Rebirth of Bayi Fishing and Hunting in the Northwest

When Li Long's tractor drove out of the mountain pass and reached Qingshui River, the sun was only a pole high.

He estimated the speed and thought that if he went to Shicheng now, the sugar factory would be closed by the time he got there.

Then just drive back.

People who saw Li Long pulling a cart of Klangzi sheep on the road were surprised, because this was mutton.

Most people were guessing where the sheep would be sent to. They thought it was most likely to be sent to a food factory.

After all, ordinary people can't eat so much meat.

When seeing so many sheep, children are at most curious, while adults are usually envious.

After all, although the production was distributed to each household these days, most families would have a lot of grain left at the end of the year, but they would not have much money.

I also have to calculate the budget for farming next spring, as well as the expenses for my children's schooling and daily necessities.

With the remaining money, after deducting a little for reserve, I could buy some cloth for my family to make clothes and some meat.

Those on the edge of the wilderness are better off, like Team 4, who can catch some wild rabbits, fish, and the like.

Teams 3 and 2 didn't even have a place to catch rabbits. After all, they were surrounded by other villages, and rabbits wouldn't go there.

Fortunately, most households would raise a pig or a sheep at this time, just to have meat for the end of the year. At this time, the pigs mostly eat pig grass, with a little bran or chaff.

It would be nice to add some oil residue.

A family has one pig, so they have to eat it in moderation. It is impossible for them to eat large chunks of it like Li Long eats mutton in the mountains. Of course, even herders rarely eat like that.

The meat must be stewed and sealed with oil, and it must be eaten for a year. The bones can be braised or boiled, but it is impossible to eat them all at once, because they must be eaten until the New Year. A pig may be divided among several families.

So when adults look at these sheep, they are naturally moved.

But it was impossible for Li Long to stop and ask them whether they wanted to buy it or not. He was in a hurry to go home, so he rumbled along on the tractor at a speed of 20 to 30 kilometers per hour in the snow and ice as he headed towards the county town.

By the time we arrived at the county town, the sun had already set halfway, with its face full of red clouds.

Gu Xiaoxia hadn't finished get off work yet. Li Long had eaten some bones and naan at noon, so he wasn't hungry yet. He drove the tractor directly to the yard.

After school and after work, this journey attracted a lot of attention.

Even when passing by the police station, Officer Guo took a curious look.

Li Long often brought back meat, so he was used to it. But he was a little surprised to see so many sheep this time.

Even the chief of the police station was alarmed and called Officer Guo over to whisper something to him.

When Li Long's tractor arrived at the gate of the yard, Han Fang had already run to the gate. After seeing that it was Li Long through the crack in the door, she quickly opened the two gates and let Li Long in.

Li Long drove the tractor in, and when Han Fang was about to close the door, Officer Guo strode over.

Seeing the police coming, Han Fang was a little curious and a little awed, and called out "Uncle Li". Li Long turned his head and saw Officer Guo and smiled.

He turned off the engine, walked over to shake hands with Guo Tiebing, and asked:
"Officer Guo is not busy anymore? Haven't you finished get off work yet?"

"It's almost done." Guo Tiebing said without hesitation, pointing at the sheep:
"Just brought back from the mountains?"

"Yes. The Shicheng Sugar Factory wants them. We just collected them."

"Are there any extra ones? Our director said if there are any, we'll take one."

"If there is only one..." Li Long thought for a moment and said:

"Okay, I'll give you one."

Li Long didn't distribute the three extra sheep much.

To be honest, my family, my eldest brother's family, and those who are close to me all have enough meat to eat. Throughout the year, I have distributed a lot of meat from the mountains and the pens to each family.

But you can’t just say I have extra. There is also the art of speaking.

When they say the meat was “evenly distributed” to the police station, it means that the meat had already been distributed, but the original distribution plan was adjusted to save Guo Tiebing’s face.

"Okay, how do you calculate the price of the meat? I'll ask the finance department to come over." Guo Tiebing was very proud and thankful to Li Long. He came here and they gave him face, that's a favor.

"I collected 1.5 yuan," Li Long said, "and gave 1.6 yuan to the sugar factory, so I'll give it to you at 1.5 yuan." Since he had done a favor, he would give the full amount. Li Long was telling the truth, so he was very calm.

