Chapter 174 The Temptation of Big Fish

"Dad, you caught a big fish. We caught a big fish!"

"Xu Laosan, you are really good! You can even catch such a big fish!"

"Third brother, you are awesome!"

"Who? Who brought the scale? Hurry and weigh it!"

"I think this fish weighs at least twenty kilograms, right?"

"I think it's more than that. I think it should be 25 or 26 kilograms!"

"Tsk, why didn't you say over a hundred pounds!"

"."

As everyone was talking, Xu Laosan slumped down on the ice, staring blankly at a meter-long grass carp not far away, with an excited look on his face.

He never imagined that he could catch such a huge fish.

If it were more than ten years ago, the village would often catch large fish weighing dozens of kilograms. However, since the famine eight or nine years ago, most of the large fish in the river have been caught. Nowadays, it is rare to catch large fish weighing more than 20 kilograms during the winter fishing every year.

Therefore, when everyone saw him catch such a big fish, they had such a big reaction.

"Dad, are you okay?"

Sun Yanhong saw Xu Laosan sitting on the ground and hurriedly asked with a concerned look on her face.

"fine!"

Xu Laosan waved his hands and said with a red face, "I'm fine now! Go back home and bring me some flour and corn. I'm going to work hard today while my luck is good!"

"Okay! I'll go get it now!"

Sun Yanhong felt a little relieved when she heard that, then nodded and agreed quickly, completely forgetting that she had previously refused to let Xu Laosan use more wheat flour as bait.

Soon, she turned around, squeezed through the crowd, and ran towards the village.

At the same time, Li Guoqiang also pulled the sled outside the crowd, and saw the giant grass carp at a glance. He couldn't help feeling surprised, and then hurriedly said to himself that something was wrong.

The villagers had already become very enthusiastic about fishing because of the catches made by him, Xu Laosan, Shang Xiuzhen and others. Now that they were stimulated by this giant grass carp, wouldn't they be even more crazy?

You know, the fishing method he taught you would consume a lot of food.

It would be terrible if someone got angry and threw all the food in the house into the water.

Thinking of this, he hurriedly asked Xu Dani and Zhu Caixia to stay where they were, then turned and ran towards the village, ready to find Xu Guangfu to talk about this matter.

Not long after he left, the villagers also took a scale and weighed the grass carp.

Seeing the result of 24 jin, the villagers suddenly felt a surge of excitement in their hearts.

Because according to the purchase price of 3 cents, this grass carp can be sold for more than 7 yuan, which is equivalent to the work points they earn by working in the fields for more than a month.

Faced with such huge profits, who can sit still?

Soon, they hurried back to their respective positions, gripped their fishing rods tightly, and stared at the float on the water with anticipation, hoping that they would be the next to catch a big fish.

Moreover, some of the villagers who were more concerned about food no longer cared about it and just sprinkled handfuls of corn into the water. In a short while, more than ten kilograms of corn were sprinkled in.

This is more than ten kilograms for each person, and now, there are more than thirty people in Xiaohewan, so at least several hundred kilograms of corn must be sprinkled into the water, which is equivalent to one person's food ration for half a year.

It is conceivable how shocking such food waste is in this era of food scarcity.

In order to prevent the situation from escalating and to avoid being accused of something later, Li Guoqiang had to find a way to put an end to this trend.

He also didn't expect that the fishing bait recipe he came up with on a whim would make things so difficult.

Ultimately, it still comes down to that old saying: interests are what move people!
Not long after, he found Xu Guangfu, told him everything, and expressed his concerns without any hesitation.

"Uncle Fu, I originally told them the bait formula for fishing out of kindness, but even if the bait formula is good, there must be so many fish in the small river bay for everyone to catch!"

"If a group of people throw food into the river and no fish are caught, I will become a sinner!"

"Don't worry yet!"

After listening to this, Xu Guangfu frowned, and then hurriedly said: "I will go with you to Xiaohewan now, explain the matter to everyone, and then call together the brigade cadres to discuss how to solve this matter."

