Traveling through 1942 with space

Chapter 325: Crushing Field

"Second brother, get up." The eldest cousin Hou Huanhuan rubbed his eyes and pushed his younger brother next to him.

"Hey! Is it dawn?" Er Huan sat up and looked at Hou Xiaoge with dazed eyes.

"Hurry up and get up. The meat buns and eggs we made this morning are still hot." Hou Xiaoge gestured to the two of them while holding a basket.

When they heard that there was food, including meat and eggs, the two brothers immediately lost all desire to sleep.

"I was still a little cold when I went to bed last night. I have to take out the quilt tonight." The eldest cousin said as he ate the eggs and buns brought by Hou Xiaoge.

"It smells so good!" Erhuan held a bun in one hand and ate it happily.

"Well! It's only April in the lunar calendar and it's still a bit creepy at night. We are at the foot of the mountain, so we have to pay attention to keeping warm when watching the wheat field these days." Hou Xiaoge looked at the fog that had not yet dissipated around them, nodded and said with concern.

After a while, my uncle's family also arrived, and my eldest cousin's wife brought breakfast with her.

"I just brought the meal, why are you two already eating it? Third Aunt, it was you who brought the meal." The eldest cousin's wife said with a smile to Wang Maimiao who was unpacking wheat bundles at the side.

"The two kids have been looking after the wheat all night and have worked hard. I steamed a pot of buns in the morning and asked Heiwa to bring some to his two brothers." Wang Maimiao explained with a smile.

"Well! We are all family, so why should we work so hard to grow our own wheat?" the eldest cousin's wife said politely.

The two brothers were thirsty after eating, and when they saw the rice soup, steamed buns and vegetables brought by their eldest cousin's wife, they ate another meal.

.........

Grinding wheat is hard work. In the days when there were no large animals or machines, people pulled stone mills weighing hundreds of kilograms back and forth to grind the wheat.

Nowadays, those who have livestock will use large animals such as cows and horses to pull stone mills to grind wheat. In the 1970s and 1980s, this evolved into tractors pulling stone mills to grind wheat.

By the 1990s, technology had advanced, and threshers, tractors, and three-wheeled motorcycles were used to assist in threshing. In the new century, technology was even more advanced, and harvesters were used to directly store the grains.

Nanjia Village has more than 20 cows sponsored by the Yanhuang League, which is enough livestock for grinding wheat.

As for the Hou family, all four families had their own mule carts, so they no longer had to worry about animals for grinding wheat.

Erda's legs are not in good condition, so he didn't pull wheat in the past few days. My uncle's family has a lot of labor, so he asked Erhuan to go over to the threshing ground to help and lead the mule out.

As for Hou Xiaoge's family, Hou Xiaoge was originally the one driving the mule, but Wang Maimiao was also used to driving the cart at home, so Hou Xiaoge let his mother drive the cart while he did the heavy work of tipping over the cart.

At this time, the two acres of vegetable fields and wheat fields of each household outside the village were flattened to be as smooth as the asphalt roads in later generations, and the wheat fields were also very hard.

Just working on the threshing floor requires a huge amount of manpower and animal power. In order to make the threshing floor harder and smoother, the villagers also spread wood ash as an adhesive.

After the wheat bundles were untied and spread out in a circle around the threshing floor, people put blindfolds on the mules, hung buckets on their buttocks, and began to thresh the wheat.

As the mule moved, the large stone mill weighing two or three hundred kilograms began to crush the wheat ears, and the wheat that had been dried in the threshing floor for several days was also threshed.

Iron was expensive in those days, so there were no large iron forks like in later times, only wooden or bamboo forks. Hou Xiaoge's family had many women, so they all used lighter bamboo forks.

The stone mill was grinding in the front, while Hou Xiaoge and her siblings were using bamboo forks to turn up the grains that were not ground in the back. The youngest brother was picking them up with his hands and throwing them up. Even the five-year-old cousin in the wheat field next door was doing the same. In short, no one was idle.

