Fishing

When I was a child, people in my village worked together as a production team.

My village was surrounded by a small moat, which was said to be a protection for the village. This kind of moat was very popular in villages in my area.

On two sides of the moat, there were trees. One type of them was paper mulberry trees. On the outer bank of the moat, there were reeds.

In order to improve the living conditions of people in my village a little bit, the leaders of my village would put fry in the moat every spring. The fry were grass carp and silver carp.

Villagers never fed the fish. They only let the fish grow naturally. In summer, we could see that the reeds in the moat were shaken because the fish underwater were eating their leaves. It was also common to see that in the afternoon, the red fruits of the paper mulberry fell into the moat and fish fought with each other for the fruits.

When autumn came, it was time to catch the fish. Every family had a traditional homemade net, which was arch-shaped and for a single person to use.

They usually caught fish from one end of the moat to the other. When they were moving forward, fish flew out of the water constantly, and people on the shores shouted at the flying fish.

After finishing fishing, each family would be allocated three to five fish based on how many members their family had. People usually fried the fish to eat. It was the only time in a year that we could eat fish.

Nevertheless, the moat dried up many years ago, and moreover, it tends to be filled up nowadays, as it no longer serves as a protection in a safe society.