Blogs
SNAIL FARMING: ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW
Snail farming or Heliciculture is the process of raising edible land snails primarily for human consumptions or sales (Wikipedia). Snail farming has been considered as one of the few livestock farming that requires low capital to start and can produce humongous profit after harvest.There are many types of snails but they are fundamentally differentiated by their habitat; aquatic snails and terrestrial snails. Aquatic snails live in water whereas terrestrial snails live on land. Snails have the reproductive organs of both males and females, which categorize them as hermaphrodites. However, they usually do not create offspring on their own. They mate with another snail, and they both lay eggs.
There are more than sixty known species of snails in the world spread across different continents and land and sea areas. Although most snails are edible, the aquatic ConeSnail is venomous and has toxins that immobilize its prey. Several species of land snails live in the wild for only two to five years, thereby causing a decline in their existence and a possibility of extinction.However, in captivity or a monitored environment, they can live for up to 15 years. Snail farming is also doing the great job of helping to regulate and repopulate the snail species, especially the land ones.
Three species of snails have been considered ideal for farming in Africa, these are:
-
AchatinaFulica
These are Eastern land snails.They are a species of air-breathing land snail, and are the smallest in size among all the desirable species for rearing in Africa. The shell is generally reddish-brown in colour with weak yellowish vertical markings but colouration varies with environmental conditions and diet. The average weight of the snail is approximately 32 grams (Cooling 2005).
-
AchatinaAchatina
Commonly referred to as the Giant African snail, andalso known as the giant tiger land snail, is a species of very large, air-breathing land snail that can grow to 30cm. Achatina-Achatina is very good for commercialization because of its profitability and the volume of eggs it lays at once. Each achatina lays within 300 to 500 eggs at a time, three times a year (more than Marginata). Therefore, if you start a farm with about 1000 snails, in one year, the probability of getting about 1.5 million snails going by the number of eggs they produce is high. However, the limitation to growing this particular snail species is that they are “picky eaters” (they are very selective of what they eat).It originated from Nigeria to Liberia and then Ghana
-
ArchachatinaMarginata
ArchachatinaMarginata, also known as the giant West African snail, is a species of air-breathing tropical terrestrial land snail. At full maturity, the Archachatina Marginata can grow up to a length of 20cm weighing 500g, with proper care, it can live up to 10 years.
Why is Archachatina Marginata One of the Best Species to Raise on your Snail Farm?
When given the right feed with a well-structured housing system; ArchachatinaMarginata grows fast and within a short period of time, four months, they can start laying eggs. Archachatina Marginata Is also known for its large flesh size. Size plays an important role in the size of the eggs they lay, hence, Archachatina Marginata species lay bigger eggs than most. In addition to this, they have a higher adaptability rate. Under good growing conditions, there are high chances that the mortality rate will be reduced compared to other species.
Benefits of Snail Farming
One might be wondering why snail farming?Why not fishery or poultry farming? Snail farming comes with numerous benefits;
-
Low Startup Cost
The cost of starting up a snail farm is relatively low compared to other livestock farming. A snail farm can be started using a small land space or even containers and the result could give a huge turnout. Snails don’t need vaccination and drug administration like other animals, they are naturally strong and adapt well to their immediate environment. Also, it is a known fact that livestock feed can take up to 70% of initial budget, however, snails are herbivorous and they devour a wide variety of live plant parts: leaves, stems, plant crops, bark, and fruits. Food rich in calcium are needed to keep their shells hard. Snails also help decompose and break down organic matter.
-
High production
Snails are prolific breeders and this is due to the fact that they are hermaphrodites. This means every snail has a male and female reproduction, hence, every snail can lay eggs, resulting in large production of eggs.
-
Low Mortality rate
In addition to this, snails have low mortality (death) rate, meaning that the loss incurred from snail farming most times is below 20%.
-
Environmentally friendly
Due to their quiet nature, Snail do not constitute any disturbance. Their droppings are odorless and a form of organic manure for the soil. Their shells can also be mixed with animal feeds as calcium supplements or an alternative to limestone for soil Ph.neutralization.
-
High Market Value
Due to snail meat being white meat and having high nutritional value, there has been an increase in the consumption and demand of snail meat. Snails constitute the major and cheapest sources of protein in Nigeria (Yoloye, 1984). In addition to this, pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies use the snail slime and shell for raw materials.Snail shell contains calcium which can be extracted and used for calcium supplements.
-
Health Benefits
Scientific research has shown that snail blood (the bluish fluid found when snail shell is broken) when mixed with palm kernel oil and rubbed on the body reduces stroke severity and severe headaches. In addition to this, there is a wide believe that snails have high nutritional value for pregnant women, and this aids child growth and birth.
Limitations of Snail Farming
As much as there are benefits to snail farming, there are also some disadvantages or limitations to snail farming
-
Slow Growth Rate
Snails can take from 8 months to 12 months to reach market size.Furthermore, the consumable part of snails is just 40%, hence they need to grow well to attain good market value.
-
Climatic condition
Snails cannot be reared in all conditions. If it is too cold they will freeze to death. Also, if it gets too windy they might just hibernate and remain dormant, a process called aestivation. Too much sunshine reduces their activities as snail are nocturnal animals (more active at night).