After the stone mill rolled three times, they let the mule take a break and drink some salt water. Hou Xiaoge and his family began to turn over the milled wheat ears. The wheat ears were too thick and the ones at the bottom had not been completely milled.

After the turning was completed, the mule was brought in to tumble the rice three more times. After working so hard for two or three hours, the mule could finally take a rest.

However, while the mule was resting, the "oxen and horses" could not rest. They still had to pick out the expired wheat straw.

After picking out the wheat straw, the rye is left under the straw.

After waiting for the wind to come, they have to use a wooden shovel to blow away the bran and broken straw in the wheat with the help of the wind.

This process has to be repeated several times with the help of wind to winnow the wheat, and a winnowing basket is also needed before clean wheat can be harvested.

However, this kind of wheat cannot be stored in the warehouse and needs to be dried in the sun.

After being exposed to the sun for several days and completely dried, the grains can be sold and stored in warehouses after paying taxes.

Of course, the grains cannot be eaten directly after being stored in the warehouse.

When it was time to eat, they had to take it to the village's public mill and use a stone mill to grind out the bran on the outer layer of the wheat. After grinding it many times, white flour was obtained.

So in an era without machinery, farming was really hard work for farmers. The poem "Song of Pity the Farmers" fully describes the hardships of the lower-class farmers.

Hou Xiaoge's family has six acres of wheat. It is naturally impossible to go through the wheat milling process only once. If the wheat ears from six acres are spread out, they will not fit into two acres of land.

Half of the two acres of vegetable fields and wheat fields were piled high with wheat bundles, and the remaining area was only half threshed.

Therefore, it is impossible to thresh half an acre of wheat at a time, and this work must be repeated for at least four or five days before it can be completely completed.

At the end of the day, after threshing an acre and a half of wheat, the man was exhausted, and so was the mule.

However, the men and mules could not rest after they returned. They had to bring back the milled wheat and straw.

Hou Xiaoge's house not only has a large yard, but also a large open space in front of the door. The wheat needs to be threshed in the threshing floor, so every household dries the wheat in front of the door.

Since Hou Xiaoge's backyard is big enough and they raise livestock, the wheat straw has to be pulled back and can be used as livestock feed in the backyard.

"Oh! Working hard all day to produce five or six hundred kilograms of wheat will make people tired to death." Hou Xiaoge said deliberately.

In fact, Hou Xiaoge didn’t want to farm at first. He just wanted his family to set up a stall. After all, he was often away and it was too hard for the women in the family to farm.

But as soon as he opened his mouth to say this, not only did his stepmother jump up and down, but even his uncles and several other families also spoke out in opposition.

"What else do farmers do if they don't farm? It's tiring, anything is tiring?" said Wang Maimiao, wiping the sweat from his face with a towel.

The words that Hou Xiaoge was about to prepare for the event were immediately aborted, so he had no choice but to drive the mule cart back home.

"Mom, you don't have to go to the fields. Make something delicious in the evening, such as fried pancakes." Hou Xiaoge said to his cheap mother after harvesting the wheat.

"What do you want to eat all day? It's like a cat scratching its mouth while eating pulp!" Wang Maimiao muttered, but did not object.

After all, the busy farming season is the most tiring. Farmers are often willing to eat more at this time of the year than during the Chinese New Year, otherwise they can easily die of exhaustion.

In Hou Xiaoge's hometown, Qin Province, there is still a saying of busy farming season even in later generations. In addition to bringing the best gifts to visit relatives and elders, the younger generation also wants to help.

After going back and forth three times, I brought back all the wheat and wheat straw, and dried the wheat at the door to dry. Today's work in the threshing floor was finished.

Because we harvested early today, it’s now past eight o’clock and the sky is just getting dark.

At this time, the aroma of rapeseed oil cakes fried in oil in the kitchen came out, making people salivate.

"Hurry up and wash up and eat. Tonight we'll have fried cakes, cold cucumber dishes, and braised meat." Wang Maimiao brought out the rice and put it on the table, then said to Hou Xiaoge and her siblings.

"Suck it!"

The siblings, who were already starving, washed their faces in the basin, then sat down and started eating following the aroma.