"No, how can I let you bother and waste your energy?" Guo Tiebing waved his hand immediately, "Let's charge 1.6 yuan. But you're not making any money at all, only 1 cent per kilogram?"

Li Long explained:
"My eldest brother's family raises pigs. I often bring sugar residue from the sugar factory, so I am considered a relative there. I can't ask for a high price for the meat. I just need to make money from the freight."

"Comrade Li Long, you are so kind!" Guo Tiebing gave a thumbs up. "Wait a minute, I'll go call the finance department."

"Okay, then I'll take out the scale first." Li Long nodded.

After Guo Tiebing left, Li Long turned off the tractor, found a basin to drain water, and then pulled out the scales he had bought in the summer. Han Fang followed and helped, and her movements were also very efficient.

Sister Yang had just poked her head out of the kitchen. When Guo Tiebing came over, she retreated back. Now she came out of the kitchen again and asked:
"Uncle, are you going to sell the sheep?"

"Yes, from the police station across the street," Li Long explained, "It should be the New Year soon, so they should also distribute benefits."

A few minutes later, Guo Tiebing came over with the finance officer, a female police officer in her thirties, carrying a small bag.

Li Long opened the rear compartment board of the truck bed - the wood covering the truck bed, and fifty sheep were loaded on it, which were for the sugar factory.

The rack lifts up the sheep, and the rear compartment panel can be removed. The three sheep and three wolves in the truck bed can be directly pulled out from the bottom, along with the wolf skins.

Li Long first pulled out a wolf. Guo Tiebing was startled and asked:

"So big? This isn't a sheep, is it?"

"Wolves. We fought them yesterday and today." Li Long explained, "There are suddenly more wolves in the mountains. They started to attack the sheep. We fought them yesterday and today."

When the policewoman heard it was a wolf, she bent down and looked curiously.

Li Long didn't care. He pulled out another wolf skin, put the wolf's body on the wolf skin, and then pulled out a sheep, holding it up and asked Guo Tiebing:

"Officer Guo, how about this one?"

"Okay." Guo Tiebing didn't know much, but he could tell the mutton was fresh and not completely frozen. He thought it was good because of the fat and lean parts (in fact, the fat of mutton is basically oil).

Li Long put the sheep on the scale and began to adjust the weight and ruler.

"Twenty-one kilograms and four hundred grams. How about twenty-one kilograms?"

"Okay." Guo Tiebing nodded.

The finance manager was a little surprised. He was quite generous. If we were to go to the butcher shop, we would have to calculate the 400 grams carefully.

According to the current market price, 400 grams costs about 60 to 70 cents.

The financial department calculated very quickly and reported the following figures:

"Twenty-one kilograms, one dollar and sixty dollars a kilogram, that's thirty-three dollars and sixty dollars. Come on, sign it."

Li Long signed skillfully. The finance department was a little surprised when seeing the slightly cursive handwriting. The name was signed very beautifully.

Li Long was not trying to show off on purpose. In his previous life, when he was bored, he asked someone to design a cursive signature on a video platform. He practiced it hard for a while. Later, the cooperative paid him money to sign, which shocked those people.

So Li Long wrote down the signature.

I used it accidentally and it worked a bit.

After signing and getting the money, Guo Tiebing said goodbye to Li Long and left with the lamb leg in both hands. Li Long politely offered to help, but Guo Tiebing refused, so Li Long didn't insist, as he just wanted to have a good rest.

But not yet.

The two remaining sheep in the truck bed had to be taken to the storage room and hung up, along with the two wolves and their wolf skins.

Don't worry about the fifty sheep on the tractor. The mice can't climb up in this cold winter, and there's no need to.

Han Fang closed the door, then quickly went into the house and poured a bowl of hot tea for Li Long.

Li Long smiled, it was worth his love for this girl.

Oh, niece.

I drank the hot tea in one gulp, feeling my stomach warm, then went into the house to change clothes and wash my face.

When I came out, Gu Boyuan had already arrived and was standing in the yard looking at the mountain of sheep piled on the cart bed.

"Yeah, it's really good. It's only been a day..." Gu Boyuan sighed, "Only the food factory back then could slaughter sheep with such efficiency."

