161 Chapter 161: Building Sheds
“Moreover, it’s much more convenient to get water with the well in this house.”
It was even more difficult to get water in Brook Falls Village now.
Except for the water meant for human consumption, almost all the water was taken from River Ringwaters.
Big Girl’s house was not close to River Ringwaters, so it took a lot of time to fetch water every day.
Song Que smiled and did not respond anymore.
“By the way, I told Uncle Zhao that I was going to plant bean sprouts when I delivered the goods to Fortune Mansion earlier today. He agreed to buy the first few batches of bean sprouts I had at a rate of 50 catties a day!” Qin Xiaoyao suddenly piped up, her eyes glowing brightly.
“75 copper coins?” Song Que asked after making some calculations in his heart.
Previously, the price of the farm-grown vegetables purchased by Fortune Mansion was one copper coin per catty.
After the drought, it was not so easy to harvest vegetables, so the price increased by five percent.
Since the bean sprouts were considered ordinary vegetables, the price should be the same.
“Mm-hmm!” Qin Xiaoyao replied.
“It’s the same price as the farm vegetables. However, if the drought continues, it should be able to reach two copper coins. When winter comes, it’s not impossible for the price to be three copper coins per catty.”
In the winter, there would be a shortage of vegetables.
Only some farms or very few farmers would cultivate greenhouse vegetables, which were much more expensive than usual.
Such vegetables could even be sold for four or five copper coins, not to mention three copper coins.
“How’s the profit?” Song Que was not too optimistic.
After all, soybeans were needed to grow bean sprouts, and the soybeans at home were three copper coins per catty.
Qin Xiaoyao smiled and gave Song Que a clap on his arm.
“One look, and I can tell that you lived like a prince before the apocalypse. You don’t know anything about farming at all.”
“If the soybean sprouts are cultivated well, they will grow strong. A catty of bean seeds can typically produce 12 catties of bean sprouts. Even if it’s only sold for one and a half copper coins per catty, the profit will still be huge!”
Song Que was shocked.
12 catties. If one catty were one and a half copper coins, that would be 18 copper coins. The cost of bean seeds was only three copper coins.
If he were to calculate in this way, it was really…
“Can it really… grow so well?” The man was somewhat in disbelief.
Qin Xiaoyao smiled confidently.
“Of course! With the well in our house, everything is under control.”
Song Que smiled with amusement and allowed Qin Xiaoyao to help him into the inner room.
“Then I shall look forward to it.”
“Mm-hmm!”
After some thought, Qin Xiaoyao added, “But I’ll have to build four sheds in the courtyard. When they are completed, we can plant bean sprouts directly in the sheds.”
One shed could house about 300 catties. Thereafter, the crops would be harvested according to the order of planting, and then the seeds re-planted.
This way, it would not be a problem to produce 300 catties of bean sprouts a day.
At that point, she would set aside a portion to send to Fortune Mansion and Fortune Restaurant.
The rest could still be sold in the market.
It just so happened that after the weather became hot, there were fewer vegetables being sold in the market.
In addition, their woven bamboo products business was not doing well, so it was timely to add some bean sprouts to sell.
At that point, she could also give some to her father’s meat stall in the market on West Street.
Then she would allocate two baskets to Big Girl stationed in the market on South Street.
And there was still Xiaomei stationed in the market on North Street.
If the three places sold vegetables at the same time and the price was right, they would definitely be able to open up a market.
“Where are you going to build them?” Song Que asked.
“I’ll build them next to the well in our house. It’ll be more convenient to water the plants in this way.”
“But in that case, we’ll have to sacrifice some of our vegetable plots.” At this point, Qin Xiaoyao’s expression became a little hesitant.
“We have too many vegetable plots to begin with, so let’s remove some plots. Even if half of them are gone, the remaining vegetables we grow will still be enough for our family,” Song Que said.
There were indeed too many vegetable plots. The vegetables that were planted after they moved house had already ripened, and their family couldn’t finish eating them.
For this reason, Mother harvested a lot and asked Qin Xiaoyao to send them to Fortune Mansion.
