Bamboo rat farming helps farmers get rich

In Xiange Village, Xianyuan Town, Huangshan District, there is currently the largest bamboo rat farm in the whole city. The owner of the farm is a young man just 26 years old named Wang Longfei. Around this Spring Festival, he was extremely busy, as more than 60 breeding rats successively gave birth to over 200 pups, the largest number of births since the farm was established.

In the spring of 2015, Wang Longfei took part in a trip to Jiangxi organized by the town government and saw the bamboo rat. After learning that bamboo rats mainly feed on bamboo stems, bamboo branches, corn and so on, reproduce quickly, have tender and delicious meat and soft fur, and have relatively high economic and medicinal value, he came up with the idea of raising bamboo rats. After returning, with the help of village officials, he found a partner, cleared out more than 80 sq m of empty rooms in his home, built more than 70 breeding pools, and also built a new 40 sq m breeding rat room. He then went to Jiangxi and bought back 100 pairs of breeding rats. Bamboo rats like warmth, fear cold and are afraid of heat. Because he did not master much breeding technology, and the bamboo rats could not adapt to the climate of southern Anhui for a time, and disease prevention and control also did not keep up, the bamboo rat mortality rate reached 60%.

Faced with setbacks, he did not lose heart at all. He went to Jiangxi again and bought back 70 pairs of breeding rats, regrouped and made another effort. He learned from the lesson, participated in employment skills training organized by the town family planning office, studied carefully, and finally overcame the technical difficulties of bamboo rat breeding. Breeding rats enter the reproductive period at 8 months, can reproduce 3—4 litters per year, with 3—4 pups per litter, and meat rats can be sold at 4 months. Last year, he earned nearly 50,000 yuan from selling meat rats, and the number of breeding rats also grew to more than 200 pairs.

Wang Longfei does not forget his fellow villagers after getting rich. He has already provided more than 100 pairs of breeding rats to farmers in surrounding townships such as Taipinghu and Sankou, as well as in Yixian County, and signed contracts with the farmers, taking responsibility for technical guidance and bamboo rat sales. On this basis, he established a bamboo rat ecological breeding cooperative. This year, the cooperative's breeding rat farming will reach 400 pairs, and together with meat rat sales, income is expected to reach more than 200,000 yuan.