Chapter 348 Paid Hunting
Yue Feng was curious about the effects of leopard bone wine and fell into a deep sleep unknowingly.

I slept soundly that night and woke up at dawn.

After opening his eyes and feeling refreshed, Yue Feng got up from bed early, took care of the dog, eagle and other livestock at home, and after they had fed and drunk their fill, he went up the mountain again to release the eagles for hunting.

As the year draws to a close, the harvest from the small enclosures in the mountains has obviously dropped a lot.

Four brothers from the Yuefeng hunting team worked in a familiar mountain area for a whole day, but each of them only caught a dozen or so prey.

Compared to previous days, the number of prey visible to the naked eye has decreased.

Yue Feng predicted that as the outdoor temperature continued to drop, pheasants and other game of all sizes would gather in places that were more suitable for the winter.

Small groups will become large groups, especially at night, when large groups of chicks gather together for the night, relying on collective strength to survive the cold nights.

Yue Feng and his people have earned all the money they should have earned, so his attitude is pretty good.

In the afternoon, after all the young men from the hunting team came back, Yue Feng held a meeting for everyone.

The frequency of subsequent falconry hunting will be appropriately adjusted to once every two to three days on the mountain, with the minimum requirement of ensuring the basic supply to the second canteen.

In the next few days, Yue Feng resumed a relatively regular routine.

Every few days, the hunting team would go up the mountain to release hawks for a day to hunt small enclosures. When they did not release hawks, they would choose relatively good weather and continue to bring the big black hawks, hunting dogs, and hunting team members to search the mountains and catch sables.

To be frank, the number of sables in the back mountain is indeed too small. After working hard for several days, Yue Feng caught a female mink. Afterwards, he searched many places over mountains and hills, but there was no trace of the sable.

Before we knew it, it was the twelfth lunar month. The temperature at the foot of Changbai Mountain dropped from more than minus 20 degrees Celsius to more than minus 30 degrees Celsius.

After several days of heavy snow that covered the sky, the hunting teams’ daily trips to the mountains to hunt were temporarily interrupted, and the Yuefeng team had to adjust to hibernation mode.

The pace of the daily routine, which was already a bit lazy, dropped significantly again.

Yue Feng usually gets up at dawn and goes to bed at eight or nine o’clock. After he no longer needs to get up early to go up the mountain, his waking time is delayed to around seven in the morning.

Every morning when I came out of the house, the outside was covered with silver. It would not be an exaggeration to say that my breath turned into ice.

Yue Feng continued to serve hunting dogs and sables as usual, and his life was plain and regular.

According to the custom in the Northeast, people would start getting busy with the New Year as soon as the twelfth lunar month came. In previous years, life was difficult at home, supplies were limited, and people were relatively restrained in celebrating the New Year. They didn’t have the conditions to be extravagant.

In comparison, the preparations for the busy New Year in the twelfth month this year are much more extensive.

Steam big steamed buns, steam big meat buns, and fill a whole jar of dumplings. Freeze them outside and store them in the jar so you can eat them until spring.

It is time to slaughter the New Year pig in the village. Every now and then you can hear that someone on the street is going to slaughter the New Year pig. Some are helping, some are cutting the meat, and some are preparing the dishes for the slaughtered pig. The atmosphere of the New Year has become noticeably stronger.

Not to mention the various trivialities of life, the only thing worth mentioning is the injured white gyrfalcon at home.

With Yue Feng’s meticulous care and feeding, the external wound on the white gyrfalcon’s back has completely healed and scabbed.

At the end of a routine cap-feeding training for the day, Yue Feng suddenly discovered that furry feather tubes had emerged from the places on Xiaobai’s wings where the feathers had been plucked out.

Although the tip of the feather tube was only less than two centimeters, Yue Feng was still very happy when he discovered it.

The quills on the tail have already grown out and are basically complete, but the progress on the wings has been slow. The quills are starting to drill now, which means that the wing bone cartilage has recovered. It won’t be long before the eagle recovers.

In the next few days, Yue Feng fed the eagle fresh blood every day. The feathers on the little white’s wings grew longer day by day, and the new feathers gradually returned to their previous healthy state.

On the second day after the roots of the quills had completely grown, Yue Feng gave Xiaobai a more comprehensive full-body assessment and came to a very good conclusion.

The missing feathers on the wings and tail have all recovered, the blood scabs on the back have faded, and the short fur on the body has returned to normal.

Based on a simple static assessment, the white gyrfalcon in front of him has completely recovered.

