Greater Cane Rat {grasscutter} Farming by Obasi Kelechi

 A Booklet on Greater Cane Rat{Grasscutter} Farming

By

OBASI KELECHI

Greater Cane Rat popularly known as ''Grasscutter'' belongs to the rodent family and is very closely related to the Porcupine, almost similar except that the Porcupine is bigger. The spiny fur on the back and rounded nose distinguish Grasscutter from regular rats. It reaches a length of about 720mm when fully matured.

Grasscutter farming is gaining popularity in Africa for good reasons.

Grasscutter farming can make you at least N3m {3 million} per year if taken seriously.

Grasscutter farming is highly profitable, more profitable than you imagined. The meat is widely consumed all over the West African region and beyond, making it one of the top 10 animals whose meat is in high demand in the market.

A market ready Grasscutter is sold at the minimum of N4,500 to N6,500.

Five hundred Grass Cutters in a year could earn you between N2m to N2.75m.

The animal reproduces very quickly and in good numbers. A fully grown female Grasscutter after gestation, carries the pregnancy for 140 to 150 days and births about twice a year. Each pregnancy produces an average of 4 to 7 young ones. Sometimes up to ten, that means one female Grasscutter could produce 8 to 20 other Grasscutters in a year.

It grows big and very fast too. Grasscutter is one of the biggest rodents in Africa. A fully mature female or male that is market ready weighs between 3.5kg for the female and 4.5kg for the male. While measuring 45cm to 60cm in body length. The standing height is between 25 to 30cm. The body size of a fully grown male Grasscutter is about the size of a nine inches block.

A good number of Grasscutters are consumed yearly but most of them still come from the wild through hunters who go into the bush to hunt for them but usually not easy to catch, making the animal's meat very scarce in the market.

GETTING STARTED.

Colony – Grasscutter lives in a colony, two mature male don't live together. Therefore, start with a male and a few females together. A colony should consist of one male and three to four females. Your capacity determines how many colonies you want to start with. A small-scale farmer may start with one or two colonies, with the arrangement of one male and 3 females in each colony.

Breeding – Grasscutter is kept 100% for the meat, it has to grow well and healthy in order to be profitable. To achieve this,a new farmer(beginner) must lay emphasis on the choice of breeding stock. Each colony must have a very healthy male. The male is the engine of reproduction, a healthy male makes a healthy stock. While selecting the male, pay attention to the well being, good weight gain in male Grasscutter is a very important factor.

In any case, both the male and female stock you are selecting for breeding purposes must be healthy. While a healthy, strong, agile male should be selected for breeding programs, if the female is not genetically healthy too, it will also affect the breeding stocks. To ensure that you achieve the best possible result, both have to be healthy.

Grasscutter Pen – Grasscutters don’t like sleeping where they eat. If you are providing them a pen, you must put this factor into consideration – either cage or house, you must provide:- sleeping place, dining and playing place.

They can be bred either in a properly built cage or in a house specially designed for them. Grasscutter is sensitive to good habitat, for a colony (1 male and 3 females) the dimension of the cage should be 180cm in length, 60cm in width and 45cm in height. Build your cage that way, separate for each colony.

If you are using a walled pen or house, make sure you build it in such a way that the place they eat must be separate from where they sleep. Also the production building must be designed to protect the animals from excess temperature and humidity.

The biggest enemies for Grasscutter are Snakes and Soldier Ants. Make sure the pen is built as a safe place and you must also be wary of human thieves.

To protect them from the invasion of soldier ants, you may pour black engine oil(grease) around the pen, especially at night during the rainy season.

The floor should be overlayed with dry soft grasses to protect their feet from being hurt and to provide them with soft cushy play ground condition.

Feeding The Grasscutters

Grasscutter is a herbivorous animal- meaning their source of food is basically grass, vegetables, stems, etc. that’s why they are more comfortable in the bush where their foods could be easily found. Their major food is Elephant or Napier grass. They also love Sugar cane and most farmers use sugar cane mainly for their feeding, Guinea grass, Gamba grass, Congo grass.

