Liping, Guizhou: a snake farmer in the mountains

In the mountains of Niujiao Bay, Defeng Town, Liping County, Guizhou Province, there is a quiet courtyard. In several neat rows of bungalows, the sound of "whoo-hoo" came out from time to time. This is the only special snake breeding base in Liping County. at its peak, there are nearly 10,000 snakes of all kinds, such as cobras, king snakes and so on.

The owner of the snake house is Luo Han, 40, who carried out ecological migration in Liping County, Guizhou Province.

Luo Han and his snake

In order to give the reporter a more intuitive view of his snake, Luo Han put on special snake-catching gloves and used a snake catcher to grab a cobra about 2 meters long from the pool. The right thumb, index finger and middle finger pinched the upper, left and right points of the snakehead respectively, supplemented by the strength of the root of the finger and the rest of the finger. The snake weighing nearly 3 jin can no longer attack people except wagging its tail in Luo Han's hands.

Luo Han, who began to work as a teenager, once opened a guitar factory in Dongguan and operated a characteristic hotel in Guizhou. Luo Han, who had passed through the "unboiled water" Luo Han, suffered a business failure because of the financial turmoil.

"I have to find a way out." The determined Luo Han did not give up, because in his previous business, Luo Han often dealt with Cantonese, and he found that Cantonese had a great need for snakes (Cantonese like to eat snakes).

As we all know, venomous snakes such as cobras in the mountains of Guizhou are "delicacies" on the table in Guangdong, Guangdong, Fujian and other regions. However, wildlife resources are protected by the state. To this end, Luo Han specially went to the special breeding bases in Jiangxi, Hunan, Guangxi and other places to learn the technology of raising poisonous snakes.

In 2009, Luo Han, who lost most of his capital, chose to start a special snake breeding in his hometown Liping.

"raising snakes is a technical job, but there is no systematic textbook, and there is no systematic training system in various snake factories. I can only explore it little by little." In 2010, Luo Han officially began experimenting with raising snakes.

"the most important thing in keeping snakes is safety. To prevent snakes from escaping, we should pay more attention to emergency treatment after being bitten by snakes." In order to avoid causing panic among the villagers, in addition to selecting the snake farm in a secluded place, multiple protection has also been done inside and outside the snake house.

It is understood that the snake room is divided into three floors: inside the first gate is a place for keeping watch, where the newly broken snakes play every summer; and inside the second gate is the snake's "bedroom", which is wrapped in multiple barbed wire.

In addition to taking good protective measures, mastering first aid methods and antidotes after being bitten by poisonous snakes are also necessary skills for snake breeders, so there are snake medicines and first aid kits that can be found everywhere in his office.

Being bitten by a snake is a risk that almost every snake owner must encounter. In 2010, Luo Han began to try to raise snakes such as cobra, five-step snake and king snake on a small scale.

"that bite was even more painful than being stung by a bee. It was the first time in my life that I faced death." He calmed himself down, immediately picked up a first-aid kit and expanded the wound with a three-edged knife. Immediately after wound expansion, wash with a large amount of water, and inject potassium permanganate to destroy the protease.

Now two tiny scars can be seen on the back of Luo Han's left hand, which he jokingly calls "the medal of men".

For fear of his family's worry, only his wife knew that he was injured by snakes at home. Until now, his wife often whispered in his ear that she did not object to him raising snakes, because it did bring benefits to his family. But I hope he will stop raising poisonous snakes like cobras.

"because of the snake's habit, it seldom moves around when it is full, and normally, the snake eats once every three to four days. In fact, raising snakes is an industry with relatively low labor costs. " Luo Han told reporters that it takes a year to raise a snake, the weight can reach more than 2 jin, and the cost is only 80 yuan, while the unit price of commercial snakes is 130 yuan.

According to Luo Han, raising three snakes is as profitable as raising a pig.

After several years of effective development and the gradual expansion of the scale of breeding, Luo Han registered and established Qianlongcheng Special Culture Development Co., Ltd. in Liping County, Guizhou Province in 2014. the company has been registered with the competent departments of industry and commerce, forestry and other competent departments. obtained snake breeding, sales, snake product development and other qualifications.

At present, Luo Han's company breeds more than 9000 cobras and king snakes, hatches more than 10000 small snakes, and produces more than 4000 commercial snakes in 2015, with a net income of 500000 yuan.

According to Luo Han, most of his snakes are taken by customers themselves, but his snake factory is also equipped with boxes to transport snakes, and occasionally he helps customers deliver them to designated locations.

After five years of experience in raising snakes, he invested more than 1 million yuan, and last year he succeeded in recovering the cost from the profits made by selling snakes. Luo Han analysis, compared with raising pigs, raising snakes has the advantage of less energy investment and lower cost.

Now, many villagers in Liping County and the surrounding Jinping County, Kaili City, and even Hunan have come to "ask for advice" on the experience of raising snakes.

In 2014, Luo Han set up a website, compiled his own breeding materials and distributed them to villagers free of charge. Now, Luo Han has opened a special classroom in his breeding base to teach villagers in need the knowledge of raising snakes.

Next, Luo Han plans to build another farm with an annual output of 20000 to 30000 commercial snakes.

"for farmers who are interested in snake farming, I will carefully teach farming techniques. I hope that more people will achieve common prosperity by raising snakes." Luo Han said that his snake factory is now large enough to support his family, but he wants to have greater development so that more people can live a "good" life like him.

"in fact, snakes are covered with treasures all over the body, except for meat that can be eaten. Snake skin, snake bile and snake whip are all very good Chinese herbal medicines. " Luo Han says that now his snakes are not worried about selling at all. There are a large number of customers in Guangdong, Hunan, and Zhejiang who buy snakes from him, and even snake sloughs (snake skin, which naturally grows and falls off, is a kind of traditional Chinese medicine) can be sold to traditional Chinese medicine dealers.

Next, Luo Han also plans to cover areas such as snake "crawling", so that snakes can not only get on the table, but also "enter the hall."

"my ultimate goal is to cultivate a snake industry chain in Liping." Luo Han is an "ambitious" man. He hopes that more people in Liping County will raise snakes together. When the number of snakes reaches a certain scale, he will extend his career from simply raising snakes to the snake processing industry.