Changing Lenses — Farmscapades 2
This is the fourth project in the “Changing Lenses” series, where I put on the lenses of an interesting individual, demography, profession, etc. and live like them for a period. Afterwards, I write about the experience and lessons I learned from them.
This is the second part of a 2 part series.
Catfish don’t sting, they prick!
From my first day on the farm, after observing so many fish at different stages in their development, my fascination with them was immediate, and grew steadily over the next year. For the next few months, I not only visited Ifeanyi & Kene more times than I could count, but I also visited numerous other farms in their company. We drove through so many terrible roads, tried so many unconventional experiments and I learned so much about catfish and raising them.
My first lesson was that catfish don’t sting. On that first day, Ifeanyi kept encouraging me to dip my hand in the pond in a bid to attract them to suckle on it. I resisted for so long as I had this notion (I’m still not sure where I got the idea) that they’ll sting me. After much persuasion, I eventually gave in and dipped my right fingers in. Initially, they all dispersed, steering clear of my fingers. This gave me the courage to dip them in even further until my entire right palm was submerged. After a while, they started coming back as one, then 2, and so on came back to speculatively nip or suck on my fingers. I withdrew my hand at fish 5 or so as my worry about being stung took over. Throughout the day, I kept dipping my hands in the ponds at intervals until I eliminated my fear of being stung. I’m sure the fish must have been wondering among themselves, “who is this pain-in-the-ass newbie that won’t let us rest?”
Sales days quickly turned into my most eventful days on the farm. The first sales day, we were at the farm as early as 6am (I had spent the previous night at Gemzy’s place in Badore, not too far from the farm). As soon as we got to the farm, we started draining all the ponds that housed the fish to be sold. The fish weren’t fed that morning and had taken a late dinner the previous night. Kene explained that asides saving the cost of feed that would otherwise have been used that morning to feed the fish, feeding the fish too soon before they are to be moved or “disturbed” often makes them sick and can even lead to death. After draining the water from the 5 ponds to be emptied that day, we waited patiently for the arrival of the buyer.
About 2 hours later, the buyer, Iya Dupe, came with a fourteen seater bus that had all its back seats taken off, essentially converting it into a large boot. Inside the makeshift boot, there were a number of used sacks, some wooden planks and stacks of basins. She had agreed to buy up all the mélange sized fish on the farm at a rate of N550 per kg. As soon as she arrived, we jumped into the now drained ponds, armed with empty, old, used sacks to gather fish from the ponds into basins to be weighed. While we were moving and weighing the fish, some of them jumped off a basin onto the floor. Eagerly, I tried to pick one up but it pricked me with its very sharp fin. Ifeanyi burst into laughter as I was nursing the pain and trying to clean off the blood. Apparently, you don’t just pick up a living catfish, there’s a technique to it. He showed me the technique: with his palm positioned over the hard head of the fish, he cupped his index and middle fingers around the mouth of the fish while nestling his thumb and ring fingers under the sharp fins, where the fins meet the sides of the fish’s head. With this, he maintained a strong, steady grip of the fish’s head, without the risk of losing his grip of the fish or of being pricked by the sharp fins despite the fish twisting and turning its body. After many attempts and more fin pricks, I finally got a hang of the technique.
As we weighed the fish, Iya Dupe transferred them into one of her basins. Each basin was ¾ filled with fish, then she filled it up with water, added a drop of palm oil and covered it by tying one of the used sacks around the top of the basin. Obviously, the sack was to prevent the fish from jumping out of the basins while having the basins only ¾ full and adding water was to aid movement and breathing since fish can only breathe in water. However, the oil was mind boggling. I asked her and she explained that adding oil to the water gave the fish the energy to stay alive for as long as necessary until whenever they’ll be smoked or sold off as they wouldn’t be fed anymore before they’re killed. After about 3 hours of moving, weighing, and pouring the fish into basins, Iya Dupe and her accomplices arranged the 17 and half basins, each weighing 30kg, in the back of her bus using the wooden planks as a platform to stack the basins on top of each other in other to maximize how much the bus could take.