After saying that, he hurriedly got up and rushed towards Xiaohewan with Li Guoqiang.

In fact, the most difficult part of this matter is that some people have really caught big fish and made a fortune by using this method.

Otherwise, the villagers wouldn't have been so easily carried away and rushed to throw the food that could sustain their lives into the water.

This is because Xiaohewan is not like ponds and reservoirs, which belong to the brigade's private property. Otherwise, how could the villagers be so unscrupulous!
Soon, they arrived at the small river bend. Looking around, they saw that the river was full of people, and from time to time they could hear bursts of excited shouting, and it was obvious that they had gained a lot.

Seeing this, Xu Guangfu's expression suddenly became solemn, and then he hurried to the river surface and shouted loudly: "Everyone stop for a moment, everyone stop for a moment, I have something to say to you."

As soon as he finished speaking, responses came from the villagers all around.

"Captain, if you have anything to say, just say it now! If the fish is hooked later, I won't have time to listen to you."

"Captain, you are such a fool. Can't we talk about it another day? I just scattered more than ten kilograms of corn and was hoping to catch a few big fish and make a fortune!"

"That's right! Nothing is as important as fishing right now. If anyone dares to stop me from fishing, I will never forgive him!"

"."

Hearing the villagers' increasingly outrageous words, Xu Guangfu's face suddenly darkened, and then he shouted loudly: "Shut up, all of you, and come over and gather together."

Seeing him get angry, the villagers were startled, and then reluctantly put down their fishing rods and gathered around him. "Come on, Qiangzi, come and talk to everyone about fishing!"

At this time, Xu Guangfu was not in the mood to waste time with the villagers. He simply waved to Li Guoqiang who was standing nearby and asked him to explain the pros and cons to the villagers.

Upon hearing this, Li Guoqiang immediately took a few steps forward, stood in front of the villagers, and said loudly: "Everyone should know that I was the one who came up with the idea of ​​using grain as bait for fishing. There are a few problems with it, and I must explain them to everyone so that everyone won't blame me later."

"The first problem is that this method doesn't guarantee that you will catch fish. If you don't catch any fish, then the food you sprinkled into the water will be wasted."

"The second problem is that with so many people throwing so much food into the water, it's easy for the fish in the water to get full, and when the fish are full, it's hard to catch them again."

"The third problem is that although the fish can be sold for money, if you want to sell it back for food, you need more than just money. You also need tickets. So you must think it through, or you will end up not being able to buy food even if you have money."

"The above questions are what I want to make clear to everyone. Now everyone can handle it on their own!"

After saying that, he stepped behind Xu Guangfu and looked at everyone quietly.

After hearing what he said, some people immediately woke up from the temptation of the big fish, while some people felt conflicted, not knowing whether they should continue fishing.

However, more people looked at Li Guoqiang with indignation, thinking that he said that just because he was worried that they would take away their fishing jobs.

Xu Guangfu could naturally see this at a glance.

However, Li Guoqiang had already said everything that needed to be said, so he didn't say anything else at this time. He just said a simple sentence to let everyone know what had happened and then turned and left.

When Li Guoqiang saw Xu Guangfu leaving, he did not stay for long. He immediately found Xu Dani and Zhu Caixia outside the crowd and took them back home.

Then, a small number of villagers, perhaps having taken Li Guoqiang's words to heart, did not continue to sprinkle grain into the water, but instead prepared to finish fishing for the day and see what the harvest was.

In addition, there are many more people who sneered at what Li Guoqiang said and did not take it to heart at all.

In their view, they only need one or two dollars' worth of corn and flour to catch a big fish worth seven or eight dollars, which is a very profitable business.

Now that they have money, do they still need to worry about not being able to buy food?
What's more, even a fool can tell that if you don't catch more fish now while there are more fish in the river, then by the time all the fish are caught, there will be nothing left to catch.

Among them, Xu Laosan, the popular fisherman, wanted to quit while he was ahead after hearing what Li Guoqiang said, but he could not stand his wife Sun Yanhong's constant urging and praise in his ears. In addition, he was a little addicted to fishing, so he hesitated for a while and finally mixed the one pound of flour and five pounds of cornmeal that Sun Yanhong had just brought with her into bait.

