Amazing Nature: Diary of my Snail farm!
Snail Cluster - Snuggle Time
Before these snails I have reared Bunnies, a small pod of tiny Turtles and poultry(this actually belongs to my late mom but I was the sole custodian). It was fun and freaky watching snail eggs hatch during lighting, Yes! They hatch from the grumbling of Thunder!
Snails are classified as Mollusc. They range from sizes to sizes depending on their Habitat and feeding, mine was a mixture of three species and one of them grows very big. In raining season here in West Africa Nigeria, Snails blossom and breed, they come out of hibernation which can last at times for 5 - 6 months depending on how severe the dry season is(period of no rain).
As you can see,they are all out of their shells enjoying the aftermath of the overnight heavy rainfall. Water is their major fuel,that is to say ; they can't survive in long dry conditions. They burrow deep the wet ground with their elongated shells during the last days of rainy season to hide deep in the ground so as to hibernate till the start of another rainy season. Many of my Snails here were hatched last year(2016/2017) as this was archive to monitor their breeding. The eggs hatched from Thunder sounds like I said, Although i am still researching the scientific correlation between this phenomenon and the reproduction of snails, it could be some sort of seismic vibrations is responsible of the hatchlings.
In my former apartment, there is a big courtyard which i had turned into the snails base. I moved to a new apartment which is extremely smaller than my last, so I lost snail farm.
Not so easy if you haven't study it, but Snails are easy to rear,they feed on natural substance like leaves, Aloe Vera, Pawpaw, Mangoes, etc. As you can see from the photos,they need green leaves and extremely wet and well ventilated space for them to grow faster.
I had different species of land snails, but on a broader category, The major types of Snails are;
- Land snail
- Freshwater Snail
- Sea snail
Locally,its an expensive source of meat because it's medically recommended for hypertensive and high blood pressure individuals. I had plan to use the earnings from Steemit to grow it in large scales for commercial production to increase the Agro-economy of my country. But it didn't work out like I planned, but I could still look into it come a Bullrun.
Thanks for your time and Happy Snail Farming to all farmers and those how wishes to try it out! 🤗.
Photo Credit - My smartphone Samsung Galaxy A3.
Congratulations, your post has been selected to be included in my weekly Sustainability Curation Digest for the Minnow Support Project.
Thank you