The fish aren’t always sold live. Sometimes, they are smoked before being sold off. Smoking eliminates the need to feed fish that have already been earmarked for sales. When done well, smoked fish also tastes amazing in stews and soups and stays preserved for as long as is necessary without the need for refrigeration or the addition of other preservatives. At the farm, they had built a makeshift smoking kiln by building a C shaped, waist high platform. The dimensions were 16” by 16” by 16” with its frame made from bricks and top covered with thick wire gauze to easily let the heat through it and onto the fish. The heat was produced from burning coal in a series of coal pots arranged at intervals beneath the wire gauze top. To smoke them, Garba prepares the fish, arranges them on the wire gauze and covers them up for about 8 to 12 hours after which he turns them to the other side and repeats the process. To ensure the fish don’t get burnt, he checks them at regular intervals before the 8 to 12 hours have elapsed and regulates the heat by adding or removing coal pots as necessary. Before the actual smoking, he kills the fish by pouring them into a sack and adding a healthy amount of salt to them (Catfish are fresh water fish so cannot survive exposure to salt). He then takes each dead fish, “de-guts” it (slits it along the abdomen to remove its internal organs and waste), then rolls it up by forcing its tail into its mouth and passing a short stick through to ensure it stays rolled up while it is being smoked. Profit is usually healthier on the smoked fish as a carton of about 60kg (weighed live) costs about N40,000 to N45,000. This helps justify the additional effort put in to smoke the fish.
Ponds & Feeds
About a week after my first visit to the farm, I visited again and met Kene preparing to leave. Apparently, he was waiting for a cab to take him to purchase feed for the fish. I offered to take him there and we set out together. We drove down to his preferred distributor’s place at Lakowe. When we got there, she already had his order, 10 bags of Top Feed catfish feed, stacked and ready. As we loaded the bags into the boot of the SUV, my curiosity was immediately piqued by the 3 lines of concrete ponds along the right side of the compound. On the way home, I quizzed Kene about them; why did she use concrete ponds while he used tarpaulin ponds? What are the pros & cons of each? Turns out:
1. The tarpaulin ponds are cheaper and quicker to construct than the concrete ponds
2. Unlike Concrete ponds, Tarpaulin ponds tend to crack under continuous exposure to direct sunlight, therefore, as much as possible should be constantly filled with water.
3. The tarpaulin ponds generally need more regular maintenance, however, they are easier and cheaper to maintain
4. The concrete ponds have a neater layout and are therefore better suited to residential areas
When we returned to the farm, Garba, one of the farm hands, was already feeding the fish using the remaining feed on the farm. He had already changed the water in the ponds. The water is changed daily as the cleaner the water, the more oxygen is available to the fish. Also, it is done before feeding to avoid disturbing the fish after feeding. He left the fish, came to join us in offloading and arranging the feed in the store, then went back to continue feeding the fish. While we were stacking the bags of feed in the store, I noticed that the bags were of different feed sizes. I asked Kene what the sizes meant and he explained: “As the fish grow from fingerlings all the way to adulthood, the size of feed they take and frequency of feeding changes. For the fingerlings, they start with 2mm feed 3 times a day; when they’re 5 weeks old, they move to 3mm 3 times a day; at 8 weeks, 4mm 2 times a day, …, until they get to full ‘table size’, eating 6mm 2 times a day.”
