Vol 3 Chapter 502: Where did the shrimp go?

Vol 3 Chapter 502: Where did the shrimp go?

 After the village committee meeting.

Li Duoyu finally had some leisure time and felt much better. After Chen Zhishu arrived, someone would help him with all the trivial matters in the village.

He can also be responsible for handling the spirit and documents conveyed by the organization.

 And he himself has more time to take care of his family, as well as manage the eel factory and shrimp factory.

After all, the special equipment for shrimp farming will be delivered in three months. Time is still very tight. The most important thing for Li Duoyu now is to quickly build the shrimp farming factory in Qixing Bay.

Not only is it about the factory building, but we also need to find a way to apply to the Electricity Bureau and build a line to Qixing Bay.

 And these all need to be run in person. In the process, it is inevitable to eat and drink with the leaders.

From a time point of view, this is almost impossible. Some things are really impossible if you don’t try hard and just give up.

 After leaving the village committee.

Li Duoyu went straight to the center of the village to find Lao Cao, who was building a house. He planned to ask Lao Cao first if it was possible to build the factory building in such a short construction period.

Sister-in-law Cao looked submissive.

Lao Cao always said that he has been too busy these years and has been building houses for others, and he has no time to build his own.

"How can you let Director Li wait outside? Why don't you make some tea first?"

Li Duoyu asked: "Is it possible to have twenty cement pools of five hundred square meters? I will prepare all the materials."

Lao Cao first poured a cup of tea for Li Duoyu, and then said: "Duoyu, your factory is too big and time is so tight. My family will definitely not be able to build it. If you don't mind, I can call you more It may still be possible with a few experienced colleagues to help.”

 “Sister-in-law Cao.”

 Speaking of it, people in the village couldn't understand it. Lao Cao, who built houses for others, lived in a very old stone house with earthen floors.

 “Seven Star Bay.”

Li Duoyu can only say yes.

When leaving, Mrs. Cao did not close the door. Looking in from the outside, the light inside the house was very dark, and there were all kinds of tools used for building a house.

“Hurry up and boil some water. There’s not even boiling water. How can I make tea for Director Li?”

In this day and age, this kind of reprimanding conversation between husband and wife is still quite common in coastal fishing villages, especially for Lao Cao and his generation, who still have a lot of machismo in their bones.

 Lao Cao frowned and pondered for a while, and then said: "To be honest, it's too late. I definitely won't be able to build it in three months."

Li Duoyu shook his head and said, "It's not on our island, it's over there at Qixing Bay."

After waiting for about ten minutes, Lao Cao hurried back. When he saw Li Duoyu standing there waiting, he talked about Mrs. Cao with a dark face.

Li Duoyu wanted to say no, but he didn't expect that the other party was very nimble with his hands and feet. He had already put down the fish shuttle in his hand and hurried towards the back mountain.

 After hearing this, Lao Cao frowned, and then became entangled: "Duoyu, are you in a hurry for this factory?"

 The money that Lao Cao earned in the past two years was almost the same as that of Mr. Mi, and almost all of it was used to subsidize his two sons.

His name seems to be Cao Zheng. Why, because they haven’t contacted him for so long, Li Duoyu doesn’t remember what this person looks like at all.

"Old Cao, he went to the back mountain to chop stones. You wait here for a while, and I will go to the back mountain to call him."

The eldest son works in a factory in Rongcheng, and the younger son works in the county to earn a living. The one in the county is still a primary school classmate with him.

It is precisely because of this idea that almost all the money earned by the older generation is given to their children. This was also the case with father and mother in the previous life. The two elders worked hard all their lives, and before they left, they did not have much money in their pockets, and even I have never even been to Tiananmen Square or the Great Wall, which I miss so much.

Li Duoyu said: "The first phase of the factory building will be 1,000 square meters, with at least 30 breeding ponds inside, and it must be able to withstand typhoons."

 “Sister-in-law Cao, yes.”

