Bird hunting
When the first spring thunder rang across the sky in my hometown, when the misty spring rain moistened the newly exposed green grass, the "Grain Rain" in the twenty-four solar terms " has come quietly. At this time, I can always hear my father mumbling "Planting fields during Grain Rain". At this time, my brothers and I don't care whether we plant fields or not. At this time, we prefer the phrase "Little Man Birds Come to the Whole". The period from Guyu to Xiaoman every year is the golden time for us to hunt birds. At this time, the birds that overwinter in the south begin to migrate to the north, and our village Not far behind is a large forest, which is an ideal stop for migrating birds. When the branches on the poplar trees begin to turn green, the woods end the sparrows' solo singing throughout the winter and become lively. Well-known and not just famous birds sing lyrical, rock, and gentle songs. At this time, my brother and I opened our treasure chest and began to check our weapons-bird traps. Every year when the birds pass through the woods near the village, they always rest here for a few days to recharge their batteries. This gives us the opportunity to eliminate them, because there are always the same kind of birds passing here every year. Over time, everyone has summed up the experience of hunting birds. There is a kind of bird called "Machuliu", which is about the same size as They are similar to sparrows. They are named because their feathers are covered with pockmarks. Their vigilance is very low. When they are looking for food on the ground, they will lower their heads and peck at any living thing they see. Therefore, they are easiest to shoot. When supporting the bird trap on the ground, you do not need to bury the bird trap with soil. You only need to put soil under the bait. The bait used is a kind of meat insect that hides in corn stalks and overwinters. It is about 1 cm long and is a delicacy that birds like to eat. The tail of the insect is fixed on the mechanism of the bird trap, so the insect wants to break free. Then he twists his body vigorously and crawls forward, but he can only "stand still". This can attract the bird's attention more. When the bird lowers its head and pecks the insect with its beak, the mechanism is triggered, and the bird trap clamps the bird's neck or body. live. There is also a bird called "chuanji", which is about the same size as a pigeon. It’s our favorite to play. Because catching a "skewer chicken" will not only prove your superb bird hunting skills, but also provide you with a good meal. In that era when living standards were still very low, it was very satisfying to have a meal of poultry meat. Because string chickens like to stand on the earth bag to look out, use a shovel to build an earth bag on the ground before lowering the bird trap, and then support the bird trap on the earth bag. This will have a high success rate. And a bird called "Red Horse Feed" is very vigilant. It has obviously found the bait, but it looked left and right and refused to eat it. As a result, it chose a small life. There is also a bird called "ganbazhi". You can play by hitting it. "Ganbazhi" is the common name we gave it, but no one knows what it is called. This kind of bird likes to stay on dead branches without leaves. We took advantage of this feature and found a few dead branches and stuck them on the ground. We put the bird clips on the ground next to the dead branches. Then we left them alone and waited for you. After playing for a while, I looked under the dead branch and saw that the bird trap had caught it. It was really fun. However, this bird is smaller and not as attractive as the skewer chicken.
You can hunt birds alone or in groups. The time for hunting birds is at six or seven o'clock in the morning, when the birds have breakfast.
