Potential of replacing pawpaw fruit and leaves with cabbage peels as a natural feedstuff in the diet of Achatina achatina linne (African giant land snail)

Abstract

An experiment was carried out to assess the growth performance of African Giant Land Snail Achatina achatina Linnie fed with three natural feedstuff; pawpaw fruit, pawpaw leaves and cabbage leaves. A total of 24 growing snails of approximately one year old were used for the study. These were randomly divided into six groups and then allotted into the three experimental diets, arranged in a completely randomised design (CRD) order. Dry matter intakes of feed being served every other days, weight gain and size increase of snails were assessed fortnightly. The results showed that pawpaw leaf is higher in protein than cabbage leaf and pawpaw fruit. However, cabbage leaf contains some essential mineral elements, which are useful in body building than the other two feedstuffs. It also showed that snails fed with cabbage leaves had the highest dry matter intake and weight gain of 14.2 and 18.6 g, respectively. Highest shell length and circumference increase of 0.3 and 0.6 cm were obtained in pawpaw fruit and pawpaw leaf respectively. Although there was no significance difference (p > 0.05) in the weight gain of snails fed with pawpaw fruit and cabbage leaves, cabbage leaf seems to be richer in protein and other essential mineral elements than pawpaw fruit. It was therefore concluded that cabbage leaf could serve as a good substitute for pawpaw fruit and leaves, which hitherto were known as the preferred natural feedstuff of snails.