After a while, my mother finished cutting all the potato vines in this field and came over to help clean up.

Now without pigs, sweet potato vines are useless. In the past, sweet potato vines had to be picked up and fed to the pigs.

Zhang Yaohua: Their job is not as simple as picking up sweet potatoes and throwing them into snakeskin bags. Shake the soil off the surface of the sweet potato, remove some of the roots, and separate the size.

Some of the bad ones should also be singled out.

"Are they all yellow meat?" Zhang Yaohua asked.

He took his mother's knife to cut potato vines and peeled a sweet potato.

Yellow-fleshed sweet potatoes are a bit like yacon, which can be eaten raw, and Zhang Yaohua has not eaten them less before. But the family usually does not allow them to eat more, saying that the stomach is prone to worms.

"This one is, the one above is purple meat." Mom said.

If it is sun-dried, the yellow meat is the best; But if it is cooked and eaten, it is more delicious purple meat. There is also a kind of white meat, which is the so-called white potato, which tastes very powdery and is Zhang Yaohua's least favorite sweet potato.

"This stinks." Zhang Yaohua threw away the peeled sweet potato.

Stinky and spicy is what they say here, in fact, it is a kind of diseased sweet potato, which tastes strange and spicy, and makes you feel nauseous and nauseous after eating.

Stinky and spicy sweet potatoes, pigs don't eat them.

If you look closely, you will find that it is a worm bite inside, so it is also called stem nematode disease, which is a dangerous and devastating disease.

The nematode punctures the outer epidermis with a mouth needle, enters the internal root of the root, the initial symptoms are not easy to see with the naked eye, the outer skin begins to fade, and soon turns blue, some are slightly sunken, some have small cracks, and the subcutaneous tissue becomes brown and soft.

This thing is also contagious, as long as one sweet potato has this disease, almost everyone around will be hit.

"Don't eat it raw, it's still a child?" Mom said angrily.

As soon as Zhang Yaohua finished speaking, his mother looked at Zhang Yaowei, and couldn't help but continue: "Ah Wei, don't you dig up the three-pronged grass by the way and keep it for seeding?" ”

This is also one of the reasons why Zhang Yaowei dislikes working with his mother the most.

No matter how well you do, she has to pick the thorns and always pick the bones in the eggs.

Zhang Yaowei had no choice but to work hard in a muffled voice.

"I'll dig it for a while!" Zhang Yaohua said.

"You?"

The mother looked Zhang Yaohua up and down, full of doubts.

It's not that I look down on you! The person who used to ask you to help cut the grass and blister his palms is sure that he can do this kind of work? Digging sweet potatoes is like hoeing the ground, the wooden handle will rub against the palm of the hand, and people who do not work often can easily grind out blisters.

Even Zhang Yaowei hurriedly waved his hand: "Hey! Brother, no. ”

With that, he spat on his palm, wiped it, and continued to swing the nail rake.

"Big brother's hands are more tender than mine." Ah Zhen made up for it.

Zhang Yaohua was speechless.

Although he grew up in the countryside, he really didn't do much heavy work because he was good at reading. It's not that he doesn't have strength, it's really a person with fine skin and tender flesh, and his palms haven't been calloused.

Unlike my parents, the palms are very rough, just because of layers of calluses.

"This grass is really disgusting, and herbicides can't kill it." Zhang Yaowei dug up one of the plants.

It is also one of the most hated weeds by farmers.

Paraquat, licorice phosphorus, etc. can't be killed.

Not only that, but the ability to reproduce is also very strong. In addition to flowering and bearing seeds, there is a series of taro-like things underneath, the size of peanuts, that thing will also grow into a plant.

Therefore, if you want to kill it completely, you have to dig it up completely, and you can't leave any roots, and then dry it and burn it.

Otherwise, even if it is dried, it will re-ignite once it encounters water and soil.

"Guess why it's one of the top 10 weeds in the world? It's because it's hard to kill. However, I heard that it is also a traditional Chinese medicine. Zhang Yaohua said.

The real scientific name of this grass should be sedge.

Sedge is a real malignant weed, mainly because it is very adaptable and fecund, and it can reproduce into patches if it has the slightest chance.

At present, sedge is distributed in 92 countries around the world, because there is no natural predator to contain, so it has multiplied in many areas, so it is listed as the first of the world's top ten evil weeds.

"Is it Chinese medicine? Can that be sold for money? "Ah Zhen's first reaction was to sell for money.

As long as it's worth something, it's guaranteed to be dug up in no time.

In China, you'd better have no value, otherwise even invasive species will face extinction, and they will have to rely on artificial breeding and artificial cultivation to survive.

Crayfish are a good example.

If it weren't for artificial breeding, the little crayfish in the wild would probably be caught before graduating from kindergarten.

"Its root can be used as traditional Chinese medicine, like fragrant aconite, and it can definitely be sold for money, but I don't know how much it is worth. I'm afraid it won't be very expensive, otherwise someone would have been eyeing it a long time ago. ”

They dug for a morning, and they dug up two pieces of land, more than 1,000 catties.

The yield of this thing is indeed very large, as a food, even if it has many shortcomings, the common people are still willing to plant a little, beware of disaster years.

After the sweet potatoes are dug up, the storage is also particular, and you can't just find a place to stack things.

Sweet potatoes are afraid of cold, and when the temperature is too low, they will be frozen, forming a hard core and not steaming. Therefore, in the north, it is generally placed in the well cellar.

Northerners will choose a place with high terrain, solid soil and low groundwater level, and dig a wellbore downward, generally with a diameter of about 1 meter and a depth of 5~6 meters.

And they have several degrees or even more than ten degrees in winter, so they don't have to worry too much about hardness.

However, when the temperature is too high, it will sprout again; When exposed to moisture, it is easy to cause germs to attack and cause rot. Therefore, when they store sweet potatoes here, they usually find a dry, ventilated corner to stack them.

It's best to dry it a little before hiding it. Those sweet potatoes with broken skin are easy to heal after being exposed to the sun.

It's the same with people, the wound can't touch the water, etc.

Mom plans to cook half a pot of sweet potatoes for everyone, while they are fresh.

Zhang Yaowei was depressed.

"Mom! Why don't you boil a sweet potato syrup? Zhang Yaohua suggested.

"This one does." Zhang Yaowei hurriedly agreed.

The most unpalatable thing about sweet potatoes is boiled, the boiled sugar water is not bad, and the roasted sweet potatoes and fried sweet potato chips are also very fragrant, anyway, they don't need to be boiled.

"It's just your brothers."

My mother scolded, but she didn't object, she started washing the sweet potatoes, and then asked Zhang Yaohua to peel them.

Later, it will be cut into small pieces, small pieces.

"How many sweet potatoes do we have left undug at home?" Zhang Yaohua asked again.

"That's a lot! There are thousands of pounds, and I have said so many other species, but I don't listen. The second brother spread his hands and said.

"In addition to drying, you can also make sweet potato flour." Zhang Yaohua put forward his opinion again.

Potato starch content is higher than rice, so sweet potato flour is more flexible and elastic than rice flour, and it is not easy to paste the soup when boiled, and it is not easy to break when stir-fried.

There are many noodle shops outside that have sweet potato flour, and many people like to eat it.

"How are we going to do it?"

"It shouldn't be difficult, right? I'll check. ”