I remember the most enjoyable time of hunting birds was when the five of us came together and brought more than 60 bird traps. When we entered the woods, we lined up in a row, walking on tiptoe so as not to disturb the birds foraging on the ground. After a while, we found a flock of dozens of birds foraging for food on the ground, and it was very easy to hunt. So we started to set up bird traps about 20 meters away from the flock. Because we brought a lot of bird traps this time, we arranged a "nine escape" game. The so-called "nine escape" game is to lower three rows of bird traps in sequence into a "┆┊┆" shape, so that even if the bird escapes the first line of defense, it will still be trapped. It may not be able to escape the second and third lines of defense. When placing bird traps, the horizontal and vertical spacing should be kept between 20 and 30 centimeters. If the spacing is too small, one of the bird traps will be triggered and the rest of the birds will be scared away. , if the distance is too large, the bird will walk between the two bird traps. After we hold the bird traps as quickly as possible, we spread out in all directions. The most important next step is to "walk the birds", because the birds are Foraging aimlessly on the ground, our job is to gather them together and drive them towards the place where we set the bird trap. Because every time after placing the bird trap, we would insert the shovel on the ground near the bird trap. Firstly, it is to let us know the specific location of the bird trap, and secondly, to warn other people who walk into the woods that someone is hunting birds here, so they will Will take a detour knowingly. The so-called "walking bird" is to whistle with your mouth. It is easy to learn, but no one knows why the birds listen to this kind of whistle command. If you want them to go to the left, you stand on their right side and blow. whistle and vice versa. If you let them move forward, stand behind them and blow. In short, you must keep a certain distance from the birds and don't act too hastily, otherwise they will scare them away. Thanks to the efforts of several of us, the birds quickly entered our encirclement. By the time they crossed our three lines of defense, more than half of them were dead or injured. I remember that time we shot more than thirty birds, which was the most successful time. In the evening, after my mother finished cooking, my brother and I buried the bird in the fire at the stove. We sat on the small bench and watched the flickering light of the fire, "salivating" as we waited for this delicious meal. A smell of burnt feathers drifted through the courtyard along the open window lattice, permeating the entire village...
When Xiaoman passed, the migratory birds were far away from our sight. At this time, we put away the bird traps, took out our slingshots and started chasing our old friends, the sparrows, who have been with us all year round. Although I failed to hit a sparrow with a slingshot throughout my childhood, in the cold winter, I also tried to catch birds using the method described by Mr. Lu Xun in "Run Tu", but in the end I failed because of my clumsiness. Nothing was found. But it is still very rewarding to dig out bird nests in winter. After winter, the lazy sparrows choose the gaps under the eaves as a place to stay, so at 7 to 8 o'clock in the evening, my brothers and I went to dig out bird nests with ladders and flashlights. In the nest, the sparrows at night were blinded by the flashlight, so they had to wait obediently for us to stretch out our little hands to catch them. The success rate is extremely high. Birds accompany us through the four seasons and accompany us through our happy childhood.
When I returned to my hometown the year before last, I heard my father say that the forest where we used to hunt birds when we were children is no longer there. Now it is full of crops, and there are not as many birds as there were when we were children. I can’t help but I'm thinking, could it be that our bad behavior of hunting birds when we were children hurt them? Or have we grown up today and plundered their homes? I don’t have an answer.
Killing the New Year Pig
Throughout my childhood, the most exciting time every year was the Chinese New Year, with making new clothes, setting off firecrackers, steaming rice cakes... The New Year begins with the killing of New Year pigs. After entering the twelfth lunar month, every family starts killing New Year pigs one after another. At that time, the pigs were raised from piglets by their own family. The general growth cycle was 10 to 12 months, so the meat tasted particularly delicious. At that time, every family raised New Year pigs to be fat. I remember one year, the pigs raised at home were so fat that they could no longer walk and even ate on their knees or on their stomachs. On the first day of preparing to kill the pig, the mother stopped feeding the pig. This allowed the pig to excrete everything in its body, making it much easier to clean the pig's intestines.
At night, my mother took out the pickled sauerkraut from the jar and started cutting it. Since there were many children at home and they had big appetites, my mother would cut a big pot full every time. Dad sat on the bench and picked up the hemp rope that would be used to tie the pig tomorrow. My brothers and I were so excited that we ran around the house and couldn't sleep.
