Practical Guide To Snail Farming      

Radka dvorakova: Pinterest 

The step-by-step activities in the intensive system of snail rearing are not too much different from those in conventional livestock rearing, such as poultry, pig, and fish.  if differences exist at all, they are in the matter of details or particular treatments but not in the fundamentals.

Below are the practical guide to snail farming

Site Selection 

The site selected for the snailery  should be close to the farmer's residence. if that is not possible a farmer who already owns and organised farmland may select a site on the farm, not too far from the service centre; i.e where the security arrangement on the farm can be easily extended to cover the snailery. in these locations it is easy for the Farmer or people acting on his behalf to keep a watchful eye on the snail stock.  in the event of incursion into the snailery by dangerous pests and predators, including human pilferers, a quick intervention is absolutely necessary. snails are noiseless and slow-moving animals, not capable of raising alarm or moving away quickly enough when they come under attack.

 Design And Construction Of Snail Housing 

The snail farmer should bear it in mind that the snail is a wanderer by nature. that is, it does not keep within bounds, especially when it environment is friendly(wet). Therefore, designing and constructing a corporate housing for snails should aim at achieving the totality of the following:

• Preventing stocked snails from escaping. 
• providing an environment that is close enough to what obtains in their natural habitat in the wild 
• preventing incursion by human pilferers, and dangerous pests and predators such as frog and toad, centipede and millipede, mouse, snake, the dreadful soldier ants, red ants, and snail-eating wild birds.

Housing For Small Scale Snailery 

 How elaborate the housing is, really depends on the scale of operation. for a small scale snailery, or for holding small numbers of snails until required for use, the following types of housing will suffice:

• Disused automobile tires placed one on top of another 
• large size clay pot
•  Cane or palm frond-strip basket.

Place any of these on a solid or concrete floor and under shade. The bottom of the housing should be filled with loamy soil to a depth of about 15cm. To aid ventilation and yet prevent snails from escaping, and dangerous pests from gaining entrance, cover the housing with the framed wire net lid.

Housing For Commercial Snailery 

For a commercial(medium and large scale) snailery, various types of housing are in use but only two of them(cage pen and sandcrete pen) are treated here.  in each type allow a floor space of 1m²/30 adults snails. Also place up to 15cm deep Loamy Soil on the floor and provide shade over the housing. The shade may be of evergreen trees or of palm fronds, grass haulms or non heat conducting sheets arranged on top of scaffold.

Cage Type Snail Pen

A typical cage pain for rearing snails must have a firm bottom (e.g  made of hardwood) that is perforated to enhance drainage. The sides and the top should preferably be made of framed wire or plastic net to enhance ventilation. The cage must be raised from the ground on four or more legs, each of the legs placed in a container filled with spent engine oil or an insecticide solution as a device against crawling insects. A cage pan measuring 2m long by 0.5m wide by 0.5m deep can hold 30-35 adults snails. To be able to accommodate a larger number of snails, appropriate number of such cage may be arranged in series or multi-storey formation.

Sandcrete Snail Pen 

A sandcrete pen is usually constructed by laying 15cm (6 inches) thick sandcrete blocks on top of one another on all sides of the pen. The height of the pen may be about 60cm beginning from ground level, or if it is a dug-out pit, from the bottom of the pit. Other building materials that may be used instead of sandcrete blocks include: clay or mud bricks, durable metal or plastic sheets, split bamboo, hardwood posts, wire or plastic net, and woven grass haulms or palm fronds.  To further secure the pen, the floor should be cemented and its top fitted with a lockable lid of well framed fine mesh wire or plastic net. A cemented shallow moat should be constructed around the pen and always filled with water mixed with spent engine oil or insecticide. A soundcrete pen with 6m long by 6m wide(36m²)  floor space can hold 1,000 to 1,200 adult snails. This number of snails is the minimum considered adequate for commercial production.

Stocking The Snailery

 The initial stock for the snailery is invariably any or both of the two commercially important species of the giant African land snail: Achatina achatina and Achatina marginata. They can be sourced select healthy and active, sexually mature, medium size adult snails, each weighing 150 to 250g and free from wounds on the head to foot and the shell.

 subsequent stocking is normally done with the young snails generated by the foundation stock. for example, Achatina marginata produces 4-8 clusters of 5-10 eggs each in one egg-laying season. Assuming an average of 50 eggs/adult snail/season, 30% of which may not hatch and 10% mortality of the hatchlings, it means about 30 young snails are expected annually from each adult male in the pen. To enhance the survival rate of young snails and possibly be in a position to supply some to researchers and others snail rearers, eggs laid in the pen should be collected by the farmer for hatching in a locally constructed wooden-box incubator. The eggs should be arranged buried in the loamy soil field to within 10cm of the incubator top and regularly mst in with water until they are hatched a box measuring 16 cm long by 60 cm wide by 30cm deep can hold 500 eggs.

Snails of different species and age groups should be stocked and reared in separate compartments, otherwise the bigger and more aggressive snails take more than their fair share of served rations, thus depriving the smaller and weaker ones of adequate feeding. Also, young snails, if not separated from their adult counterparts, may suffer mortality due to breakage of their soft and fragile shell when the adults crawl over them.