After walking for more than thirty meters, he turned back to Li Duoyu and said, "Wait a moment, I'll be back soon."

Hearing that 1,000 square meters was needed to resist typhoons, and that 30 pools would be built in it, Lao Cao couldn't help but take a breath and asked, "This project of yours is very big. Will it be built on our island?"

If you dare to say so, I estimate that the divorce agreement will be printed out for you that night, and you will take the child back to your parents' home the next day.

But for Li Duoyu, who has lived two lives, he is a little uncomfortable. After all, in his previous life, including his son, he had no status at all with his daughter-in-law.

Li Duoyu nodded and said: "It's quite urgent, and the factory building is relatively large. It's best to complete the construction within three months."

People of Lao Cao's generation have gone through hardships. Ever since they were young, they have never lived a good life for a few days. Their biggest wish is that the next generation can live a better life and not suffer anymore.

When the woman saw Li Duoyu, she smiled and said, "Hey, Director Li, are you here to see Lao Cao?"

This woman who is over fifty years old looks like a very traditional fisher girl, and she is also dressed like a fisher girl.

 “I’ll burn it right away.”

Li Duoyu got straight to the point: "Uncle Cao, are you free recently? I would like to ask you to help me build a factory."

After hearing this, Li Duoyu said on the spot: "Of course I don't mind this. If you can find a few more masters, I won't be happy enough."

There are also several carts at the door, some used to pull stones, some used to transport sand, and a pile of gravel.

I heard that Lao Cao paid for all the TVs and refrigerators in his two sons’ homes.

Sister-in-law Cao didn't dare to reply to anything Lao Cao said to her, but she had already made a note in her mind that the next time Li Duoyu came, she would make tea first and then go find him.

 But in fact, Lao Cao’s family situation is very similar to that of fishmonger Mi LaoTou. He has two sons and two daughters.

 “Approximately how big is it?”

　　When Li Duoyu first arrived at their home, Lao Cao was not at home. Only his wife was mending the net at the door.

Lao Cao continued: "If you want to withstand typhoons, ordinary factory roofs will definitely not work. Iron frames and iron pillars are necessary, which will cost a lot of money. You may have to be mentally prepared."

Li Duoyu nodded and said:

“It’s okay, Uncle Cao, you can use the best materials and the best craftsmanship, but don’t save me any money on it.”

Lao Cao then asked: "Have you come out with the factory drawings?"

“This is relatively simple. Inside the factory, it mainly consists of the ponds, as well as electrical circuits and waterways. In the second phase, I will build dormitories and offices.”

“Okay, then I’ll go to the county town in the afternoon and find some old masters who have trained with me to see if they are willing to work together.”

 “So anxious?”

Lao Cao sighed with emotion: "It's okay if we don't rush. The three-month time limit is too tight. Maybe we have to rush to work at night."

Li Duoyu smiled and said, "Uncle Cao, safety comes first. Do you want me to take you to the county?"

“No need, hurry up and I’ll take the afternoon passenger boat. I’ll have to tell Zeng Datou later that their house will not be built until the second half of the year.”

 After hearing this, Li Duoyu finally understood that Uncle Cao had rejected other people's orders and gave priority to building his factory.

 After leaving Uncle Cao, Li Duoyu came to the dock. This time, it was Chen Wenchao and his wife who were responsible for purchasing live shrimps.

 Now Chen Wenchao has many things that Liu Xiaolan helps him handle, especially in areas that he is not good at.

For example, when it comes to rejecting others, Chen Wenchao is very blunt. If he can't do it, he can't do it. He often quarrels with fishermen until he becomes red-faced.

But Liu Xiaolan is completely different. She knows how to speak tactfully. Although she refuses, the other party can accept it.

"Uncle, you have too many live shrimps with broken legs. Director Li agreed that only intact and lively prawns will be charged 50 cents each. You can only sell them by the pound." The fisherman sighed: " When untying the net, the legs of the shrimps are easily torn off, and there are not so many intact ones.”