Early the next morning, my father found a few strong laborers and started to catch the pig. When the pig was not paying attention, several people swarmed up, knocked the pig to the ground, and quickly tied the pig's legs and legs with hemp rope. The pig's mouth made it unable to move. Several people carried the fat pig to the table that had been prepared, and the next step was to start killing the pig. My brothers were busy holding firewood to heat hot water. The pot at that time was very big, about one meter in diameter. Because I was brave, I was responsible for catching the pig's blood. At this time, the pig's head stuck out from the table. Dad was holding the pig's ears with one hand, and the other hand was holding a butcher's knife more than a foot long, ready to kill the pig. At this time, the mother always faced the south and muttered "Fat pig,... "Fat pig, leave this year and come back next year." Maybe this is the mother's wish and yearning for the future life. When the butcher's knife penetrated the pig's neck, the pig made a painful cry. I heard my father say that the butcher's knife It would pass through the chest and pierce the heart. The moment Dad pulled the knife out of his neck, blood spurted out and fell into the basin below. I took a long section of sorghum stalk and kept stirring it in the blood basin. After a while, a thick layer of blood tendons hung on the sorghum stalk, but at the time I didn't understand why I had to stir the pig's blood. It wasn't until I learned about blood later that I realized that agitation destroyed the platelets that play a coagulating role in the blood, so the blood stopped coagulating. I remember one time my grandma’s family was killing a pig, but the knife did not hit the heart. When everyone thought the pig was dead, they loosened the hemp rope tied to its legs. As a result, the pig that was lying motionless on the table suddenly turned over and stood up. , and staggered to the yard. I was killed again in the end, which made me laugh for a long time. When the blood slowly drained away, the pig stopped moaning. The next step is to "pig blowing". At this time, the pig must be placed on the table with its belly upward and its four hooves facing the sky. Cut a hole in one of the pig's hind legs and start blowing the pig with a wooden stick. The wooden stick is made with a diameter of approximately Made of 1.5 cm steel bar, one end is simmered into a circle with a diameter of more than 10 cm, and the top of one end is slightly pointed. The total length is about 1.5 meters. When staking a pig, hold the circle of the slug with one hand and slowly insert the other end of the slug from the small opening cut on the pig's leg. This is a technical job. The slug should be controlled between the pig skin and the fat layer. Generally speaking, Each pig will be beaten a dozen times, so that the "pipes" created by the hammers will spread all over the body. Then use a pump to pump air into the pig's body at the incision on the leg, so that the air will flow to the whole body along the "pipe" that has been set up. After a while, the pig's whole body swelled up and became "fatter" than before. At this time, the "rolling pin" must be used to continuously beat the parts of the pig's body that are swollen by the air, which is called "driving the air". The purpose is to spread the air evenly throughout the body. After all this trouble, there is only one purpose, which is to make it easier to remove the hair of pigs. At this time, the brothers had boiled a large pot of water, and then they lifted the pig to the big pot to water and remove its hair. The entire process takes more than an hour. The pig that has been shed has become white and clean. At this time, move the pig back to the table and clean the surface with clean water. "Evisceration" was the climax of the whole process. At this time, my brothers and I would gather around the table and watch our father perform an "anatomy" on the pig. The disembowelment started from the pig's abdomen, and my father took a sharp knife from the neck to The knife edge started to be cut down to the anus of the tail. From the knife edge that cut through the skin, a layer of snow-white fat meat was exposed, and then a deeper layer of lean meat was revealed. The meat in this part is what we often call "pork belly"
Fat and thin. Inside is a layer of fat called "suet", usually 2 centimeters in length. After Dad cuts this layer of fat open with a knife, the entire pig's internal organs are exposed to us, including the heart, liver, lungs, and stomach. The intestines, intestines, etc. were all clearly visible, and they were still steaming. When I touched the softness with my hands, my father first took out the "lantern hanging" in the chest. In fact, the trachea, heart, liver, and lungs were all connected together. , carried by hand like a big lantern. In the abdominal cavity are the stomach, small intestine, and large intestine.
After a while, my father took out everything in the abdominal cavity, and what was left was cut into eight pieces. At this time, the big pot had been repainted and he was ready to cook the meat. I remember that he cooked dozens of kilograms of pork every time. , and soon the whole yard was filled with the tempting aroma of meat. At this time, Dad began to prepare the blood sausage. He should put chopped green onion, minced ginger, pepper noodles, monosodium glutamate and other seasonings into the blood, and gradually add water to the blood to dilute it until the blood is just enough to "hang a bowl". , the so-called "hanging bowl" is to use a bowl to scoop a bowl of blood and slowly pour the blood out. The blood will form a light red, thin blood film on the wall of the bowl. Every time my father mixes the blood, he always adds one or two bowls of old soup for cooking meat. The blood sausage poured out in this way is tender, fragrant and delicious. When the pork was cooked to medium rare, my father put the stuffed blood sausage, and my mother put all the sauerkraut cut last night into the pot. At this time, my brothers and I began to invite relatives and friends in the village to come to our house to eat pork, and the lively pork feast began. Although we could not eat with the adults at that time, my mother had already She secretly cut a bowl of meat for my brothers and me, so that we "greedy cats" could eat it first. The next day, my mother put a lot of suet and fat in the pot to form two jars of meat oil. At that time, due to the soybean oil It was very expensive and my family couldn't bear to buy it, so we used meat oil for cooking all year round, and the oil-free oil shuttle was our favorite delicacy until we had a full meal of oil shuttle. The Year of the Pig has truly come to an end.