Snail Farming in Nigeria
Nigeria has benefited from agriculture over the years, with poultry and fishery competing for the first spot in the list of livestock farming.Livestock is also an important aspect of Nigeria’s agriculture. Yen postulated in 2009 that in comparison to plant protein, animal protein holds higher nutritional status, owing to larger amount of essential amino acids found in the later.
Snail meat is of huge demand in the Nigerian market as well as the global world, snail meat is considered to be tasty with high nutritional value. Snail meatcontains high amount of protein, iron, calcium, magnesium, vitamin A and very low fat, a meat every doctor won’t hesitate to recommend. Unsurprising, snail meat is costly to acquire for consumers but largely profitable for farmers and sellers.
The annual demand for snail in Nigeria is about 7.5million kg.Also in Nigeria, the prices of raw, matured snails go for ?250 to ?600 depending on the size. The United State America imports more than $4million worth of snails annually from all over the world, including Nigeria,yet there hasn’t been much development in the farming and production of snails in Nigeria.
Due to the dwindle in the populations of snails over the year, it is not so common to pick up snails in the wild as before. Not to say there hasn’t been a consistent supply of snails, however, snails are being reared in a monitored and enclosed environment,and this has helped in the continual existence of snails in Nigeria.
Snail Farm Setup
To setup a snail farm, there are some mandatory expenses that needs to be accounted for, they include; the housing, fresh snails for farming, feeding, handling/ processing, marketing and transportation. The cost of these expenses are based on how big you want your snail farm to be. With the economic condition in Nigeria, it is safe to say a minimum cost expenditure of a ?10,000 might be needed to kick start the business, even thoughmore expenses might be incurred along the way. Let’s start from the most important step and then climb our way up.
Decide Which Species of Snail
When starting up a snail farm the specie of snail is quit important, as earlier stated, the best specieof snail for our location. Archachatina Marginata is best suited to start your snail farm.
Snailery Setup
A snailery is a place setup for snail breeding. Your snailery can be setup based on your budget and convenience. However,the main important thing is to have a snail housing where snails can graze and move freely.
There are three types of snail housing; Intensive, Semi-Intensive and Extensive Snail housing.
Intensive snail housing system is an enclosed housing system, structured to recreate the natural habitat snails are fondly found. Activities like feeding, hatching, and movements are totally controlled by the farmer. Such farming system includecages, green houses, plastic tunnels, buildings and large but rather enclosed land.
In the Extensive or free-range snail housing system, the snails are allowed to move freely in a mapped environment and feed in open pastures within the environment. This system is usually practiced by farmers doing snail farming business for commercial purposes and occupy a large expanse of land.Small scale farmers with less capital and adequate land space can practice this. They are not confined to an areaunlike in the intensive system.
Finally, we have the Semi-Intensivehousing system that combines some of the practices of both the intensive and extensive housing systems. In this system, egg-laying and hatching occur in a controlled environment like the intensive housing system.
However, after 6-8 weeks the young snails are moved to the outside pens for further development like in the extensive housing system.
Construct a Box Cage for Your Snail
-
The box should have a cubical wooden frame.
-
Construct a stand of at least 30cm for the box.
-
Build the base of the box using a stronger wood, the base should have a little space underneath to allow for excess water drainage.
-
After constructing the box, fill the pen with hummus sandy loamy soil to a moderate depth depending on the height of the pen.
-
Whichever height it possesses, it should be 30% filled with soil,
-
Put dry banana leaves in the pen for mulching and water retention. Cover the box with a lid made of wire mesh and mosquito nets, the lid should be fitted with padlock, for extra security.
-
Place the box stand in a bowl and fill it with water plus kerosene or condemn engine oil, other disinfectants can also be used. This helps to protect the box from insect attack.
Note that the cage must be spacious enough and conducive to avoid overcrowding, as overcrowding can cause spread of disease.Also, the soil should be able to retain water at a moderate level (your choice of soil should be Sandy-Loam soil or Loamy soil with moderate pore spaces). The pen should also be closed; this prevents the snails from leaving the pen as well as predators coming in.
Snail Purchase
A
Snail Lip Showing Maturity
fter completion of the housing unit, the next step is to buy your snails. It is important to examine the snails before buying them to determine if they are healthy and fully grown to lay eggs and populate the farm. To confirm this, observe the shell of the snail, if there is a lip, that means the snail is fully grown and therefore good for breeding. Mature and healthy snails can be gotten from snail farms anywhere in Nigeria. www.nairaagro.com is an Agric-hub where snail farmers advertise their snail products and services from all over the country.
Feeding
Snails are vegetarians and can be fedwith a wide variety 0fleaves and vegetables.They benefit from vitamins, calcium and protein to stay healthy and attain a stronger shell. Snails are also known to feed on composts, so, left over foods, banana peels and waste products are edibles for snails. However, make sure the dirt or compost are thoroughly sieved. Feeds can be formulated for snails. Formulated feeds are feeds gotten from the combination of two or more ingredients (Like groundnut, soya bean, bean, maize) at different proportions. This should be grinded into powder to aid feeding and digestion. Calcium supplements should be added to their feeds as well.
