Snail farming is the rearing of snails in captivity. The snails are
confined in an enclosure and most of their requirements like feed; water
and lime are supplied on a regular basis by the farmer.
On maturity, the snails are harvested, processed and consumed by the
farmer or sold. Since the seasonality of supply of snails from the wild
limits their use for meat on a continuous basis, the need for organized
small or large scale snail farming has become imperative.
Snail farming in Nigeria is one of the most neglected and yet one of
the post profitable animal rearing business anywhere in the country. It
provides one of the finest opportunity to make good money at a very
short time. But why are Nigerians not yet fully engaged in this money
making animal rearing? The reason is ignorance.
Most people in Nigeria still have the believe that snail can only be
picked in the bush. The culture of going to the bush to pick snails in
the villages during raining time has been there for generations. So, it
has been difficult for people to come to term that snail can actually be
kept and grown at home.
Just like in many other aspects of farming in the country, Nigerians
are yet to discover the great money making potential in snail rearing
business and that is why we suffer in hunger and poverty. We neglect
where the money is and keep pursuing it where it is not, going from one
city to the other looking for one petty trading after another to trade
on.
SNAILS FARMING SYSTEMS:
There are two main systems of snail farming. These are: Indoor and Outdoor systems
Indoor System: This system involves raising snails
indoors in pens located in a building. The snails are fed a mixture of
fresh vegetables, concentrates, and other food materials. The system
utilizes little space as the snails could be raised even in trays placed
on shelves on the walls. In advanced management, the system allows for
temperature regulation, controlled lighting, regular cleaning, and
health care.
Out-door System:In this system, snails are raised
out-doors on pastures. The snails may or may not be fed. The farmer has
little control over the performance of the snails. The snails move about
feeding on natural food materials.
A modification of the out-door system is one in which the snails are
confined outdoors in enclosures and fed both synthetic and natural
diets.
It is easier to control and manipulate snails in this setting. This system fits in very
well into the Nigerian farming system.
REQUIREMENTS BEFORE STARTING:
The farmer will need the following to start a snail farm – (The modified out-door system).
Enough edible live snails.
A good site near his house with the right kind of soil and the right amount of water for the snails to live and grow.
*Enough food and shelter plants.
*The materials to build a pen for the snail.
SELECTION OF SITE:
A prospective snail farmer must choose a suitable for his farm.
Important factors to consider are: Location, soil type, moisture
content, wind direction, lime content of the soil and environmental
temperature.
Location of Farm: The snail farm should preferably
be located close to the farmer’s house. In this way he will be able to
watch his snail regularly, detect any problem earl, protect them from
their enemies and take care of them easily. There should be adequate
space for future expansion.
Soil Type: The snail farm must be sited at a place
where the soil is rich in humus and other decaying plant and animal
materials. The soil should contain sufficient lime or calcium for eggs
and shell and snails shell formation. Snails do not live in hard soils
nor do they live in loose sandy soils. Snails cannot dig into hard
clayey soils to rest and lay eggs while soils with a lot of sand do not
hold enough water. The ideal snail soil should be medium (light) to
allow air and water to penetrate easily.
Moisture content of Soil: Snails prefer damp soils.
The farmer should avoid very wet lands and lands prone to flooding in
the rainy season. Dew and rain keep the ground moist so that the snail
can move easily and dig into it to rest and lay their eggs For a round
the year production of snails, a ready source of water supply for
irrigation or spraying should be provided.
Snails usually seal off their
aperture and go into hibernation during the dry season unless a
continuous supply of moisture is guaranteed. The soil could be kept
continuously wet by the provision of shelter plants like banana/plantain
or the farm could be watered to provide the necessary conditions for
the survival and multiplication of snails.
Wind Direction: Snail farms should be situated in
sites well protected from the wind. Strong winds during the snail
growing season are bad for snails because they lead to
dehydration and subsequent drying up of snails.
Temperature and Humidity: Snails are cold blooded
animals and therefore sensitive to change in atmospheric humidity and
temperatures. In West Africa, temperatures in the areas where most
edible species of snails are found do not fluctuate greatly.
However,
significant fluctuation is in humidity below 75% induces the snails to
aestivate(i.e. to loose valuable growing time). Snails therefore prefer a
habitat that is neither too hot nor cold. When the temperature is too
hot or too cold, the snails withdraw into its shell. This is called
hibernation. Snails thrive best on temperatures of about 10 – 23°C.
CONSTRUCTION OF PEN (SNAILERY):
The type of snail pen depends on a number of factors which include:
*The scale of the snail farming enterprise;
*The type of snails farming i.e. In-door or Out-door;
*The stage of development and habits of the snails. This bulletin will discuss
the construction of out-door snail pen.
S
ize of Snail Pen: A snail pen can be large or small
depending on how many snails the farmer wants to raise. For a new
farmer, it is advisable to start with a small pen
He would need fewer materials and fewer snails for this. As he
becomes more experienced in snail farming, he can build a bigger pen and
get more snails to raise. A5m x 5m out-door pen is a suitable size to
start with.
PEN TYPES
1 Hutch Box Method: The hutch boxes which could be
single. The floors of the boxes are filled with sieved organic soil to a
depth of 5 – 8 cm, which must be slightly limed (Caco). The bottom of
the hutch 3boxes have holes to allow excess water to drain out. The
hutch boxes are put under trees like rubber, cocoa, citrus and even
plantain for shade. When hutch boxes are used, the soil is changed once
every two to three months.
