing net had appeared, it was both sturdy and had a large surface area; one cast was enough to complete their daily workload, and the remaining time could be used to forage for pond snails, lotus roots, crabs, and loaches.

There were also many river shrimp, but they had previously only been able to catch a few in their cages, and the quantity was very small, so they had never paid much attention to them.

But now they could make shrimp nets with very small mesh. By finding areas where shrimp were dense, they could catch a lot in one cast. Although the largest were only as big as a thumb, they were still meat, and the taste was very delicious.

Baifeng had them dry the shrimp into dried shrimp, which could be boiled into dried shrimp porridge. The larger ones were picked out with a sieve, and those with the leisure time could boil them and peel them slowly to eat, but the tribespeople's opinion was to simply dry them, grind them into powder, and boil shrimp powder to drink.

The planted crops had also reached the time for harvest. Originally, buckwheat could have been harvested at this time, but unfortunately, the last hailstorm had caused Baifeng to lose all hope for the buckwheat, so it had long since become part of the green fodder.

The yield of the Rice could not compare to that of later generations, but even after suffering from the disaster, it was still the crop with the highest yield in their tribe. Baifeng only regretted that he had planted too little, and after the harvest, he would immediately open up several hundred more acres of paddy fields.

Baifeng roughly counted them; there were about ten ears of grain on one rice stalk, and each ear had about sixty grains of rice. Although this number was not even one-third of the lowest-yielding rice of later generations, its return on investment shocked Baifeng: one seed planted yielded six hundred, while wheat could only yield twenty.

Moreover, the taste of the rice was very good, and Baifeng was also very satisfied with its plumpness. Now, even if the Baifeng Tribe truly suffered a disaster, they could live prosperously for a year relying solely on grain without eating meat.

The situation with the Sorghum left Baifeng speechless. The stalks grew truly tall, over three meters, but the ears were like the tufts of hair tied on a child's head—small and sparse.

There was no help for it; Baifeng just considered it fodder. The cattle loved eating the Sorghum stalks, but as for Sorghum as a staple food, Baifeng could hardly compliment the taste. Millet was already rough and scratchy to the throat, and Sorghum rice was even worse.

After knocking off the Sorghum seeds, cutting the stalks at the appropriate position, and tying them together, they made a very useful broom. The tribespeople loved cleanliness, so they used Grass to tie into brooms to sweep the floor; the brooms made of Sorghum were shorter and could be used inside rooms, and if this thing were taken out to sell, it should be quite popular.

The yield of Sorghum was very low, but they had planted a lot of it; Baifeng estimated that the harvest was about three thousand catties, as they had only planted these few types of crops on so much arable land.

Because everyone did not particularly like eating Sorghum, and there was other grain available, Baifeng set his sights on making Wine; Sorghum was very suitable for making Wine.

However, the thing Baifeng lacked most right now was wine starter. In the past, Baifeng had made fermented glutinous rice and brewed fruit wine himself, but he had never made distilled liquor because it was more complex and not convenient to make at home.

When he made it in the past, he always bought ready-made wine starter. As it turned out, he didn't understand that the starter used for fruit wine and fermented glutinous rice was the same, and unsurprisingly, his fruit wine brewing failed; the color was excellent, but the taste was just like vinegar.

Later, he learned slowly and realized that the starters used for the two were not the same. It was also at that time that he learned how to make starter using ancient methods, though he had learned it without ever putting it into practice.