Grasscutter farming is growing in popularity in Africa because of many reasons. Greater Cane Rat, commonly referred to by the name of Grasscutter, is part of the rodent family. It is very similar to the porcupine. It is almost like a clone, but the porcupine is larger. Spiny hair on its back, as well as a rounded nose, are what distinguish Grasscutter from real rats. Its length is approximately 720 millimeters once fully mature. Grasscutter farming is a lucrative business that can earn around N3 million annually If you do it right.
How do you get started with Grasscutter cultivation across Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, or any area of west Africa where the animal is the most loved? This article will answer this.
The Grasscutter is among the animals that are extremely suitable for commercial raising. If you’re in the village but are moaning about the lack of money, you should be taken to the village square and offered 24 strokes of a cane during a hot afternoon. Why? Because you’ve allowed opportunities to go over the years!
After reading this article, you have between 6 and 12 months to earn at least one million dollars in this field. If you don’t, there’s something wrong somewhere. Now, let’s get to business and look at how grasscutter farming works.
Grasscutter farming can be extremely profitable and much more profitable than you thought. The meat is consumed across and beyond the West Africa region and beyond, making it among the animals with the highest value whose meats are in high demand. Market-ready Grasscutter can be purchased from N4,000 and N5,500. Five hundred grasscutters can earn between N2 million and N2.75 million in one year.
The animal reproduces quickly and in large quantities. Fully grown woman Grasscutter, upon gestation, bears the child for 140 to 150 days and gives birth approximately once a year. Each pregnancy can produce an average of 4 to 7 young ones. Sometimes, it can be as high as ten. This means that a female Grasscutter can produce between 8 20 – 20 additional Grasscutters over a year.
It is a huge animal that grows rapidly as well. The Grasscutter is the largest rodent found in Africa. Fully mature females or male who is ready to go on the market can weigh between 3.5kg for females and 4.5kg for males. The body size ranges from 45cm to 60cm in length. The height of a standing person is 25-30cm. A mature male is around the size of a 9 inches block.
A lot of Grasscutter is consumed yearly, but most originates from wild hunters who go into the forest to hunt for these animals. They are generally difficult to capture, which makes the animal’s meat extremely scarce on the market.
Getting Started In Grasscutter Farming
Colony– Grasscutter lives in a colony; two mature males can’t reside in a single house. Therefore, begin with a male and then a couple of females. A colony should consist comprising one female and three males. Your capacity will determine the colony size you want to begin with. A small-scale farmer could begin with a single or two colonies, with the arrangement being three females and one male within each colony.
Breeding Breeding Grasscutter is used 100% for meat. It must grow well and be healthy ways to earn a profit. To do this, a new farmer must focus on choosing the best breeding livestock. Every colony needs to be able to boast a healthy male. The male is the main engine for reproduction. A healthy male is a healthy population. When choosing a male, be aware of the health of the animal. The weight gain that is good in male animals is among the most significant factors in determining the animal’s health.
In any event, the male and female animals you select to breed should be healthy. Although a strong, healthy male animal must be chosen to breed, if the female animal isn’t genetically healthy can impact breeding stocks. Both animals must be healthy to ensure the most optimal results.
The Grasscutter pen – Grasscutters do not like eating where they sleep! If you’re providing them with a house, consider this issue. Whether a cage or a house, You must offer eating and drinking areas and playing space.
They can breed in cages suitable for breeding or in a special house created specifically for their needs. The Grasscutter is sensitive to a healthy habitat. For the ideal group of (1 male and three females), the cage size must be 180cm long, 60cm wide, and 45cm high. Create your cage. In this way, you can separate each colony.
Grasscutter Cage Picture
If you have a walled pen or home, construct it so that the food they eat is separate from their sleeping area. The production facility should be constructed to shield animals from extreme temperatures and humidity.
The main enemies of Grasscutter are snakes, and the most common enemies are Ants. Ensure the place is built in a secure area and be aware of the possibility of human theft. To keep them safe from the ravaging of soldier ants, it is recommended to sprinkle black engine oil on their residences, especially in the evenings during the rainy season, which is usually.
The floor should be topped with soft, dry grasses to prevent their feet from injuries and give them soft cushiony playground conditions.
Feeding The Grasscutters
The Grasscutter is an herbivore, meaning its food source is mainly from the bush. That’s why they’re more at ease in the bush, where their food can be easily discovered. Their primary food source is Elephant as well as Napier grass. They also love Sugar Cane, and most farmers utilize sugar cane mostly for their feed, Guinea grass, Gamba grass, and Congo grass.
Farmers who have experience know that hygiene and proper feeding are essential factors in ensuring a grasscutter’s successful, profitable cultivation. You can also increase the weight of the broiler’s finisher or starter’s feed for broilers to aid in gaining market weight quickly.
The animal also enjoys Gliricidia sepium and herbaceous legumes such as Stylo (Stylosanthes Gracias) and Pueraria phaseoloides. The pitch and root of coconut palms, oil, Anacardium’s bark, and fruits like half-ripe pawpaw, plantain, and mangoes are their pleasure. Food crops like groundnut maize, rice grain, legume tubers such as cassava, sweet potato, etc. are also the food they eat, according to that grasscutter farmers.
The farmer also said that Grasscutter eats palm wine, which is why they are responsible for destroying the oil palm plantations. They get their water from the fields and head to the river during drought season. However, if they are domesticated, you may give the animals water by adding some attraction to them. It should be noted that he doesn’t dig a hole and cannot climb trees and is also stressed.
They are also fed with formulated concentrates, such as pellets, and manufacturing by-products such as corn bran, wheat bran groundnut, oilseeds, soya seed cakes, brewer’s yeast grain legume pods, cobs, and maize shucks, and brewer’s yeast as feed additives.
Grass cutters don’t like cold environments. The room or cage they are kept in must not be too cold or hot. A suitable environment for humans is considered to be suitable for grass cutters.
Time to wean If you can provide good and adequate nutrition, the grasscutter babies are typically weaned from four and eight weeks. However, they could remain with their mother for up to four months as a group. Children can be separated from their mothers from five to seven months and placed with a male who will mate with them.
The newly weaned animals are married at a time between 7 and 8 months from the time of birth. Indefinite mating is likely to occur when an unweaned male Grasscutter is seven months old, and the female is eight months old. The indefinite period of mating is 140 days. However, if within 160 days of being separated from the male remains no evidence of pregnancy, then it must be returned to the male to be able to mat. Having another male be used for the same purpose is also recommended.
The Market For Grasscutters
The market, as I mentioned previously, is huge. Grasscutter meat, also known as Bush meat, is most likely the most sought-after animal on the market. People love it, and it sells extremely quickly. Large restaurants use it for cooking expensive delights. The whole flesh of a mature grasscutter sells for N4,500 at the market. Market women who sell it are always in need of it.
Most people living in cities could not afford meat as it’s extremely scarce. Therefore, no amount of Grasscutter you made won’t be sold within a few days. It will take the collective efforts of a multitude of farmers to meet the gap in demand for bush meat in markets across Africa today.
The Grasscutter is a prolific reproducing animal that begins mating seven months after birth. It has two births per year and can produce 4-7 pups in a row. So, when 100 females have two births yearly, you could have 900- 1,500 on your farm in one year! That number could bring you less than N5 million when they’re mature for commercialization.
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