Catfish Farming and Poultry Farming are both profitable if you indeed know how to play your game effectively.
If you manage either one of the farming businesses, then you should be making a large chunk of money.
There are different factors to consider before venturing into two of the most profitable farming in Nigeria, Catfish Farming and Poultry farming
Do read to the end as you did be doing yourself a great favour.
Now, Let’s dive in.
How profitable is Poultry Farming in Nigeria
What is the Cost of starting a Poultry Business?
- START UP COST
Let’s just analyze the cost estimates this way.
For a Poultry Farming Business, here is an average estimate of what you should be spending at the initial startup looking at the vital things to put in place.
- Area of Land
A vastly spaced area of land that is well constructed should be made available. Depending on your prospective area of startup for the Poultry farming business.
I guess you should figure that yourself but here is a little tip; Look for an area that is kind of a farm settlement so as not to negatively affect the settlement of humans around that area.
Do note that there are Farm Settlement and Human settlement. A human settlement is an area that is fully habited by human beings while a Farm settlement is one that is partially inhabited by human but useful for agricultural purposes
After acquiring the land (Note: You can rent an area of Land for a stipulated amount of time, it does not necessarily mean that you will buy one), Next, you will want to build cages for your Birds (Chickens, Layers or Cockerel)
A battery cage should cost around #50 ,000 to #60,000 per unit depending on how many units you want to build.
I did recommend you start with a number of birds that you can be able to maintain and still attain the result you want bearing in mind that a need a Low mortality (death) rate of your birds too.
Now, let me make things a little bit easier for you. We have about three different stages of growth of your birds.
- Day Old Stage
These are the early days of your birds; these are usually called “Pullets” in this early infant age. This is the stage where they have just been hatched from the hatchery. At this stage, you can decide to buy these birds from the hatchery, they come in units of a range of 48-52 in number per package.
In Nigeria, each bird goes for a price of #140-160 per bird depending on the hatchery you get your birds.
So, if you do the Math,
Let’s take a unit cost Price of #150/bird * 50 Pullets
You should be spending the around 7500 naira/50 birds.
Note: You can do the currency conversion in US dollars
Take $1 = #550
Hence, you should be spending around $13.6/ 50 Birds
So, you can decide to purchase as much as 5000 birds of a kind of birds of your choice
Note: We have the Layers, the broilers and the cockerels and Kindly be informed that the kind of day one you start with is price dependent and varies too.
- Laying Stage
You can save yourself the stress of rearing your birds from the day one or early stages and buy from other Poultry Farms that have done the job for you already.
Buying your birds at age 12 weeks which is the beginning of their transiting to Adulthood comes with a higher price unlike the day one stage.
Advantages of Buying a 12-week-old Layer Bird
- You don’t go through the process of buying medications and vaccines up until the 12th week because all that have been covered for you
- The Number of birds you buy from whosoever is selling to you is what you pay for
In other words, the death of birds prior to the period of purchase of these layers doesn’t bother you unlike when you will have to rear them the infant stage where you might be faced with high mortality issues which could affect your profit at the end of the day
- You spend lesser funds before you start seeing the return for your money as they soon start laying at that stage
Note: A bad growth process of these birds could affect both their laying stage and their laying capability as you do not know beforehand if your sellers underwent due vaccination, feeding and medication process as the weeks passes by prior to your purchase.
So, in this case, that’s why some poultry farmers prefer rearing these birds from the infant hood to maturity.
- Old Laying/Post Laying Stage
This is the stage where your layers become weak and unproductive to keep on laying eggs as before.
They lose their peak laying period due to age. Just like in women, as you know the female folks can hit menopause and at this period, they lose most of or all form of fertility require for laying eggs.
At this stage, you may consider selling them off to buyers for consumption.
- Feed Cost
As expected, the total cost of feed is a function of the number of birds you are rearing and the kind of birds involved.
What I mean to state is, the Broilers are the most food-consuming among the other kinds followed closely by the Male folk (the Cockerels) with the pullet taking the last position. So, what this fact, it should give you a hint of what your feed estimates should be.
The feed size usually come in a sack of 25kg weight. Another point to note is, the type of feed constituent to buy from the feed mill should be dependent on the birds’ needed nutrients at each point in time.