I went out to join Garba outside in feeding the fish. I noticed that as he scattered the feed across the surface of the pond, the fish were frantically splashing about the pond, rushing to wherever the feed landed. He showed me how to “spread” the feed across the surface of the water while feeding them to minimize fighting. I collected the bag of feed from him and as I was feeding the fish, I noticed, curiously, that rather than sink to the bottom of the pond, any feed that was left uneaten continued to float on the water. I thought this was a quality issue with the feed as they appeared to be quite dense therefore, I figured they really should have sunk. I pointed it out to Garba and he explained that there are essentially 2 types of catfish feed: the floating feed and the sinking feed. The sinking feed is slightly cheaper, however, unlike the floating feed, it’s difficult to tell if the fish are eating it or not and it also pollutes the water faster.
Standing on the Shoulders of others
On one of my numerous trips to the farm, as I was speeding along Lekki — Epe expressway with Ifeanyi in the passenger’s seat, he suddenly turned to me, mid conversation, and said “Chuka, this fish farming ehn, I feel like there’s still a lot to be learnt o”. That was the beginning of a series of trips that took us to the deepest ends of Lagos, through the worst roads, in the most annoying weathers but full of interesting lessons and experiences.
The first such trip was to Iju. Apparently, Ifeanyi had met this guy, Dimeji, at the Diamond bank BET 6 training and he was also into Animal farming. We discussed with him on the phone and agreed to pick him up somewhere along Obafemi Awolowo way in Ikeja since I hadn’t been to Iju before. We got there by 12 noon as agreed but he was nowhere to be seen. After waiting for about 3 hours, he finally showed up (blaming the delay on unprecedented traffic) and we set out. The trip took another 1 hour of navigating through pothole riddled roads and winding dirt paths before we finally arrived at his place. His farm was in his home; his concrete ponds lined the fence around his home while a mini feed mill was constructed just to the left of the entrance into the compound. After a long conversation about fish, snails, pigs, farming co-operative grants and feed mills, we were ready to leave. Unfortunately, the journey back was even worse as it started raining heavily and when traffic became unbearable, we had to sleep over at a friend, Changes’ place. It was a terribly stressful day with the only consolation being that we learnt about 2 things:
1. A powder supplement, which helps reduce impurities in the fish’s water by converting their waste to spirogyra which is edible for the fish.
2. Adding fish / bone meal as a natural protein supplement to the feed we were already using to feed the fish or snail.
Next, we went searching on Vconnect. After series of searches and calls, we got a few leads. One of those leads was Mr Obinna. He owns a poultry farm in Epe but we figured he could link us up with some fish or snail farmers. We called him, spoke for about 5 minutes and agreed to meet up with him the next morning at his farm. The next day, we set out by 7am to make the 10am appointment. His farm was far. Really far. Almost 3 hours from Ajah roundabout with minimal traffic far. When we got there, we waited another 2 hours before he arrived. When he led us into the farm, we were taken aback by how massive the farm is. We would later find out it is about 23 hectares big. He took us round. He had 2 huge poultry pen, each housing 10,000 layers; a pig sty with over 50 pigs (he explained it was an experiment to gauge the profitability of raising pigs); a poultry feed mill, some administrative buildings and a large expanse of undeveloped land.
As we toured the farm, I observed keenly and asked questions at intervals. I found out so many interesting things:
1. Layers start to lay eggs from about month 3 and continue laying optimally till they are about 12 to 18 months old. Afterwards, their egg productions starts to dip and they can be sold off for meat at about the same price they were purchased, meaning the only cost incurred are the feeding and medical costs.
2. Turns out some birds are better layers than others but there is no way to know by merely looking at them. However, quite unsurprisingly, the biggest factor that determines how often they lay eggs is how well they eat; better fed birds lay eggs more regularly.
3. Birds easily get infected and any infection spreads very quickly through the pen therefore, there is a disinfectant puddle at the entrance of the pen that any visitor must dip their feet into before stepping into the pen, there is a sick bay close to the entrance where any bird that shows the smallest signs of an infection are taken to and quarantined until they’re determined to be healthy, and a vet comes around monthly for check-ups of the birds.
4. Broilers, on the other hand, reach full maturity at about 3 months old and can immediately be sold off for meat (they’re significantly more expensive than old layers because they’re fleshier and their skins are more tender).