On the day of completing the comprehensive evaluation, Yue Feng weighed Bai Mao accurately, and the weight came to 3.5 jin and 2 qian. This guy had been in Yue Feng’s hands for more than a month, and had become fat and strong.

After recovering from the injury, the days of being well fed and well served are over. It’s time to start the formal training to lose weight!
That night, Yue Feng and his father began a new round of working overtime.

The supply of meat is reduced, and the eagle is kept awake at night to speed up the metabolic cycle and consume physical reserves.

During this period, combined with the previous training of recognizing the whistle and the lure, the training steps are almost similar to the training when the Black Hawk just arrived home.

I don’t know if it’s because this white spear has been kept at home for too long and is not too afraid of people, but after the formal training of falconry began, the white spear’s daily training progress is obviously much faster than the last training period of the black hawk.

It took the big black eagle nearly ten days to eat and recognize the sentinel happily. When it came to the white spear, it only took four days and three nights for the eagle to start eating happily in the open air in the yard.

Yue Feng controlled Xiaobai’s weight to decrease steadily every day, and evaluated the guy’s training progress bit by bit.

Two days later, Xiaobai had become very familiar with the lure. When he hung the string at home and called it from a distance, he would come to the bait almost every time he heard the whistle, without hesitation.

Seeing that the eagle’s ability to recognize the lure had become more stable, Yue Feng took Xiaobai to the wide ridge outside the village the next day to begin training him to swing the bait.

When swinging the bait, Xiaobai revealed the problem of insufficient physical reserves.

After all, he had been recuperating at home, staying on the falconry with a hat on for more than a month, so his flying ability inevitably declined to a certain extent.

When the black eagle was being trained to swing the bait, it rarely showed signs of exhaustion. However, the white one that had just been swung could only fly for less than ten minutes before its speed dropped significantly. After landing, it would open its mouth wide and gasp for breath.

Faced with this situation, Yue Feng made targeted adjustments to the training plan, changing the daily swinging of the bait plate to twice a day, in the morning and evening.

The daily feeding amount is also consciously divided into two portions.

This morning meal provides about one-third of the total daily feeding amount, ensuring that the physical energy reserves will not be depleted after completing the morning flying training.

Before dusk, when you swing the bait plate for the second time in the afternoon, feed the remaining two-thirds of the day’s portion.

In this way, the daily training volume increased, and the problem of poor physical strength was also recovered steadily after daily training.

Another week passed and Xiaobai’s performance in swinging the bait plate has improved from ten minutes at the beginning to a stable half an hour each time. When the whistle is blown and the bait is dropped, the eagle no longer breathes heavily when it lands on the ground like at the beginning.

Yue Feng knew that the little guy’s condition had slowly returned to a relatively normal range under his continuous training. It was time to transition from swinging the bait in a small plate to hiding the bait in a large plate!
Just when Yue Feng spent most of his time fiddling with the white gyrfalcon and ambitiously trying to make Xiaobai as big as possible before the Spring Festival, a phone call to the village office interrupted Yue Feng’s falcon training plan.

That day, Yue Feng had just returned home from hunting falcons in the wild when Wang Xiaona, wrapped up tightly, came to his house to look for Yue Feng.

Wang Xiaona: “Xiaofeng, there’s a call from the village office looking for you. It seems to be from the forest farm! I’ll come over to call you after I hang up the phone. They’ll call you again in ten minutes!”

“Looking for my phone number? Come on, I’ll go ask what’s going on!”

Yue Feng casually put the hat on Bai Mao, then took his wife’s arm and went to his father-in-law’s house.

After waiting in the village office for a few minutes, the phone rang again and Yue Feng picked up the phone immediately.

“Hello? Hello, I’m Yue Feng, who are you looking for?”

“It’s Xiao Yue! I’m your Uncle Zhou! Zhou Jianchun from Red Star Forest Farm!!” A familiar voice with a slight distortion came from the phone.

“Oh, it’s Director Zhou. Do you have something to talk to me about?” When Yue Feng heard that it was Zhou Jianchun calling, his tone immediately became much more respectful.

As adults, no matter how much you despise someone, you still have to save face. If the other party calls you, there must be something going on, good or bad, wait until the other party has finished speaking before you speak.

“The Chinese New Year is less than half a month away! We have a job for you before the New Year at our forest farm!”

“Hmm? What kind of work? Just tell me what I can do, and I will definitely complete it for you with guaranteed quality and quantity!!”

Yue Feng’s heart skipped a beat, and he began to think secretly while asking.