According to experienced farmers, Hygiene and good feeding are the most important factors for a successful, profitable Grasscutter farming. You can also fatten the male with broiler’s finisher or broiler starter’s feed to help attain market weight within a short period of time.

Grasscutters also like Gliricidia sepium, herbaceous legumes like Stylo (Stylosanthes gracilis) and Pueraria phaseoloides.

The root and pitch of oil and coconut palms, bark of the anacardium and fruits such as half ripen pawpaw, plantain, pineapple, mango etc are their delight. Food crops such as groundnut, rice, maize, grain legume, tubers like cassava, sweet potato, etc also make part of their food.

Grasscutters feed on palm vines, that is why they destroy oil palm plantations. They take their water mostly from the field and go to the river during the dry season only. But when domesticated, you can give them water by adding some attractant to it.

Grasscutter, it should be noted, does not dig holes and cannot climb trees either.

They can also be fed with formulated concentrates like pellet as well as other processed by-products like wheat bran, corn bran, groundnut, soya, oilseed, cotton seed cakes, brewer yeast, grain legume pods, brewers’ grains, maize husks and cobs, brewer’s yeast, moringa, etc. as feed supplements.

Grasscutters don’t like cold environments.  The pen or cages where you keep them must neither be too cold or too hot. Environment that is suitable for humans is considered suitable for Grasscutters.

Weaning time – With good, adequate feeding, the grasscutter litters can be weaned between four to eight weeks. But as a family, they can be with the female for four months. The litters can be separated from the female between five to seven months and placed with a male to mate with them.

The weaned animals can be mated at the age of between seven to eight months from birth. Indefinite mating is expected to have taken place when the weaned male Grasscutter is seven months old and the female is eight months. The indefinite mating period is 140days. But if after 160 days of separation from the male, there is still no sign of pregnancy,then it should be taken back to the male for proper mating. Usually there should also be an extra male that can serve the same purpose.

The Market For Grasscutter.

The market, as stated earlier, is very big. Grasscutter meat or ''Bush meat'' (as it's called in Nigeria) is probably the most desirable animal meat in the market.

Majority of the population (depending on your location) loves it and it sells very fast.

Hotels and restaurants use it to prepare high priced delicacies. Full meat of a mature Grasscutter goes for N4,500(least) in the market and the traders who trade on it are always in demand of it.

Most people in the city cannot buy the meat because it’s very scarce, so no amount of Grasscutter produced that can’t be sold within days. It will take the combined efforts of thousands of farmers to fill the need for ''bush meat'' in the market in Africa right now.

Grasscutter is a fast reproducing animal and starts mating within 7 months after birth. It gives birth twice yearly and produces 4-7 at a time. That means, if you have 100 females that give birth twice in a year, you would be having 900 to 1,500 in your farm within just a year! Such a number will bring you nothing less than N5 Million when they are matured for marketing.

The average lifespan of a Grasscutter is 7 to 9 years.

NOTE: Albendazole is efficacious for reducing faecal worm egg count in captive grass cutters at a dose level of 2.5 mg/kg BW.

The protein requirement and performance of gestating grasscutters on diets formulated from wheat offal and soybean meal.

Grasscutter produces white meat that is very similar in taste and texture to seafood depending on the age at which they are slaughtered. It is high in protein yet low in fat.

Grasscutters are active at night; they are sensitive to wind and dry food, which cause respiratory problems. They do not dig holes but rather use burrows made by other animals.

Compared to other meats such as rabbit meat, grasscutter meat is very low in cholesterol and high in protein. It has a very high mineral (e.g. iron, calcium and phosphorus) content compared to beef, mutton, and chevon.

Imminent parturition is manifested by the expectant mother adopting the 'penguin posture' three days before delivery and a combination of the 'penguin posture' with frequent looks at the lower abdomen a day before delivery. The grasscutter delivers precocious young after 148-158days of gestation.

Grasccutter is a little more complex than rabbit in it's body composition and the gestation period of grasscutter lasts for 5months while that of rabbit is just 1 month, so the differences in the gestation period tells us how complex they are, grasscutters are also bigger in terms of their body mass compared to rabbits.