Fifteen Baba

Every household in Shijia area should make "the fifteenth bamboo stick" for the Lantern Festival, offer sacrifices to the God of grain, predict the amount of rain in each month of the year, and present bamboo sticks to each other to show solidarity and friendship, and augur a bumper harvest in that year. The fifteen-year-old bamboo batter is to soak the bamboo valley, grind the seeds into grains with stones, remove the chaff shell, soak it again, grind it into oars by hand, put the oars in a wooden basin, cover it with gauze, put a layer of grass ash on the gauze, and absorb water. After about five or six hours, bamboo batter can be made into one batch of pre-prepared stuffing with shredded meat, dried tofu and salt. 。 The first box contains twelve, representing December in turn. Put your thumb on a small nest on each bamboo. After steaming, uncover the lattice and observe how much water there is in each bamboo nest, which bamboo nest has more water, which bamboo nest has less water, which bamboo nest has less rain and drought in this month. In the era of backward science, Tujia people often used this method to predict meteorology. After observing the rainwater for one year, the fifteen bamboo sticks were placed outside the door, respecting heaven and earth, and the God of grain, and praying for blessings.