Li Long remembered that his elder brother seemed to have said that they went to work part-time in a food factory, where they slaughtered sheep on an assembly line.

Of course, there were many more animals slaughtered that day, and there were many more people.

"Are you going into the water?" Gu Boyuan suddenly asked.

"Still in the mountains." Li Long said, "There are many wolves in the mountains. I can't pull those that went into the water. They plan to bury them in the snow as bait to attract the wolves tonight and kill a group of them."

"Hey, there are a lot of guns, right?" Gu Boyuan became interested when he heard it, but unfortunately he couldn't participate.

He was a scholar, and he had not used guns as much as Li Jianguo, so he could only think about it. "Maybe seven or eight." Li Long thought for a while and said, "I took more than two hundred rounds of bullets today, which should be enough."

"That may kill a lot of wolves." Gu Boyuan nodded, "Wolves are troublesome!"

There is no such thing as wildlife protection these days. Wolves used to roam rampant in many places on the northern slope of the Tianshan Mountains in the 1950s, 1960s, and even the 1970s.

They are not limited to the mountains and mountainsides, but can also be found in the plains at the edge of the basin, in the reeds, in the sand pits, and in the Gobi Desert.

I really don’t know how many people were killed by wolves. In those days, many people fled from Kouli to the northern border, and I don’t know how many of those who went missing were killed by wolves.

People like Li Jianguo and Gu Boyuan who lived through the same era all know how powerful wolves are.

"We caught several yesterday and today." Li Long pointed to the storage room and said, "I brought back two wolves and three skins. I don't have time to clean them up now. I'll kill them tomorrow or the day after tomorrow when I'm free."

It was getting dark, Li Long went out to pick up Gu Xiaoxia and then had dinner.

In the mountains, of the young men who escorted the old man to Yushan Jiang’s house, only two with guns stayed behind, and the rest returned.

There were seven rifles in Halimu's winter camp alone.

Li Long asked Halimu to share the bullets he brought this time. In the evening, they continued to eat the mutton from lunch and drank the soup with naan. Living in the winter nest was a bit crowded, but everyone got used to it.

Adults and children alike knew that if the arrogance of these wolves was not curbed, there would be no peace in the winter dens.

We killed a group of wolves here, and they didn't gather in packs, so we didn't have to worry about small-scale harassment later. Every family had a gun, and firing two shots at night could deter them for a long time.

Everyone knows that it is best to attack the alpha wolf. The alpha wolf who can gather the wolves together is the most threatening.

After eating and drinking, the children went to rest, and the adults sat on the kang to discuss tactics.

When it was completely dark, they all put on their fur coats, went out, and found a suitable place to prepare for an ambush.

Yushanjiang and Halimu coordinated these young men to ensure that their shooting ranges overlapped without interfering with each other.

And be careful.

As for an ambush, the main goal is to wait for the enemy to tire themselves out.

Halimu was the landlord, so he knew when the wolves would come. He patrolled and checked everyone's ambush. Yushanjiang also got some horse manure and sprinkled some on everyone.

In fact, they smell very much like mutton. They eat mutton at noon and at night, drink mutton soup, and their urine smells like mutton.

Finally, Yushanjiang and Halimu also wrapped themselves in coats and ambushed on both sides.

The direction the wolves were coming from was most likely the south of the winter den. But with the experience of Halimu and Li Long's ambush last time, he knew that the wolves might also come from behind.

So we still have to be careful. Halimu and Yushanjiang ambushed in the snow, facing both sides.

It was past twelve o'clock and the temperature outside had dropped to minus 27 or 28 degrees Celsius. Although it was not yet the coldest time, the people in ambush were almost frozen to death.

It was at this time yesterday that a pack of wolves came to attack, and Halim came out and fired a gun into the air to scare the wolves away.

There were too many wolves, so he didn't dare to let them come towards him. One person couldn't handle so many wolves - he would hit one and then the others. If seven or eight wolves pounced on him at once, one person would definitely not be able to handle it.

One young man couldn't stand it anymore and wanted to move, but was stopped by the people next to him.

Most people just endure it.

In fact, among the people who grew up in these mountains, there are few who have never been frozen, and most of them are quite resistant to cold.