5. As we headed for the pigsty, the stench was the first thing that greeted us. Apparently, since pigs don’t have sweat pores, they have to plop down in whatever liquid they can find to cool down whenever they’re hot. Although they have different compartments for food, drinking water, “cool down” and waste, pigs don’t care and they often mix up the uses of the different compartments: peeing in their drinking water, drinking their “cool down” water, etc.
6. Pigs are very easy to breed and take care of as they eat practically anything from meat, vegetables to even wood & iron if they’re motivated enough
7. Pigs have an average litter size of 7.5 but can deliver up to 15 piglets in 1 litter and take only 6 months to reach reproductive age.
8. Since only 1 male pig can breed over 10 females, males are often sold off for meat at a younger age, after selecting the choice male for breeding while females are kept to continue breeding until they’ve reached “menopause” hence, are often sold off for meat at a much older age.
The Obinnas had big plans for their farm. They wanted to develop the 23 hectare expanse of land into a massive integrated farm that housed numerous different animals, processing plants, staff quarters, an administrative building, etc. They now had Layers and pigs, they were building another huge 10,000 capacity pen that would house broilers and the next animal on their agenda was fish. As we discussed, they asked to us to partner with them in setting up a fishery on their farm. It was going to start small and gradually expand as the profits come in and their staff grow more and more competent. We scheduled a meeting for Friday, 6th April, 2018 to discuss and agree on the finer points of the agreement.
Epilogue — 10th April, 2018
It was a rainy Tuesday night. I was driving back to my uncle’s place in Ago. Although he was not around, he had travelled out of the country, my mum, sister and I had been at his place, with his family, for the past 2 days. Every evening, I would go home to surulere to feed my dogs: Scoff, Jolene and Klaus. I was at ijesha, driving back from surulere, when she called me.
I picked up, “Hello, Mrs Obinna”
“Hi, Chuka. How are you?”
“I’m fine, thanks. How are you?”
“I’m fine too, dear. I’m calling because I didn’t hear back from you people on the proposal we made on Friday”
“Oh yes, that’s true. I’m so sorry we didn’t get back to you yet. Things just got crazy. I’m sorry”
“Hope all is alright o”
“Not exactly, but it’s all good. I thank God. I lost my Dad”
“Oh my God! Are you serious? What happened? How? When?…”
“He died on Sunday morning. He had been ill for a while. He came to stay with my sister and me in February so we could keep an eye on him. He was actually getting better before this happened.”
“Oh my God! I had no idea, we had no idea. You didn’t tell us. Why didn’t you say anything? I’m so sorry Chuka…”
“It’s fine. There’s nothing you could have done. And he really was getting better so no one actually saw this coming…”
“I’m so sorry, Chuka. I really am. Please accept my condolences”
“Thanks a lot. I really appreciate it. And sorry I didn’t get back to you on the proposal, as you can imagine, the past few days have been crazy for me…”
“No, no I totally understand. You should be there for your family this period. You can take your time and give us your answer whenever you’re ready”
“Yes, I’m actually on my way to meet up with them at my uncle’s now. We decided to stay together for a while to support each other…”
“That’s great”
“Also, I actually have already made a decision regarding your proposal” I paused for about 5 seconds to choose my words “I decided I want to take a break from the whole farming thing for now”
“Alright, I can understand why you’ll say that. How long will you be taking a break for?”
“I don’t know. Indefinitely. I’m really sorry but I have too many things going through my mind at the moment. I’m taking a break from a number of things. Later on, I’ll figure out what to get back to or not. If I decide to come back, I’ll let you know”
“I understand. Be strong dear, you need to be there for your family”
“Thank you. I really appreciate. Good night. My regards to your husband”
“Good night”
I hung up.
If you enjoyed this, feel free to buy me a cup of coffee or 333 to enable me take on more experiences 😋