“Mm-hmm. Then I’ll inform Mother,” Qin Xiaoyao said.
The two of them talked for a while more before lying down for an afternoon nap.
After she woke up, Qin Xiaoyao went to look for Madam Liu and told her about the plan to take up some vegetable plots.
Although Madam Liu felt a little reluctant, she eventually still agreed to her daughter-in-law’s arrangement.
After that, Qin Xiaoyao went to prepare the century eggs.
Following this, she drew up building plans in preparation for building sheds in the courtyard.
When the overhead sun was slightly lower, and some parts of the courtyard became cool, Qin Xiaoyao brought her tools and started to get busy.
A while later, Qin Erhu came to fetch some water.
...
When he saw that his youngest sister seemed to be engrossed in some major undertaking, he came to ask her what she was doing.
After finding out that they were going to build sheds to grow something called ‘bean sprouts,’ Qin Erhu offered to help without any hesitation.
“Father said that the family has collected enough pigs and told Big Brother and me not to collect pigs these two days. Now, our family only slaughters one pig a day or two pigs at most. Big Brother and I are not busy!” Qin Erhu said.
“Building sheds sounds easy, but it’s not easy for you to do it alone!”
“Wait for me to carry the water back and get Big Brother to help. Tomorrow, we’ll also take turns to come and help. By the day after tomorrow at the latest, your shed will be ready.”
As the weather was hot, they couldn’t keep working all day. Otherwise, they could have finished by the next morning.
“Alright then. I’ll have to trouble Second Brother!” Qin Xiaoyao agreed after a moment of hesitation.
The reason she agreed was that it was indeed not easy for her to build the shed alone.
Taking for example the mounting of the upper beam, with the cooperation of other people, she could achieve twice the result with half the effort.
In addition, for convenience’s sake, the big wooden pillars that supported the shed had to be bought from the lumber shop.
Otherwise, Qin Xiaoyao would have to go out of town and into the mountains to chop them.
...
In order to save time and hassle, she naturally didn’t want to waste so much effort.
If there were anything that could be solved with money, she was prepared to spend money.
However, even so, she still had to go to the lumber shop to haul the wooden pillars back.
In short, building a shed seemed simple, but it was not an easy task in fact.
“Hey! What are you being so polite for?” Qin Erhu replied.
He hauled up the water buckets and stood up.
“Wait for me. We’ll be there in a while.” After he finished speaking, he strode off and left.
After that, Qin Xiaoyao didn’t have to wait long before Qin Erhu returned.
Not only did he bring Qin Dahu, but he also brought her father.
All three of them were holding tools in their hands and were obviously here to help.
This gave Qin Xiaoyao a shock.
“Father, why have you come?” She quickly stopped working and went to support Qin Dazhuang.
Qin Dazhuang simply pushed Qin Xiaoyao’s hand away.
“Why can’t I come?”
Seeing his daughter’s worried expression, Qin Dazhuang said, “I’m fine now! I was idle at home anyway, so I came over to work with you guys so that you could finish your task earlier!”
As he spoke, Qin Dazhuang immediately began giving instructions.
He got Qin Dahu to saw the wood and instructed Qin Erhu to dig holes. Then he told Qin Xiaoyao to go to the lumber shop to buy wood.
Qin Xiaoyao saw her father was full of energy and knew that he wouldn’t listen to advice, so she could only give up trying to talk him out of it.
She then pulled Qin Dazhuang to the side and only allowed him to supervise the tasks on site.
After that, she discussed with Qin Dazhuang the materials needed for the sheds before she went to look for Madam Liu. Thereafter, she went to the storeroom to push the handcart out.
It had to be said that Qin Dazhuang was indeed experienced in this job scope. In addition, the Qin family members were all adept at carrying out various tasks.
By the time it was dark, the rough outline of the shed was completed.
The Qin family stayed at the Song family’s house for dinner.
Qin Xiaoyao and Song Que came forward and warmly welcomed Qin Dazhuang and his two sons.