Mating
Reproduction is an important aspect of livestock farming. Due to snail’s hermaphrodite features, there won’t be issues like looking for male snail or female snail. When preparing to mate, snails go through a mating ritual. This can involve playful biting and rearing up against each other. The rearing up, upon closer observation, looks like they are fighting and the next minute as though they are kissing. This can go on from minutes to hours.
Hatching
Snails can start breeding from six months old. After mating each snail lays eggs in clusters between 30 and 1,000 eggs. The eggs are white or yellowish and are 4-5mm in diameter, which are buries in the part of the soil conducive for incubation. The job of the farmer is to collect these hatched eggs and prepare them for incubation. These steps usually takecaution and composure especially in handling the eggs.
Step 1
Collect the eggs from the snail housing, a hoe or spoon might be needed to collect the eggs, the eggs must not be touched with bare hands. Once in contact with hands, they won’t hatch. Once the snails start laying eggs, one needs to check for new eggs weekly or bi-weekly. The next step is to incubate the eggs.
Step 2
Mix a little bit of water and soil in a new container or a separate housing, make 2inches deep holes in the soil, be certain the eggs are in the individual holes, then cover the eggs with about two inches of soil. Afterwards, loosen the soil with a hand fork.
Step 3: Tracking
After burying the snail eggs, note the dates and the number of eggs in the makeshift incubator. This will help aid the incubation process and period which can last between 21-40 days (meaning eggs will start hatching from day 21). Once the snails start hatching, they crawl out of the thin layer of soil covering them. However not all of them will hatch, so one needs to constantly crosscheck with the records available.
Step 4
Collect the new hatched into a new housing or pen, again don’t pick them with your bare hand. The best equipment to use could be a plastic spoon. Afterwards, they should be fed with calcium based food to boost their growth.
Harvesting and Marketing
It takes a snail six to twelve months to mature, depending on nutritional value and as well as the environmental adaptive features. It is not economically advisable to harvest your snails before maturity. In addition to this, harvesting all the matured snails at once to sell in the market would affect production. There won’t be enough snails to mate, evidently the number of eggs will be drastically reduced. It is important to keep few for breeding and to serve as base stock for your snail farm. A major constraint in marketing is transportation. Matured snails go for N250 to N600 depending on the size, to transport these snails will require an estimated value being added to the price.
Snail Farming Challenges
There is no business without its own challenges, snail farming is not an exception. Snail farming might be challenging if the needed requirements are not in place. Some of these challenges can be avoided, others can only be managed. Challenges include:
-
Predators
Snails are fragile creatures and are also slow; this makes them an easy target for predators. The Most common snail predators are snakes, however, there are others like millipede, crabs, frogs, toads, birds and lots more. The solution is to exterminate these predators once sighted. Snail pen can be raised and properly enclosed with wire mesh to avoid predators. It should also be noted that predators like birds or crabs shouldn’t be reared close to these snails.
-
Soil Type
Soil contamination can affect the reproduction and mortality rate of snails. There should be a constant test of the ph. level of the farm soil. The soil Ph. level must not be acidic, rather it ought to be rich in calcium. More importantly, the soil in the pen should be changed every three months.
-
Snail Feed
Giving snails the wrong type of feeds will most likely affect their growth or spike their mortality rate. Snails are not slow growers; their growth is largely based on what they are being fed.
-
Light Intensity
The fact that snails are nocturnal, and prefer to be more active at night. They mostly feed, mate and move around at night.The light intensity in the farm should be at barest minimum, especially at night.
-
Diseases and Parasites
Snail diseases and parasites might not be seen with naked eyes, however, there are noticeable patterns once the snails are affected. Some of the symptoms include fragile shells, excessive secretion of serum, inactivates, reduced or no tentacles, inability to reproduce and loss of colour in new shells. A farmer must be observant, once an infected snail is spotted, it should be separated from others and given food nutrients, thereby improving its immune system as this will help combat the said parasites or disease.
-
Climate
The survival and reproduction of snails is majorly determined by the climatic condition of the snail farm. Snails survive in high humid environment, with low temperature. This can be managed by the farmer. The farmer must ensure that the snail farm is between 23 to 28degree Celsius.Any high temperature will affect the development and reproduction of the snails. The humidity of the snail farm must not be less than70-90%, and this is achieved during the rainy season. In the dry season, snails die from hot air, therefore the snail pen should regularly be sprinkled with water to achieve a humid and temperate environment.
Conclusion
Snails have good market demand and evident increase in price rate as said earlier, and can easily be sold in the local market. Also,snail meat consuming rate is growing very fast around the globe due to its high nutritional value and medical recommendation as a preferable source of animal protein (white meat). Expanding transactions via digital marketing will help improve sales as well as productiontranslating into huge profit margins. Many feed companies are coming up with supplements rich in calcium and antibodies that makes the snails growfaster, stronger and bigger.
(Fun-Fact: do you know you can export your snails using www.nairaagro.com platform to connect to buyers all over the world).
User says
Loading...