If they are lacking in Calcium, get a feed that is highly rich in Calcium, if they are protein-deficient, get one that is rich in protein.
- Cost of Vaccination and Medication
We have two kinds of vaccination, the Oral Vaccination and the Injection Vaccination.
The type and name of vaccines to apply to your birds is a primary determinant of the issue at hand and the weekly vaccination process required for your birds at each stage.
For example, we have the Gomboro Vaccine in available in most Nigeria animal labs, these vaccines are orally (in water) applied to the birds at the 3rd week of the birds’ age.
We also have the Lasorta vaccine too and other various vaccines that are either injected or applied in the water of these birds at different periods of their lifespan.
There are Multivitamins that are essential for their growth too. You should not ever ignore giving them vitamins as it metabolizes their growth.
- Other Costs
- Cost of acquiring heating elements (at the day 1 to the week 4 of the birds’ age)
- Cost of Labor
- Cost of fumigation
- Cost of feeders and Drinkers
How profitable is Cat Fish Farming?
Catfish farming is another profitable farming business that require care, diligence and attention.
What is the Cost of starting a Catfish Business?
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- Fish Pond Construction
The importance of Building fish ponds cannot be underestimated as this is the abode of your fish.
The size of ponds to construct is dependent on the number of hatched fish. For a hatched 10000 fish, building five to seven ponds should be enough to accommodate them as they will be sorted with time as they grow.
The essence of sorting these fish is to ensure even distribution of weight.
The early stages or newly hatched fish as called fingerlings as they grow with time, they are sorted so as not to eat themselves as the larger ones (which are rapidly growing) develop that affinity to consume the fairly smaller ones.
The Juvenile fish are the fairly developed ones, they are slightly bigger in size and weight compared to the fingerlings.
The mature fish are those ones that are over a year in age. These ones are big enough to be used for hatching purposes.
Note: The weight in milligram of feed to be feed to the fish is a function of their growth pattern, their age.
For example, the fingerlings are given the 0.1mm-1mm feed. So literally, the age of the fish is a primary determinant of the type of feed and quantity to be given them.
You can’t be giving a fingerling a 3mm feed, it will choke and kill them or they won’t eat them as you may end of wasting them.
- Cost of Feed
- Cost of Labor
- Cost of medication
- Cost of hatching / purchase of an already hatched fish be it fingerling or Juvenile
- Cost of Maintenance
And other miscellaneous costs that are required but not mentioned here.
Things to look at for before setting up a Catfish business
- The Market
Your market strength and the demand of fish is a depending factor before you decide you want to venture into Catfish Farming Business
- Availability of water supply
Fish need water to supply and you did be punishing them if you change or drain off their water as at when due. It is advised to change the water in the pond as soon as you start noticing a change in color.
The effect of not changing the pond water on time is that it can pollute the health of the fish and their vulnerable nature can’t resist them diseases and eventual death if care is not taken.
- Financial stability
You need a good financial strength to maintain a goof catfish business. You need to buy them drugs and feeds on time.
You need to pay laborers too and you can’t do that if you don’t have the financial strength for that.
CatFish Farming and Poultry Farming, which is more Profitable?
For the profitability, I will say the poultry farming business is more profitable than the Catfish business.
Here are my candid reasons.
In a poultry business, you can make money by selling the eggs, you can also make money by selling them for consumption, the excretes of the birds can be used as manure for farmers on farmlands.
In a Catfish business, you can only sell them off.
Catfish Farming and Poultry comparism
Points to note
- The market is large for both businesses but the poultry farming business has a wide range of options in terms of other profit needs.
- The catfish farming business is better in terms of getting quick cash as compared to the poultry farm business. The fingerlings at an early age of 2 weeks can be sold to potential buyers. If you are raising them to table size, in 4 months you will get back your money for the capital (excluding the cost of building the fish pond as that one is a long-term asset)
- The poultry farming business requires more money to start up compared to the catfish farming business after all cost estimates has been analyzed.
- The poultry farm business is a long earning farm business as you will keep feeding them until they begin to lay eggs.
In conclusion, if you want to make quick money in four to six months, go for the catfish farming business but if you want to earn more money, go for poultry farm business.
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