In this way, the small river bay soon returned to a bustling scene, and under the stimulation of the fish that were caught, it became more and more lively.

It was evening in a blink of an eye.

After fighting hard in Xiaohewan for a day, the villagers began to count their spoils and prepare to go home, and they also did not forget to ask everyone about their harvest.

This is a serious question.

In the end, they found that except for Xu Laosan and seven or eight other villagers, each of them caught more than 40 kilograms of fish, and earned about five or six yuan after deducting the cost. Most of the others only caught five or six kilograms of fish, barely breaking even with the cost.

There were even three or four villagers who only caught one or two kilograms of small fish and lost seven or eight kilograms of food.

Faced with such a situation, except for a few stubborn elements and those who made money, everyone else began to take Li Guoqiang's words seriously.

However, most people still hold on to a certain degree of luck, thinking that if they continue fishing tomorrow, they may be able to catch a fish weighing dozens of kilograms like Xu Laosan.

By then, let alone selling it for money, this fact alone will be enough for them to brag about for a whole year.

Therefore, by the next morning, the number of people coming to Xiaohewan to fish did not decrease much, but instead increased slightly.

The main reason is that those who made money through fishing brought their entire families with them, hoping to expand their results through the human wave tactic.

For this reason, some people took the fish to the commune to sell before dawn, and then spent money to buy some fish hooks and fishing lines. It was a huge investment.

What was even more unexpected was that not long after the fishing started, Xu Laosan caught a 22-pound bighead carp in full view of everyone, which instantly made people jealous.

If you can catch such a big fish every day, doesn’t that mean you can earn five or six dollars every day?

Five or six dollars a day, that’s one hundred and fifty or sixty dollars a month!
Thinking of this, everyone couldn't help but get a little excited, and rushed home like crazy to get flour and cornmeal, making bait for baiting and fishing. In a short while, they had sprinkled hundreds of kilograms of grain into the water.

Little did they know that the food they had scattered in the past two days alone was worth about a hundred yuan.

The total amount of fish they caught was at most equal to the value of the food.

This is just like people in later generations who go fishing, often spending dozens or hundreds of dollars on fishing gear and bait, but in the end most people only catch fish worth less than a few dollars, or even come up empty-handed. Only a small number of people can catch a lot of fish.

In the end, it is the fishing tackle shops that make money.

At this time, Li Guoqiang had no idea that Xu Laosan had caught another giant fish. In the past two days, he had been at home brushing up on various skills, especially the animal taming skill. With his hard work, he had successfully broken through to the L5 level and was not far from L6.

And the sika deer, after his careful training, has begun to accept Xu Dani riding on it.

Perhaps it won't be long before he can use Gold Daddy's money to get rewards and own eleven sika deer that can be used to pull carts.

At that time, it will be much more convenient whether you go into the mountains to collect firewood or go to the county town to attend the market.

In addition, he also took advantage of the time when he went into the mountains to dig soil and collect snow to expand his small world to explore the terrain at the foot of the back mountain. He finally found a small valley surrounded by mountains on three sides that was more suitable for beekeeping.

However, if he wants the brigade to agree to let him build a apiary, he must show the brigade real benefits.

The best way is to go into the mountains and dig up a dozen groups of bees and bring them back to show the team his beekeeping skills and strength.

In the midst of busyness, New Year’s Eve soon arrived.

Early in the morning, Li Guoqiang took Xu Dani and Zhu Caixia to write Spring Festival couplets and paste New Year pictures.

Qu Yinfeng, Xu Yuping and others also made new clothes for Xu Dani and Zhu Caixia the day before, and also made a new undershirt for Li Guoqiang.

Just as they were busy clearing the snow in the yard and cleaning the house, Shang Xiuzhen also came over with Xu Wanling, Zhang Chunyan, Shen Fengxia, Pan Qiaoyan, Wu Zhaodi and other female educated youth.

(End of this chapter)