"Uncle, be careful next time you untie the net. Such a big one costs fifty cents and half a pound of meat."

After hearing this, the fisherman took a selfie of his thigh and cursed at his son behind him: "I told you to be careful, but you can't sell it at a high price now."

Li Duoyu couldn't help but smile when he saw this scene. This counts as a salary and two employees.

 Li Duoyu asked: "How was the shrimp harvest today?"

Chen Wenchao had a bitter look on his face: "It's not ideal. We caught very few shrimps today, and many of them were small sword shrimps (slippery shrimps). Brother Yu, I didn't catch the big yellow shrimp you wanted." How many."

Old man Mi, the fishmonger on the side, was very happy today. If Li Duoyu didn't buy these sword shrimps, he would buy them all today.

So far, more than ten kilograms have been harvested. This kind of shrimp is not as big as the large yellow shrimp, and the price is much cheaper. The market price is about three yuan per kilogram.

 Sword shrimp is a kind of sea shrimp that can be caught almost all seasons, and it is also the most abundant shrimp species in their waters.

The fishmonger’s purchase price is only one yuan and seventy-eight dollars, so fishermen don’t make much money by catching this kind of shrimp.

After all, shrimps are too light, with dozens of them weighing only one pound. Even if you are lucky and the whole net is full of shrimps, they will not be particularly heavy, and they will only weigh less than five or six pounds to hold them to death.

 Lao Mi smiled and said: “If the big yellow shrimps were so easy to catch, the price wouldn’t be so expensive.”

Li Duoyu checked and found that the two large buckets brought over by Chen Wenchao did not contain many live shrimps.

 The total number of them all added up was less than forty. Li Duoyu checked it and found that there were probably less than eight individuals suitable for being broodstock.

At this time, Lao Lu's fishing boat, which was more than ten meters long, also returned to the pier. He and his son-in-law were not looking very good, and their faces were covered with beard residue. It looked like they had stayed up all night last night.

Before their boat even docked, someone shouted: "Lao Lu, have you caught any prawns?"

Lao Lu had a dark face and cursed: "Catch a ghost."

As soon as the words were spoken, Lao Lu realized that he had said the wrong thing. People who go to sea are still very taboo about saying such things.

Hurryly, he made two beeping sounds, bowed to the Tianhou Palace, and began to pray incessantly.

Old Lu sighed: "His uncle usually has a lot of them when he doesn't want to catch them, but when he really wants to catch them, he can't catch any of them. They are all these mantis shrimps (pipi shrimps)."

Lao Lu’s son-in-law Zhang Yuansheng brought down two buckets of mantis shrimps and a basket of miscellaneous fish.

After seeing this kind of mantis shrimp, the fishermen on the pier couldn't help but laugh: "Old Lu, it's better to just throw this kind of thing into the sea. How can you catch it again? You are not afraid of the trouble of untying the net."

Lao Lu choked back on the spot: "I have to earn back the fuel cost. My boat is not like a small boat like yours."

Looking at the two baskets of mantis shrimps, Li Duoyu couldn't help but smile. In this era, mantis shrimps are really not easy to sell. Like barnacles, they are disliked by fishermen.

 The best-selling fish now are the most popular sea fish that are large and meaty, such as large yellow croaker and rice fish.

As for seafood like shrimp shrimp, the shell is full of thorns, which is very prickly. Foodies who don’t know how to eat it will not be able to eat it at all.

Moreover, the meat yield rate of this product is very low. The meat that is hard to break out is not enough to fill the teeth, so it is disliked by everyone.

 The most important thing is that if the season is wrong for this thing, there won’t even be any meat on it. The locals usually call it Shui Gu, and they won’t even bother to cook it.

 Once caught, fishermen will curse, because shrimps are covered with spines, and if you use too much force, the net will be easily broken.

And if you give this thing away, it will be disliked. According to the uncle, there were many such shrimps more than ten years ago.

　　It was a whole boatload once caught, but no one liked to eat it. Later, it was taken directly to the breeding factory and used as pig feed.

