Several Common Misconceptions About Snail Farming, Farming Experience Shared
When farming snails, there are many misconceptions or rumors that cause economic losses for farmers. Today I will introduce several frequently occurringmisconceptions about snail farmingto everyone.
Misconception One: As long as it is a snail, it can be used as a “breeding snail”?
There is an essential difference between breeding snails and commercial snails: First, breeding snails grow evenly, with clear whorls, neither too fat nor too thin, and a high egg-laying rate. Commercial snails, on the other hand, do not need to be considered for reproductive growth -- they only need to grow fast, yield high, and be cost-effective. Second, breeding snails have strong adaptability, strong disease resistance, and good physique. Commercial snails, however, are large in size, poor in adaptability, and weak in disease resistance. Therefore, commercial snails cannot be used as “breeding snails.”
Misconception Two: Snail farming can make you rich quick?
When farming snails, the first thing to check is whether there is a market. If farming succeeds but there is no market, it is the common people who suffer. Take buying 200 breeding snails as an example -- producing 1000 kg of commercial snails per year with a net income of 4000 yuan would already be considered good. Yet some promotional materials actually claim that farming 30 snails can produce 3000 kg of commercial snails per year with a net profit of 30,000 yuan, which is truly hard to believe, but it is indeed attractive, causing many people to be cheated. Second, it does not conform to the law of value. For something new, it is normal for the price to be higher than its value in the beginning, but if it is too much higher, that is abnormal. Therefore, one-sidedly exaggerating that snail farming can make you rich quick is incorrect. Theoretical data cannot be used to calculate actual output, because it involves issues such as egg-laying rate, hatching rate, and survival rate.
Misconception Three: The higher the buyback price, the better?
Price positioning is a complex systematic project that must take into account the interests of farmers, development companies, processing companies, sales companies, consumers, and all other parties. The most important thing is that consumers can accept it -- only with a market can there be profit. Only when farming, processing, sales, and consumption flow smoothly can farming have a way out and form a virtuous cycle. So, how can the interests of these parties be balanced? Currently, the consumers are star-rated hotels and restaurants. If each dish is priced at around 80 yuan, then the snails supplied cannot exceed 30 yuan. The retail price of “white jade sea cucumber snail meat” is 28 yuan per can, and the ex-factory price is only 20 yuan. Each kg of fresh live snails is processed into 1 can, so calculating the cost, if fresh live snails are purchased at 12 yuan per kg, then money is lost; if fresh live snails are purchased at 10 yuan per kg, then the processing company earns only a little more than 1 yuan. For farmers, the cost of raising 1 kg of snails is only about 2.4 yuan, so purchasing at 10 yuan per kg is more than 4 times the farming cost, which farmers can fully accept. However, many promotion units on the market use high-price buybacks as a cover to actually resell breeding stock. Their buyback prices for snails reach as high as 15 yuan, 18 yuan, 20 yuan per kg, and some even as high as 30 yuan, when in fact they have no real buyback capacity. Therefore, the higher the buyback price, the more deceptive it is.