Who knows! As soon as I returned to the mountains to farm, I encountered a natural disaster.

As long as the temperature doesn't rise and it rains, it's cool. Zhao Yeqing has to put on a coat when he gets up in the morning and can't take off the coat until noon.

Although the current rainfall will make the floor wet, the sun will still shine during the day, so it will not affect the health of the crops too much.

At present, the only disadvantage is that it is not suitable for drying things. Even if it didn't rain today, it rained last night. When the sun shines, the water vapor on the floor evaporates, and the things hanging in the yard cannot be dried.

Whether it’s clothes or food.

Zhao Yeqing took out all the dry goods stored at home to dry. In the winter, the uneaten food was left in the house for a long time. Even if it was not moldy, it would still have a smell. When the sun came out, it had to be taken out to dry in the sun to disperse the smell.

There are also some shrimp skins drying in the dustpan in the yard, which were caught during this period.

The two of them did not dare to go into the water with the bamboo rafts they had used before, so they could only catch shrimp slowly using shrimp cages. The harvest was not much every time. The two changed cages several times and the harvest was not much.

He was too lazy to cut bamboo to make a new bamboo raft. It was too troublesome, so Mu Xi made a few more shrimp traps and placed them by the lake, trying to win with quantity.

In the past, Mu Xi would go to the lake alone to retrieve the shrimp pots, or they would go together if they were both free.

But today is the time for the first top dressing of the fields. This job has always been done by Mu Xi, so the task of collecting the shrimp cages was handed over to Zhao Yeqing.

In order to save time, Zhao Yeqing now rides Xiaohong on long trips. He takes Xiaohong out of the stable, puts on the saddle and rides directly to the lake.

There are not as many shrimps in spring as there are in autumn. In addition, after this winter, I don’t know if they were over-consumed by the fish in the lake, resulting in not much harvest from the shrimp pots that have been placed for so long.

One of the shrimp pots was damaged. Zhao Yeqing looked at the two finger-sized holes, raised his head and looked around, planning to break some reed poles to fill the hole.

After all, this shrimp pot has to continue to be kept, and harvesting it a few more times should be enough for this period of time. In addition to the shrimp skin, you also need to make shrimp powder to use as chicken essence and MSG. Without it, the cooking will still lack some flavor.

Zhao Yeqing walked to the reeds with the shrimp pot and looked at the newly sprouted reeds that were now taller than her and very dense.

Worried that something was hidden inside, she moved away a little, so she first took out the spear from her back and poked it to test it.

Not to mention, this poke really made her poke something out.

As soon as the tip of the spear hit the grass, there was a sound of something entering the water.

Zhao Yeqing quickly turned her head to the side and saw ripples in the water. The ripples were small, thin and long, which made her heart instantly lift.

What a snake.

Zhao Yeqing had already evacuated this place as quickly as possible before. Even if the snake had been driven away, she would not dare to stay in this place any longer.

But after the last experience of killing the big python in Yunwu Mountain, Zhao Yeqing found that although he was still afraid, he was no longer so afraid.

Now that the snake has been driven away, she folds some suitable reeds to replenish the shrimp cage.

When choosing reeds for weaving, don’t use reeds that are too tender. If they are too tender, they will break when folded. Slightly older reeds are better.

This season, most of the reeds are new, and the old ones are not easy to find. Zhao Yeqing used a spear to open up the reeds and confirmed that there was nothing inside before he dared to get started.

She hadn't noticed that the middle of the reeds had collapsed before. As soon as she pulled the grass away, she saw several gray-white eggs in the collapsed area.

Zhao Yeqing was familiar with this thing. They were wild duck eggs. A few years ago, she also took a few from this place and made them into salted duck eggs.

If you look closely, there is a wet mark next to the duck egg, and there are signs that the duck egg has been moved. It must be that the snake just came ashore from the water and found that the duck egg was about to be eaten when she cut off the beard.

No wild ducks were found by the lake this year, but we were still able to get such a harvest. It is probably because the wild ducks were afraid of being preyed on, and hid whenever there was any movement, or they might have died.

There were ten duck eggs in total, and they were just placed in the middle of the grass. Zhao Yeqing was afraid that as soon as she turned around and left, the snake would come back and eat the eggs.

She stood up and looked around but couldn't find any trace of the wild duck. After thinking about it, she squatted down and packed up all ten wild duck eggs and took them away.

The female duck that laid this clutch of duck eggs usually guards the eggs, but now she is not on top of them to hatch them. If the wild duck really dies, leaving this clutch of eggs behind will be a feast for the snake.

Wild ducks have two egg-laying periods. In the past, when the climate was normal, it was from March to May in spring and around October in autumn. If the wild duck is still alive, let it have another clutch in autumn. This clutch will be Taken away first.

He whistled for Xiao Hong to come over.

There was a cloth bag hanging on Xiaohong's saddle. This bag was used to store grass seeds when the pasture was planted in the grass circle. Zhao Yeqing took off the cloth bag and padded it with fine fluff.

This wild duck's nest was made of this fine down. Zhao Yeqing directly dismantled its nest and put the duck eggs in it after placing it in a cloth bag.

When hanging the duck eggs back on the horse, I didn't forget to pick a suitable reed, weave the shrimp cage and put it back into the water.

After getting this unexpected harvest, Zhao Yeqing started to deal with them as soon as he got home.

Mu Xi was a little surprised when he saw her go out empty-handed but come back with a large bag of duck eggs: "Are there wild ducks by the lake?"

Zhao Yeqing shook his head, "Instead of looking at the duck, I looked at the duck eggs, and I almost got eaten by a snake."

"Then what are you going to use it for? Salted duck eggs or preserved eggs?"

"No, I plan to hatch them."

If she were just for food, she would definitely leave one or two in the duck's nest to let them survive according to nature, but she packed them all away for the purpose of hatching.

The survival rate is higher if you follow her than if you leave her in the nest.

Zhao Yeqing has two plans for how to incubate next. One is to turn on the lights and keep the temperature inside the incubator at about 37 degrees and the humidity between 60% and 70%.

Another option is to let the hens at home do the hatching.

Eggs... duck eggs cannot be put in the same basket, Zhao Yeqing plans to use both methods.

I took a grow light, which is easy to control the temperature. Then I put Mu Xi's watch in it to observe the temperature, and then put some water in the box.

When the temperature was controlled to fluctuate between 37 degrees and 2 degrees, four wild duck eggs were put in, and the remaining six were put into the chicken coop.

Mu Xi understands Zhao Yeqing's character. She is the kind of person who can do it herself and does not leave the work to others. Now when she looks at the ratio of the number of duck eggs,

"So unsure of yourself?"

"The main thing is that this is my first time doing this, so I have theoretical knowledge and zero practical experience. I don't have to try it first."

After all, it takes a long time for duck eggs to hatch. The eggs have thick shells. The book says that the incubation period of wild ducks is more than 28 days. I don’t know how long the eggs have been born and when they will break out of their shells.