Regarding Van Phu, when he first came to the commune to ask Mr. Nhung's family to raise snake, everyone knew and enthusiastically instructed him. Following the instructions of local people, reporter Dan Viet could easily get to Mr. Dinh Van Nhung's house. As soon as he arrived at the gate, an elderly man with deep skin water came out to welcome him and took Dan Viet reporter to visit the model of raising black snake breeds.
After telling three stories, reporter Dan Viet expressed his desire to see the snake garden, Mr. Nhung jokingly said: "Just calm down, where are you going? Without a home, I drink a cup of hot tea. When I get out of the garden, I chase and catch snake to watch...". It was thought that a snake owner must be a mysterious, secretive " organ", but who would have thought Mr. Nhung would be so open and happy.
Besides the cup of hot and foul green tea, Mr. Nhung talked about his hard work as a farmer and his fate when coming to the profession of raising snake. Mr. Nhung told Dan Viet reporter that before, his family also planted many types of trees, raised many types of children... but the economy was just "ugguggling", not much in return. After a while, someone took him to the supporting city, carrying him to find a higher salary, but he kept waiting and reflecting. It is not easy for business people to earn money, but why let their fields and gardens be abandoned at home?
Then one night, Mr. Nhung accidentally turned on the TV and won a program introducing a high-performance snakehead fish farming model. From that day on, his mind kept showing the shadow of that long, black reptile. Mr. Nhung decided to "pack the squid" to go to large snake farms in Tam Diep (Ninh Binh) or in Ha Nam province to learn and learn from experience.
During the research, he found that black snake is quite easy to raise and suitable for the family's land and garden conditions. After going around the snake farms, Mr. Nhung returned to discuss with his wife and children to invest 45 million VND to buy 60 snake breeds to try. To keep the snake herd from getting lost, he invested in building a surrounding wall around a garden to release the snake inside.
Although they have just been put into trial farming, the snake herd has developed quite well and after only one year, the snake breeding began and the eggs were harvested. "In the first year, although snakehead fish had a lot of eggs, due to lack of experience, I collected very little that year, due to the high rate of damaged eggs" Mr. Nhung recalled.
After more than 4 years of diving with snake farming, Mr. Nhung's family now owns more than 70 black snake of the parents, some of which are very tall and weigh over 3kg. Thanks to this number of snake, Mr. Nhung's family earns an average of more than 500 eggs each year, sold for about 130,000 VND/ enough, after deducting all expenses, his family makes a profit of tens of millions of VND.
Since Mr. Nhung's family raised a long snake, the local people have been very curious. The most interesting time was when Mr. Nhung went to catch snake. He went into the garden to chase, chase, and catch the snake like chasing a chicken, looking fun but many people were very scared, some people were worried about the skin of the chick, even the hair of a collar, and their hearts were pounding every time they saw Mr. Nhung chase and catch a long snake with a clear, big mouth...
"In previous years, the price of solid eggs was very high, sometimes up to nearly 300,000 VND/oc, but now it has decreased to 130,000 VND/oc. Although egg prices have decreased, in general, raising breeding animals still has a very high economic efficiency, many times higher than other types of livestock, Mr. Nhung revealed.
He shared: "If we raise snake in cages, we have to feed them "evil", and if we raise snake in the garden naturally like mine, it is very leisurely. Just pay attention to the fence so that the snake does not move out of the cow. As soon as they release the insects, the reptiles live in the garden... The snake goes hunting and kidnapping, the reptiles release and eat them gradually. When I see worms and reptiles in the garden, almost all of them are gone, I buy them to release them for them to eat. Raising snake in this way is both clean and the snake thrives very well and does not suffer from any disease...".
According to Mr. Nhung, black snake is raised for about a year before starting to breed. The breeding season starts from early April until the end of July. During this period, the snake laid about 3 eggs, each of which had an average of more than 10 eggs. The temperature above 15 degrees Celsius is enough for snake to prey on, but if below that level, snake cannot eat.
Speaking more about the breeding snake farming technique and experience in raising snake in the garden setting method, Mr. Nhung said that the sex ratio when raising breeding is 1 male and 5 females. In the garden, we must create a landscape so that it resembles the natural environment, so we must plant trees and tunnel for the snake to live in. In addition, it is necessary to regularly check the fence and clear trees next to the fence, to avoid having snake cows outside causing loss.
"My family has 70 snake children, so each year the cost of buying insects and reptiles to feed the snake is about 10 million VND. Just buy them and release them in the garden for the snake to catch and eat gradually, without having to take care of them at all. Raising this way is both easy and each year earns more than 50 million VND from selling snake eggs, if I sell the whole snake meat more, I will earn hundreds of millions of VND" said Mr. Nhung
Seeing the effectiveness of Mr. Dinh Van Nhung's family model, many families inside and outside the commune have come to learn from experience to raise. Up to now, the black snake breeding profession has been spread to many places in Ninh Binh province and contributed to creating stable income for many families.