Stocking Density 

Stocking density simply means the number of snails put into each unit area (e g 1m²) of available floor space in the pen. it can  also be defined as the management of competition among individual snails in the pen such that no one is allowed more space that it needs. In this regard, a stocking density of 30 adults snails per metre square of available floor space is considered optimum under intensive rearing systems. At higher than optimum density, crowding sets in, resulting in severe inter-snail competition for floor space and food. This will adversely affect the expression of individual snail's genetic potentials for growth rate, ultimate size, reproductive output, and general well-being.

Snail Feeding 

Edible land snails are naturally herbivorous, feeding on a variety of vegetable matter in the wild. In captivity, which snailery represents, research and experience have showed that the following foods of plants origin are suitable for feeding snails:

• Leafy vegetables that man can safely consume, e.g amaranthus celosia, pumpkins, Roselle, etc. However, waterleaf is suspected to induce diarrhoea in snails, and therefore should be avoided.
• Leaves of pawpaw, cocoyam, cassava, and the milkweed
• Unripe and ripe banana fruits 
• Ripe fruits of plantain, banana, guava, and oil palm
• Moistened cereal and legume bran
• Cooked and solidified cereal starch 
• Compounded feed prepared from awesome cereal grains (e.g maize, blood meal, fish meal, essential amino acids and multivitamin formations, and crushed bone, oyster shell, poultry egg shell and limestone. Carefully calculated quantities of this ingredients, to achieve 15 to 25% crude protein content of the final product, are  milled and mixed to produce the desired snail mash; the mixture for young snails containing higher protein content than that for adults.

The use of compounded mash by commercial farmers is inevitable. With a large number of snails to feed it is practically not feasible for the Farmer to grow or go in search of enough leaves fruits and food remnants.

Food should be served to snails daily in the morning and evening and remnants of the previous day's rations cleared from the pen before serving fresh ones. Although snails are generally believed to be most active under cover of darkness, research has indicated that when exposed to continuous lighting they tend to consume more food and thus gain weight and size rapidly.

Watering The Snailery 

it is important that the environment in which  the snail is should be in a wet condition. snail instinctively assumes a dormant state during which growth ceases. Therefore the snailery should never be allowed to experience water stress. sprinkling portable water on the snails regularly and placing some in shallow utensils for them to drink from, will achieve good level of wetness in the environment. However salted water should be avoided as it can cause plasmolysis and degeneration of the snail flesh.

Snailery Hygiene 

The practice of sound hygiene in the snailery  will greatly reduce incident of pest, predators, and diseases; thus stocked snails remained healthy and active.    The concept of hygiene in the snailery means:

• Regular washing of feeding and watering utensils 
• Removing feed remnants and decaying feeding stuffs from the pen
• Prompt removal of inactive, diseased, and dead snails 
• Weeding and cleaning the surrounding area during which plants and objects that may harbour snail pests and predators are removed
• Adequate ventilation in the pen.

Record keeping 

The snail farmer should keep neat, accurate, and readily accessible records of all activities and transactions in connection with the snailery. only by so doing can he or she properly monitor expenses, snail mortality in the pen, and at the end of each rearing cycle, whether the project pays or not. besides, records form the basis for any advice offered to prospective and new entrants into snail farming, Even when the Farmer is an illiterate someone should be approached to write records for him or her.  Records are like a road map, telling the farmer how to move along.

 Records that may be kept in the snail farm include:

•  Purchase receipt and invoices
• Dates 
• Quantities 
• Cost and deployment of capital
• Running cost items.

 as well as proceeds from the sale of adult and young snails. A few specific examples are:

• Snail housing: type, dimension, date of construction, cost. 
• pen use history, from stocking to harvesting: date stocked, quantity and species of snail stocked, harvest date, operating expenses, revenue realised.
• For each set of snail stock: species, quantity purchase cost, harvest dates, number of snails harvested, proceeds from sales. 
• Compounded feed: quantity, cost, rate of use. Hatchlings (young snails) taking out of a pen and how they are disposed of.
• Equipment and miscellaneous items: quantity, cost, deployment.
• Labour and personnel: rate of payment, deployment.
• Details of miscellaneous expenses
• Feeding stuffs (leaves, fruits, etc) quantity, procurement cost, rate of use.

Summary Of Snailery Management Practice

For optimal performance and safety of stock snails, it is imperative that the Farmers should pay attention to the following;

• Snail housing must be well constructed, strong, and secure; doors and lids well fitted and lockable 
• The moat constructed around the snailery must always be filled with water into which spent engine oil or insecticide is added
• The containers in which the legs of a cage pen are placed must be filled with spent engine oil for insecticide solution 
• Selection of high-quality foundation snail stock and rational stocking density 
• Prompt separation of hatchlings from adult snails and rearing them in a separate compartment.
• Adequate feeding and wetering at a regular interval using high-quality and salt-free feedings stuffs and water.
• Mulching stocked snails with suitable vegetable matter such as the leaves of plantain, banana, pawpaw, cocoyam and cassava.
• The soil placed on the pen floor must be changed periodically.
• proper illumination of the snailery and its surrounding at night.
• Injurious chemicals must not be used in discriminately in and around the snailery.
• Daily attendance and inspection visit to the snailrey. By so doing, security breaches and outright presence of pests and predators in and around the pen will be detected before much harm is done.
• Keeping neat, accurate, and readily accessible records.

Adapted from: Practical Snail Farming by Kola Fasakin 2007(Fasakink@yahoo.com)