“Two cents, one cent is too cheap, I can’t even make back the gas money.” Lao Lu complained.

Old man Mi looked disgusted: "We are familiar with each other. You can ask other fish collectors in our village if they want mantis shrimps like you."

 “That fifteen cents.”

Old man Mi still refused: "If I charge 15 cents, it will cost at least 30 cents at the vegetable market. Who wants this stuff?"

“It’s only ten cents at most, and really can’t be more, so I’ll just make up the number. In this season, no one wants this meatless thing.”

“It’s only a dime, so you can give me a better price for the remaining fish.”

Except for Lao Lu who didn’t catch the prawns, no other fishermen caught them either. Even the confident Zhao brothers were confused this time.

 More than fifty people were caged down.

They caught less than thirty local yellow shrimps, and less than ten of them met the standard, which made them quite depressed.

 You can come to the pier.

Seeing that no one caught any prawns, I immediately felt balanced. When I learned that Lao Lu had sailed out for a day and a night and came back with two baskets of prawns, I couldn't help but laugh on the spot, and my mood instantly improved.

These fishermen on the island have various methods of catching shrimps. The method of catching shrimps by sinking and sticking nets to the bottom is the simplest.

However, the sticky net used for catching shrimp is best to be single-layered, so that the survival rate of sea shrimp is relatively high and it is easier to remove the shrimp.

 If a multi-layered sticky net is used, shrimps are often entangled tightly when caught, which is not only difficult to untie, but also has a much higher mortality rate.

There are other fishermen in Lao Lu, and most of them use sticky nets to catch fish. The Zhao brothers use ground cages. The survival rate of shrimps caught with this fishing tool is relatively high, and they are more suitable for use as broodstock.

The most efficient one is the shrimp fishing boat equipped with a beam trawl, that is, Liu Yun's boat. However, this fishing method causes the most damage to the shrimp. Many shrimps have already been caught in the net bag when they are caught. Squeezed to death.

The trawl net of this kind of ship is different from the ordinary trawl net. It has a beam with wheels rolling in the sea.

The shrimps hiding in the sand will jump out of the sand when frightened, and there is a layer of net at the net entrance above the truss.

 It can directly filter out miscellaneous fish and large fish. If an experienced boat owner usually catches shrimps.

 Obviously, Liu Yunhe and his second cousin Li Yuanguang were not very experienced ship bosses.

The people in their boat fought hard for a day and a night, and like Lao Lu, they came back with five baskets of shrimps.

Seeing that they couldn't catch any shrimp, and Li Duoyu was very big, Lao Cao built the shrimp farm before the time came.

 It is quite embarrassing that this year’s shrimp farming project was aborted because there were no broodstock shrimps.

 “Where did the shrimp go?”

Li Duoyu frowned and looked for the fishermen who went out to catch shrimps, asking them about their fishing time and location one by one.

I found that the farther out to sea, the smaller the number of fish caught. Lao Lu ran the farthest and ran outside the Dongjia Reef. Among all the fishermen, he was the only one who did not catch any prawns, and the rest were closer to the fishing location. Fishermen catch more or less.

It seems that the closer you get to the offshore, the more prawns you catch. Li Duoyu frowned and thought for a while, then suddenly remembered something and slapped his thigh.

 “Damn it, I almost forgot.”

Chinese yellow shrimp have a migratory habit. Their breeding season is in spring. The spawning ground is near the mouth of the river, and the water depth is no more than ten meters.

 The fishing area where brothers Lao Lu, Liu Yun and Zhao were still able to catch yellow shrimp before.

But now the yellow shrimps are running in groups to the estuary, planning to make babies on a large scale. They don't understand this habit, so they naturally rush to nothing.

Li Duoyu said to Chen Wenchao who was standing aside: "Xiaochao, you can call Shitou later, and we can go out to sea to see if we can catch giant yellow shrimps."

"Okay, I'll prepare the sticky net and ground cage right away." (End of this chapter)