Then I saw a pair of green eyes appearing on the southern hillside.

Tonight, the wolf came without even howling!

One pair, two pairs, three pairs...

Suddenly, a dozen pairs of wolf eyes appeared on the southern slope.

Yushanjiang and Halimu didn't watch much, they were paying attention to both sides.

There are also on both sides.

The wolves formed a circle and pounced.

I don’t know if he intends to take down this sheep pen today.

Halimu tried hard to find the wolf king.

The wolf king usually does not appear at the beginning. He only observes the overall situation from a high place where he can command easily.

Halimu knew that only by defeating the wolf king could the attack be defeated. Even if only a few wolves were killed, it would be unlikely that they would gather together to retaliate.

If the wolf king is not killed, even if most of the wolves are killed, the wolf king may gather another pack of wolves to take revenge.

Yushanjiang is also looking for him. It can be said that most people here are looking for the Wolf King.

Being able to kill the wolf king itself represents strength and honor in the tribe.

The young men didn’t think too much about it. Seeing so many wolves appear, most of the young men had already started to mark the wolf eyes according to their own positions.

The wolves appeared more than a hundred meters away from here. These people could hit them if they really wanted to, but they were not well prepared.

And it was agreed in advance that they needed to wait for Yushanjiang's order.

Talihar did not go to see these ordinary gray wolves, he was also looking for the wolf king.

In the darkness, his eyes were bright. Last time he killed seventeen wild goats, both he and everyone else knew that there was an element of luck involved.

If you want to be a truly good hunter, the best way is to kill the wolf king in this ambush.

There were more than a dozen wolves in the front line, and a few wolves were behind them at the edge of the forest. They were responsible for reconnaissance.

The Wolf King's position may be further back.

No one has been found yet.

No one was in a hurry. These green eyes slowly approached the winter den. Apparently, the gunshots from Halimu yesterday also made them cautious.

When the wolves were less than a hundred meters away from their winter den, a short howl was heard in the distance, and the fan-shaped wolves suddenly stopped.

Really obedient.

Some young people couldn't help themselves, but Yushanjiang and his team had matched the people very well, and the middle-aged man next to them immediately reminded them in a low voice.

The slightest movement would not attract the wolves' attention.

They have already smelled the blood here, and those horses that have not been put into the warm circle in time are all targets of these wolves.

Although wolves have no shortage of food in the mountains, the running speed of those red deer and roe deer is not slow at all.

If the wolf can eat delicious lamb from the sheepfold in this winter den without being able to escape, why would it choose those things that are not easy to hunt?
Therefore, the pack of wolves was also restless. Some of them even stopped after hearing the howling, and then tried to move forward tentatively.

The short howl exposed the wolf king's position.

Halimu, Yushanjiang, and Talihar were all looking over there.

Unfortunately, it was too far away and there were scattered bushes blocking the way, so the ambushers in the low place could not see the wolf king's position.

The wolf king was also observing the winter den at this time.

The wolf was close enough to its winter den, and if there was any danger, the other party might have already taken action by now.

After waiting for more than ten minutes, there was no movement. Some wolves were already dissatisfied and started howling with their heads raised. Then the wolf king howled again and ordered the wolves to move forward.

The wolf king also appeared in the snow and walked towards his winter den.

The wolf king walked slowly, but remained very vigilant.

It discovered that the scouting wolves had left their scouting position and were moving towards the winter den.

Obviously, these scout wolves also want to be the first to eat the delicious food.

The wolf king howled in dissatisfaction again, and the scout wolves had to slow down, find a high place, and look around.

When Halimu, Yushanjiang and others saw the wolf king, the wolves were less than 40 meters away from the sheepfold in their winter den.

The wolf king was a head taller than the other gray wolves and was much larger in size.

No wonder he could become the Wolf King!
At the same time, three rifles were aimed at the Wolf King.

As for the other wolves that were closer, most of them were also caught in the crosshairs circle.

Although the moon on the eleventh day of the twelfth lunar month was not particularly round, it cast a layer of silver light over the earth, allowing the herdsmen to see these ferocious beasts clearly.

"Fight!" Yu Shanjiang shouted and pulled the trigger with his finger.

"boom!"

"Boom!"

"Bang bang bang bang..." (End of chapter)