Chapter 57: Chapter 57: Harvesting Onions and Tanning Deer Hide

“The lake is now calm, it’s the perfect time to set sail with the ’Pioneer’ once again.”

“I’m going to the small island where I hunted the mule deer to collect all the wild onions I discovered a few days ago. They are an important seasoning for me in the coming days.”

He brought the logging axe and bow and arrow, along with a willow basket prepared for storing onions, and placed them in the ’Pioneer’ canoe.

Skillfully pushed the canoe into the water, then nimbly stepped into the cabin, adjusting his seating posture.

Hands gripping the wooden paddle, core engaging to drive shoulder and arm muscles, he rowed powerfully yet steadily backwards, leaving a clear trail of water extending continuously behind the boat.

As the distance shortened, the outline of the small island became increasingly clear.

It wasn’t very large, overall shaped irregularly like an ellipse, covered with dense vegetation.

Mainly consisting of low shrubs and some hardy coniferous trees, with rounded rocks and a small sandy beach at the edges due to being washed by lake waters.

After about a few minutes, the bow of the ’Pioneer’ gently grazed a shallow beach on the south side of the island.

Lin Yu’an steadied the boat with the paddle, pulled the canoe up to the shore, and tied it to a large rock with the rope he brought.

“Safe landing!”

He first patrolled around the island’s edge, carefully observing the ground and vegetation, looking for useful resources or signs of animal activity.

The island was very quiet, apart from the rustling of wind through leaves and occasional bird calls, almost no other sounds could be heard.

He noted traces of water birds nesting, but most were empty, evidently the breeding season was over.

In the center of the island, the terrain rose slightly, with some taller spruce and black pines growing.

He found some wild berry bushes here, but most berries had fallen or were pecked by birds, leaving only a few shriveled ones hanging on the branches.

“Looks like the island’s main resources are still plants.”

“Large mammal activity signs are scarce, they might just occasionally swim over for food.”

With no more significant discoveries on the island, Lin Yu’an wasn’t disappointed, as the other main goal of his trip was to gather wild onions.

Quickly reaching the destination with the prepared willow basket and simple digging tools,

the patch of wild onions still pleasingly thrived, though most leaves had started to wither, the bulbs underground were at their fullest.

The air was filled with their unique, somewhat spicy onion-garlic scent.

The distribution of these wild onions was quite extensive, visually covering at least several dozen square meters, almost carpeting the entire gentle slope.

“This is it, a natural spice base! Today, I’m bringing home all these ’treasures’!”

He squatted down, holding a sharp wooden stick, beginning his large-scale collection work.

Starting from the slope’s edge, he used the sharp stick to pry open the soil around each wild onion’s root while avoiding damage to the bulbs buried deep.

When those purple and white, approximately quail egg-sized or slightly larger bulbs appeared intact,

he gently grasped the base of the withered leaf stalk with his fingers and pulled lightly, a full bulb with soil adhering came out responsively.

“Collecting these wild onions, the primary parts taken are their bulbs.”

“By autumn, plant nutrients return to the roots and bulbs, so bulbs are fullest this time.”

Lin Yu’an moved swiftly, like an experienced farmer harvesting mature crops in his field.

For every uprooted wild onion, he first lightly shook off the soil attached to the roots, then placed them in the willow basket beside him.

The quantity of wild onions here surpassed his initial expectations.

He practically carpet-swept through this several dozen square meters of wild onion patch, ensuring not a single mature plant was missed.

Time quietly slipped by in focused labor, by the time Lin Yu’an finished collecting the final area’s wild onions, the sun had begun to set westward.

“Let’s see my harvest!”

“This patch of wild onions, I almost captured them all! Let’s estimate about how much we have.”

“This willow basket is full, filled with about twenty kilograms! That’s an incredible amount!”

“These wild onions, with suitable processing and storage, like hanging to air dry, or burying in dry sand, will be enough for my use throughout the long winter!”

With this bustling and weighty bounty, he paddled back to his warm stone shelter.

Back at the shelter, Lin Yu’an spent considerable time processing these newly gathered wild onions.

He braided part of the bulbs and hung them to dry on the crossbeam inside the shelter for winter use.

Lin Yu’an took a deep breath, the air filled with rich onion aroma and faint smoky meat scent.

The sky was still early, a few hours before sunset.

His gaze shifted to the mule deer hide, this large mule deer hide had begun to slightly harden as it hadn’t been properly treated.

“Folks, the onions are processed, it’s time to deal with this deer hide.”

“Such a big and complete mule deer hide would make a perfect warm blanket.”

He laid the deer hide flesh-side up, laboriously spread it out on a slightly inclined large birch log stump.

“All tanning processes start with thoroughly scraping clean the flesh side residue of any fat, meat bits, and that layer of membrane tissue.”

He picked up the oil scraper polished from shale stone pieces and began to meticulously scrape.

This procedure was similar to handling beaver hide but mule deer hide was larger and thicker, taking him nearly three hours to initially complete.

This process allowed him to gather a considerable amount of consumable fat, though further refining was needed.

The mule deer hide flesh side then began showing clean pale yellow, repeatedly washed with stream water to remove leftover grime.

Lin Yu’an stood by the stream, draped the clean deer hide over a large rock for draining, then facing the camera, his expression turned serious as he spoke.

“Brains are rich in lecithin and other substances, a highly efficient natural tanning agent, a method long continued.”

“However, in the North American Region, especially deer species, there exists a pathogen called CWD – a prion, in some places even dubbed ’Zombie Deer Disease’.”

“A deadly illness caused by prions, attacking animals’ nervous systems, akin to mad cow disease.”

“Although the mule deer I hunted appeared very healthy externally and internally with no signs of disease.”

“Yet, I’ve already opened champagne, so after careful consideration, I’ve decided not to use this mule deer’s brain for tanning.”

“Instead, I’ve opted for another natural tanning agent – plants rich in tannic acid!”

“When gathering firewood earlier, I collected plenty of western hemlock and willow bark, their bark containing ample tannic acid.”

“However, tanning such a large deer hide, this pottery basin is obviously insufficient.”

“I need a larger container, one that allows the entire deer hide to be fully submerged in tanning liquid.”

“So my Pioneer must make some ’temporary sacrifice’.”

Lin Yu’an cleared miscellaneous items from the canoe, carefully detached the military green waterproof tarp from the canoe completely.

This tarp was huge, thick, and completely waterproof, making it an excellent material for creating a temporary tanning pit.

Next, he took the logging axe to dig a rectangular shallow pit about two meters long, one meter wide, and half a meter deep in a vacant area near the shelter.

“No need to dig too deep, just enough to accommodate the deer hide and allow some tanning liquid depth will do.”

When the pit reached the appropriate size and depth, he laid the waterproof tarp into the pit.

He weighed down the tarp’s turned-out edges with stones, ensuring the tarp snugly fitted the pit’s inner walls, forming a fabric bag-like tanning pit.

“A simple yet very useful tanning pit is completed!”

“The next step is to process the bark, boil it to make tanning agent, but that will have to wait until tomorrow.”

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(Good Saturday morning everyone, it’s 7:03 now, whoever can get up this early on a Saturday must be diligently striving for the responsibilities on their shoulders, old bros!)

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