In recent years, since my parents no longer raise pigs by themselves, they buy some pork that has a short growth cycle and is grown on feed every Spring Festival. It's hard to eat "benzopork", but the long-lost aroma of meat has always been lingering in my mind. Today in the bustling and busy city, we may not only have lost the taste of the New Year, but also the strong flavor.
Field Feast
When I was young, my knowledge of fruits began with New Year pictures. I remember one year my grandpa bought four pictures full of flowers, plants and fruits from the market. In the New Year pictures, my grandma would point to the fruits on the New Year pictures and tell me: This is a banana, that is a pomegranate, and that is a pineapple. There are some grandmothers who are not famous. Whenever I feel "greedy", they will touch the fruits on the New Year pictures quietly with their little hands. Swallowing my saliva, my mind wildly imagined the taste of these fruits, because at that time, the only "fruits" we could eat were cucumbers, tomatoes, apricots, crabapples in the orchard, and frozen pears and persimmons that could only be eaten during the Chinese New Year. Climb up to the big elm tree behind my grandma’s house and eat a hearty meal of elm money. Although they taste ordinary, they grow in the vegetable garden in front of and behind the house, especially after the summer rain. The green cucumbers and pink persimmons are hung with crystal water drops, which is really unique.
When the summer vacation comes, my brothers and I often go to the fields to dig for pig vegetables, bitter hemp vegetables, and mother-in-law. , carrots... everywhere, clusters of blue flowers are blooming, causing butterflies to dance. The whole field is filled with a faint floral fragrance. At this time, we rarely go home for lunch. Make delicious things by yourself in the fields. Braised potatoes, roasted corns, roasted grasshoppers... Although braised potatoes are the most troublesome, we still like to do them because they are so delicious. When it was almost noon, we started to make preparations. I was responsible for digging the kiln, my eldest brother collected firewood, and my younger brother went to dig potatoes in the fields. At that time, the windbreaks in the fields were crisscrossed, dividing the fields into patches. On both sides are drainage ditches with a trapezoidal cross-section, which are filled with wild vegetables and grass. I always like to dig the kiln on the edge of the ditch. This not only saves effort when digging the kiln, but also makes it easier for my brother to use the same tools for digging pig vegetables. Hold a knife. The shape of the "kiln" is similar to a cooking stove at home. The size depends on the number of potatoes. After I dig the kiln, the next step is to make "charcoal", but the "charcoal" here is not. Instead of charcoal, soil charcoal was used. I grabbed a handful of very wet black soil and kneaded it vigorously. If necessary, I used my other hand to apply more force. As a result, the black soil was kneaded into a long strip of "charcoal", and the charcoal was kneaded. Place them one by one on the circular kiln mouth. After completing the first circle, continue to place the second and third circles on the first circle...
