NOVPUB
Chapter 736: Chapter 726 This is a Good Thing
Shen Yunfang accompanied Director Bai down the mountain and only found the school leaders and professors, who were bent over studying something, by the biogas pool next to the earthworms.
"Xiaoshen, you arrived just in time. I just heard from the workers here that these pools of earthworms are specifically bred for feeding livestock," a professor asked as soon as he saw the two approaching.
"Yes, in order to add nutrients to the chickens and ducks, and to help them lay eggs sooner, we recently started using the method of feeding earthworms with earthworms," Shen Yunfang glanced at the several concrete pools in front of her.
There were a total of six pools, each about three meters wide and eight meters long. Five of the pools contained squiggling mature earthworms, which could make the faint-hearted feel queasy. The pool at the very end held earthworm eggs and baby earthworms, which would be moved to the neighboring pools once they grew a bit larger.
These earthworms were specifically for the breeding department, so the responsibility for these pools also fell to them. After feeding the chickens, ducks, and geese, they would come over here, process and prepare the mature worms for use. The yield from these six pools barely met the needs of the breeding department.
"How long have you been raising these, and do you have any breeding records we could look at?" an old professor asked.
"We don’t have that," said Shen Yunfang.
The old professors felt a wave of disappointment.
"However, raising earthworms isn’t too difficult. Look at this pit, which we built specifically for the earthworms. I won’t mention the length and width, but the depth is about half a meter," Shen Yunfang shared her years of experience in earthworm farming in a mixed and summarized way.
Although earthworm farming had already appeared at this time, people hadn’t yet fully realized the use of earthworms and systematic breeding methods had not emerged, so the old professors were quite interested in the breeding conditions they saw here.
In the end, the school leader even instructed Shen Yunfang to write a detailed written report later, then discuss it in a school meeting. If it proved to be feasible, they would apply for a research topic for her.
Shen Yunfang immediately beamed with joy. Last time she applied for the Lingzhi project, she received a hundred thousand yuan in funding; if this application went through, it would bring in at least fifty to eighty thousand yuan. Delighted, Shen Yunfang readily accepted the task.
Shen Yunfang thought the matter would end there, but a few days later, the school leader sought her out, saying that they intended to organize a group including school leaders and authoritative professors from various fields to inspect her farm once more.
Shen Yunfang didn’t know their purpose, but as the farm was at its busiest during the autumn harvest, she genuinely lacked the energy and staff to host this tour group.
Shen Yunfang spoke frankly, but the school leader smiled and said that this time they were going to inspect it. If things looked promising, the school might designate her farm as an official experimental base for Agricultural University, which meant that every year they would allocate experimental funds. Periodically, they would even send professors with intern students for onsite internships.
Her eyes sparkling, Shen Yunfang understood that if her farm really piggybacked onto Agricultural University, the benefits would be substantial, not least being able to legitimately minimize taxes. Moreover, these intern students were essentially free labor. The advantages clearly outweighed any drawbacks.
Without much consideration, Shen Yunfang promptly agreed to the offer but also made clear that it was the rice harvesting season. If Agricultural University came to inspect, she could only assign one person to show them around, as they shouldn’t expect VIP treatment.
The news actually pleased the school leader.
"When I last visited your farm, it seemed you also had fish in the rice paddies, right?"
"Yes, this year our farm experimented with rice field fish farming, rice field loach farming, rice field eel farming, and rice field duck farming. In the spring, we even consulted with professors from our school on the relevant knowledge," Shen Yunfang explained truthfully.
"That’s great. When we come over, you don’t need to entertain us. Just go on with your own work; we’ll just watch from the sidelines."
Although the leader had said this, if Shen Yunfang really took the words at face value, she would be a fool. So on the day a large group of leaders from the Agricultural University came for an inspection, Shen Yunfang still assigned Comrade Wang Anhua, the head of the sales department, to accompany them throughout the whole process.
After all, it was her extensive experience out in the field and her excellence in hosting leaders that made her arrangements impeccable.
Shen Yunfang, Zhang Chunwang, and Sun Dawei crouched in the rice paddy, organizing everyone to drain the water and catch the fish.
Because the harvest area was quite extensive, it wasn’t just the farm’s own employees who were working; Zhang Chunwang also hired nearly a hundred people from outside.
Though the number sounds large, spread over four hundred acres of rice paddies, it really wasn’t significant.
Zhang Chunwang didn’t plan to finish harvesting everything in one day. Besides, the fish, loaches, and eels in the paddies were not so easily caught, so he decided to harvest over four days, a hundred acres a day.
The harvesting site was already bustling with activity, with people coming and going, carrying buckets full of live fish, their faces beaming with smiles that could not be concealed.
Each Dongfeng truck, loaded with big buckets of fish, made several trips to the city.
For four consecutive days, the leaders from the Agricultural University saw nothing but such a bountiful scene. They even made on-the-spot arrangements with Shen Yunfang to purchase a truckload of fish, loaches, and eels for the welfare of all school faculty and staff.
Throughout these four days, Shen Yunfang’s expression remained fairly calm. But once back home, she let loose and bragged incessantly to her husband Li Hongjun. Those days, their dinner table was never without these aquatic products.
After the fish, loaches, and eels were collected from the rice fields, the paddies were left to dry in preparation for the rice harvest in a few days.
Busy once again, Shen Yunfang led a group of employees to start processing the loaches and eels as snacks, adding another source of income to the farm.
Before the rice grains filled the storehouse, weighing them brought joy to everyone. From this figure alone, it was clear that this year’s planting department staff would have a prosperous year ahead.
Director Bai even personally made a call to inquire about the rice harvest, offering to help Shen Yunfang with sales contacts. The focus was on state-owned and collective enterprises; because of the scarcity of goods in the 1970s, many units would seek to secure a batch of grains and oils at the end of the year as welfare for their employees, following the economic opening of the 1980s.
"Director Bai, I really can’t give you an answer straight away. You don’t know, but when we were harvesting, the leaders from the Agricultural University happened to be inspecting our farm. The rice isn’t even threshed yet, and they’ve already reserved a batch. Moreover, we need to keep some for brewing our alcohol and feeding the workers. And there are also several related units that called ahead to reserve some, so I truly don’t know how much I can allocate for you," Shen Yunfang said rather apologetically over the phone.
Director Bai hadn’t expected such a situation of supply not meeting demand; he’d thought he was doing Shen Yunfang a favor by promoting her sales.
"Ah, Xiaoshen, they’ve already called me several times on this side. With our relationship, you can’t let me lose face," he said.
"Hehe, sure, sure, Director Bai, rest assured, I’ll certainly squeeze out a portion for you. But I definitely don’t have much. How about this—I’ll have Manager Zhang tally it up immediately, and I’ll give you a definitive answer as soon as possible," Shen Yunfang replied.
After hanging up with Director Bai, Shen Yunfang thought it over and decided to take the initiative to call the logistics department of the military region to inquire if they needed grain. If they did, then they would distribute evenly among a few parties. She didn’t want to have finished selling everything on her end only for the military region to start thinking of placing an order; that would be troublesome. After all, Li Hongjun was still in their hands. As a military wife, she had to consider their thoughts somewhat.
