Chapter 90: Chapter 90 Preparing for Fishing

    The Yue Family’s fish pond was ready for harvesting, and the news spread quickly throughout Daye Village.

    Now that the busy farming season had passed, many people headed toward the pond after breakfast to watch the excitement unfold.

    There were two most common methods of fishing from the pond.

    Previously, most would drain the water from the pond and catch the fish directly from the dried bed.

    The advantage of this method was convenience and speed; after selling the fish, the pond would freeze over in winter, and they could refill it with water and stock it with fish fry the following spring.

    However, the Yue Family planned to use another method, encircling the pond with a large net from one end to the other, with several people on each side pulling the net, “scooping” up the fish inside.

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    This method was much more troublesome, involving not only many preparations beforehand but also continued maintenance of the pond during the winter.

    But the benefit was that the offspring of those “escapes” could be raised as new fry, and the fish that were not harvested would grow fatter and larger by the next year.

    Yue Jiannan, usually the most talkative at home, was unusually silent today.

    After setting the fishing net, he paced around the pond, circle after circle, staring at the swimming fish, lost in thought.

    Yue Jianxi asked in confusion, “Third brother, don’t you feel dizzy?”

    Village Chief Zhang frowned, appearing troubled, “Not many, basically one or two fish each. You know the nature of these people, after Wang Jinshun instigated, those who had originally ordered all backed out.”

    A few days before, Lin Chunju had asked Village Chief Zhang to help find out how many in the village wanted to buy fish, so the Yue Family could sell to them at a lower price.

    After all, winter was approaching, and many households were thinking of making fish soup to nourish their bodies and put on some fat for autumn.

    But Wang Jinshun claimed that the fish from the Yue Family had only been raised for a year, so they would surely be small and lack nutrients.

    Many suspected that Wang Jinshun, having a hard time himself, didn’t want others to have it better.

    This year, when harvesting the crops, everyone knew that even though Wang Jinshun had contracted two plots of land, his yield was only 30-40% higher than the previous year.

    After calculations, it wasn’t even certain he could recoup the rental cost.

    He was simply biting off more than he could chew with not enough hands, yet he insisted on running both ends.

    However, influenced by Wang Jinshun’s words, many villagers still got cold feet.

    Even though the Yue Family said they were willing to sell at a discount, it was their first year raising fish, and who knew what they could produce.

    If they committed to buying in advance and upon harvesting, they found the fish smaller than wild ones from the river, whether they wanted them or not, they would likely have to swallow their pride.

    Due to this concern, there weren’t many in the village who were willing to buy fish in the end, with the remaining being those who had good relations with the Yue Family, like Granny Zhou and Jin Aijun’s household.

    But with only these few families, who were buying for their own consumption, how much could they really purchase?