“I mentioned this to you last time. At the end of every year, our forest farm has to give New Year gifts, and you promised me that you would take the responsibility!” Zhou Jianchun said slowly.

“Oh, yes! I remember this! There was a heavy snowfall some time ago. Ever since I went into the mountains with my uncle and others to hunt for a large number of animals, I haven’t gone hunting for a large number of animals since then!

The snow crust should be frozen hard now. There is still half a month before the New Year. Please tell me what prey we plan to catch for the New Year gifts. I will take people to get them!”

Giving New Year gifts is something that happens every year at the forest farm. Whether it is the employees of the forest farm or the relevant leaders of upstream and downstream units, they always have to visit each other during the New Year.

They live by the mountain and the water, and they guard the forest farm, so naturally they need game from the mountains to move around.

When Yue Feng helped his father to ask Uncle Li for a job position, he also made a promise in this regard. Yue Feng is not the kind of person who says he won’t do something and then talks nonsense, so when Zhou Jianchun called, Yue Feng expressed his position immediately.

“We have a lot of people at our forest farm, and the planned tasks for the New Year gifts are also quite heavy. According to the previous years’ backup plan, we need 2000 kilograms of fresh wild boar meat, 800 kilograms of roe deer meat, and 1000 kilograms of bear meat or venison! How about it? Do you have the confidence to complete it in the half month before the New Year?”

“Can this wild boar meat be male or female? Is there any gender restriction?” Yue Feng asked after listening.

“In principle, we don’t want to blast the eggs. Most of the meat will be distributed to the regular workers in the forest farm as employee benefits!

Of course, if it’s really not enough, we can add one or two big boars to make do! But the price offered by the forest farm is much lower!”

“Yes! Sure! Then what is the purchase price for the different types of meat in our forest farm?” Yue Feng continued to ask.

“The price offered by the forest farm is slightly lower than the market price. Sow wild boar meat is 55 cents, and bull wild boar meat is 40 cents. Roe deer meat is 90 cents, and venison or bear meat is 1.1 yuan!

But as a unit support, we can provide you with additional support in terms of forest rangers, firearms, and transport vehicles!”

To be fair, the price Zhou Jianchun gave is indeed slightly lower than the market price, but if you take into account the additional support of various personnel and equipment, it is also quite good.

After all, when you go hunting in the mountains on weekdays, you don’t have a big Jiefang truck to ride in. Plus, the extra income such as fur and bear bile does not have to be handed over to the forest farm. So all in all, it is fair.

“The price is barely acceptable. So how many people can you provide this personnel support for?”

“As long as it does not affect the daily day and night duty of the forest farm, all the forest rangers can assist you in hunting in the mountains! About eight to ten people! As for the truck, I can help you coordinate a Jiefang truck. As for the guns, 56 semi-automatic, no more than five at a time, and 500 rounds of bullets!”

“Okay! Then I agree! I’ll go to the field tomorrow and meet Captain Guo directly, okay?” After hearing this, Yue Feng agreed readily.

“Sure, I’ll say hello to Guo Jianfeng!”

“Okay! That’s it for now, we’ll talk about it tomorrow when we get to the forest farm!”

“Ok!”

……

After hanging up the call, Yue Feng let out a long breath.

Pay eight to ten people to go hunting, give them guns and bullets, and a big truck to drive!

The key is that all the prey caught can be sold to the forest farm at a relatively fair price.

This is a bad job!!
“What’s the matter? Are they looking for you to work at the forest farm?” Wang Xiaona tugged at Yue Feng’s sleeve and asked with concern.

“Hehe, Zhou Jianchun asked me to give a holiday gift to the forest farm, and he also arranged people and cars for them. The recycling price is also quite good!” Yue Feng put down the phone and touched his wife’s soft and boneless little hand calmly.

“It snowed so heavily a few days ago, and you still wanted to go into the mountains to hunt?” Hearing this, Wang Xiaona looked a little worried.

“Don’t worry! The snow has been falling for such a long time, it should have frozen over. Bring your skis, and you won’t be delayed! This time we are working for the government, and there are nearly ten people in the forest protection team alone!”

“Go hunting with the foresters?”

“Yes, they also provide guns and trucks! This is a good job! Paid hunting!!

The New Year is approaching, let’s get some more wild animals back, because we need to eat during the New Year! I’ll get more and prepare a decent New Year gift for your family!”

“Don’t be so stressed. You’ve brought a lot of stuff to my house during this time!”

“Hey, small problem!!”

……

(End of this chapter)