2
.Trench Pens : in the trench type, pens, square or
rectangular holes (depending on the desired shape of pen) are dug in
the ground about 50cm deep. The dug up area is divided into pens and the
sides are built up to 2 – 3 blocks high from the ground level while the
bottom is covered with loose soil. The pens are covered with nylonmesh
nailed to wooden frames for lids. The trench pens which more or less
look like the hutch pens could be used for hatching snail eggs, rearing
and for finishing.
3.Make-shift Snailaries: Snail keeping as a hobby or on a very small scale could be done using the following make-shift outfits:-
i. Stack of old motor types
ii. Baskets
iii. Boxes
FEEDS AND FEEDING OF SNAILS:
Snails are voracious feeders and may consume about 10 time their body
weight of leafy vegetable or plant material every day. To be successful
in snail farming, the farmer must ensure a steady uninterrupted supply
of foodstuffs to his snails throughout the snail growing season.
Food Plants: Snails feed on a wide variety of
cultivated and wild plants. Young tender green leaves as well as dead
and decaying leaves are eaten. Green leaves of Amaranthus, cocoyam,
cassava, lettuce, cabbage, fluted pumpkin, hibiscus, are all eaten by
snails.
Before beginning, the farmer should find out what plants his
snails like to eat. He can thus get information from an experienced
snail farmer in his locality. He can also with his lantern watch snails
at night and see what they are eating. Different plant materials could
be dropped in the pen and by trial and error, he could find out which
ones the snail would prefer
Fruit Trees as shelter and food Plants: Some fruit
trees provide shelter as well as food for snails. Banana, plantain,
mango, pawpaw, sweet oranges, cocoa etc serve dual purpose of providing
shelter as well as fruits. Snails prefer feeding on over ripe fruits of
these trees .Ripe oil palm fruits, broken pods, seeds and seedlings of
cocoa are also consumed by snails. Generally, snails usually hide on
shelter plants during the day when it is dry and move to food plants to
eat at night or early in the morning
when they are wet with dew.
Other Feeds: Snails also feed on synthetic diets
containing a good amount of protein, calcium and phosphorus. An example
of such diet is poultry marsh. Wet poultry droppings, rotten vegetables
and dead animals are all consumed by snails.
Apart from the items
mentioned here, there are many other foods in the farmer’s locality
which snails like to eat. As stated earlier, these could be found out by
trial and error.
Feeding Habit of Snails: Snails are nocturnal and
feed on a wide variety of feed mainly in the night, early morning,
evening or on cold rainy day. Their activity level (including their rate
of feeding) fluctuates with the ambient temperature.
TAKING CARE OF THE SNAILS:
After the snails are put in the pen, the farmer should:
*Watch them carefully to see that they are eating well.
*Give them the right type of food in adequate quantity.
*Wet the food and shelter plants and moisten the ground regularly.
On dry days
During the snail growing season, water the ground daily. Always water
in the evening at sunset. Ensure that the soil is moist and not wet. In
areas with dry season, when plants do not grow, snails dig into the
ground to rest.
They should not be watered at this time, otherwise the
snails come out of the ground when they should not. The snails breeding
season in Nigeria corresponds to the period of the rainy seasons.
CAUSES OF MORTALITY IN SNAILS:
Snails have many enemies. These include termites, soldier ants,
frogs, toads, rats, snail eating birds, lizards, and larvae of some
beetles.
Common salt is also poisonous to snails. Over crowding is a
serious cause of mortality in snail pens. When too many snails are
crowded in a pen, they produce undesirable secretion which is observed
to reduce their productivity. To remedy these;
*Examine the pen fence regularly and mend any openings.
*Use materials that keep out pests from your fence.
*Maintain the right stocking density in you pen.
*Keep away poisonous chemicals like common salt.
HARVESTING SNAILS:
Generally, snails that are well fed and managed would be ready for
harvesting within 12 to 24 months from the date of stocking. Also, when
the farmer sees a lot of baby snails in the snail pen, he could harvest
the fully grown snails.
He first put into the pen. Average weight of a snail a well matured
snail of the giant type is 200gm. It takes not less than two years of
efficient feeding to attain this weight. Growth rate is slow and a lot
patience has to be exercised in snail farming.
ECONOMICS OF SNAIL PRODUCTION :
Unlike other livestock enterprises, housing for snails is cheap to
construct. Snails could easily be kept even in make shift housing. The
feeding of snails is cheap, snails do not compete with man for food,
rather, they feed on the wastes from man’s kitchen, poultry droppings,
leaves and over ripe/rotten fruits. Snails have very high multiplication
ratio.
The A. marginata for example lays up to 80 – 100 eggs/growing season while the
- achatinalays up to 300 eggs or more in a growing season. Snails
hatch within 30 days and in 12 – 24 months are ready for table. One
snail therefore can in a growing season give 100 – 300 new snails
(depending on the breed).
Labour requirement for attending to snails is very low. 1 man
hour/day can care for 100 snails .If a farmer started with 10 snails
which cost about N600 – in a growing season the 10 snails will give
about 10 x 300 eggs = 3,000 eggs. When hatched and reared, and allowing
10% mortality, in a growing season, the farmer
will come up with about 2,700 new snails.
Feeding on leaves, fruits
and kitchen waste, the farmer spends nothing on feed. At maturity; the
2,700 will sell at 2,700 x N40 = N108,000Internationally, snail meat
commands good market in Europe and North America. The French snail
requirement is about 5 million kg/annum ,out this, more than 60% is
imported. Italy is said to consume about 306 million snails annually.
Back home in West Africa, Cote d’Ivoire has an estimated annual snail
consumption of 7.9 million kg.
Although the annual snail consumption
figure for Nigeria is not known, one thing is certain that the demand is
far ahead of the supply. Snail farming in Nigeria therefore has very
bright future.