Finally, the charcoal is arranged into a conical pyramid. At this time, the main work is completed, and the rest of the work of burning the fire is left to the younger brother. After about an hour of burning, you will see the earth on the kiln mouth. The charcoal was burned red by the fire, so no more firewood was added to the stove mouth. When the flames in the kiln gradually extinguished and only the red charcoal was left, the prepared potatoes were thrown from the stove mouth into the charcoal fire and poured with charcoal. Spread the potatoes out on the branches, push down the burned conical pyramid and cover the potatoes with earth charcoal, so that there is charcoal underneath the potatoes, and the red earth charcoal above them will be stewed quickly when they are pinched from the front and back. To prevent the heat from dissipating too quickly, we cover the entire kiln with a thick layer of soil. After a while, we touch the soil covering the outside of the kiln with our hands. If we find that the soil is particularly hot somewhere, it means that the soil here is not thick enough. The heat inside has been conducted out. At this time, you need to continue adding soil until it is no longer hot to your hands. The rest of the time you can go eat black sweets and catch grasshoppers. After an hour, you can "start the pot." First clean off the thick sealing soil. When you see charcoal exposed, you need to be careful, because the temperature of the charcoal is about 100 degrees at this time and you must not touch it with your hands. A fragrant smell floated out from the gap between the charcoal. This was because the two brothers had swallowed their saliva. With "greedy" expressions on their faces, I used two branches as thick as chopsticks to take the charcoal out of the kiln one by one. By this time the potatoes were braised just right and a layer of golden crunch had formed on the surface. So you and I gathered around the kiln and ate hungrily. There were times when my brother swallowed very hot potatoes and stomped his feet in pain. Although living standards have improved now, I still miss the stewed potatoes of my childhood. Compared with stewing potatoes, burning corn is much simpler. Place the unpeeled corn on a pile of branches, light the branches and let the corn burn in the fire. When the fire gradually extinguishes, take the corn out of the fire. At this time, several layers of corn leaves have been burned by fire. Peel off the remaining leaves from the corn cob. At this time, a burst of heat mixed with the fragrance of rice came out, and the corn kernels also changed from the original white to golden yellow, and then Then put the corn on the charcoal fire. Then you can hear the "crackling" sound of the corn being roasted by the fire. After a while, it was roasted. Several friends sat together, eating and laughing with relish... It was really happy. .
Although you can see grilled corn stalls in the market now, most of them peel the corn first and then grill it. Although this saves time, the taste is greatly reduced, so After work, I still use the method of my childhood to burn corn and eat it. Although sometimes it makes me covered in smoke and dust, it still has a special taste in my heart.
Catching Grasshoppers
Children are all familiar with the topic of grasshoppers. At the summer market, you will occasionally hear the grasshoppers in the grasshopper cages chatting incessantly. The chirping attracted many children to watch it, and some even asked adults to buy it and hang it on the balcony. This often touched my mind, so the scene of catching grasshoppers in the fields when I was a child was in my mind. It emerged clearly...
At that time, the grasshoppers in my hometown generally had two colors, one was green all over, we called it "bean green", and the other was brown all over, we called it "fruit red" because of "fruit red" Grasshoppers are relatively rare, so whenever someone catches a "red fruit", they naturally want to show it off to everyone. Maybe it's because "rare things are valuable". Most of the grasshopper cages sold in the market now are made of bamboo shavings and are very delicate. The grasshopper cages we used when we were children were all made by ourselves, including triangular pyramids, rectangular parallelepipeds, and cubes. You can completely "create" them according to your own preferences. Although they are not very beautiful, they are still practical. At that time, our parents were busy with their work and had no time or energy to take care of us. We had to "reliance on our own." The material used at that time was sorghum stalks. Speaking of which, I lamented that today's children are "industrious and industrious". "There are no distinctions between grains". When it comes to sorghum stalks, how many children in the city now know that sorghum stalks are the same as the "sweet stalks" sold in the market, except that they are not sweet. When choosing materials, you should choose It is thick, straight and is an "old pole" that was cut last year and kept for more than half a year.
The skin of the sorghum stalk here has hardened and turned yellow, and the flesh inside has also dried out due to loss of moisture. The grasshopper cage is ready in about an afternoon. There is a small door that can be opened on the grasshopper cage for convenience. Put in the grasshoppers and food, and everyone hangs the prepared grasshopper cage under the eaves. When one grasshopper starts chirping, it will cause other grasshoppers to chirp. It is really "one after another" and very lively. When you go to the fields to catch grasshoppers, you have to go out into the fields. At this time, in the fields, the sounds of grasshoppers, crickets, locusts, well-known and unknown... are noisy together, and it really feels like a "symphony".